The speedway was originally run and promoted by the Racing Drivers Association of South Australia and after a lot of hard work, the track held its first official meeting on 2 November 1979. Its opening meeting saw the track officially opened by the Minister for Transport, Recreation & Sport, the Hon. Michael M. Wilson MP. Unlike Rowley Park which had a dolomite surface, Speedway City has a clay surface which specifically suited the car racing categories such as Sprintcars, Speedcars and Super Sedans with their wide racing tyres, but was not so popular with the Solo and Sidecar riders who felt the sticky clay track and the solid concrete retaining wall made racing more dangerous than it needed to be. This often led to criticism that even for championship bike meetings the surface was prepared more for the supporting car events than it was for the bikes. 1985 was the last year that the bikes ran regularly at the speedway, although the sidecars did make a few appearances during the 1990s. From 1985 the bikes raced at the motorcycle only North Arm Speedway (opened in 1981) located in the industrial suburb of Gillman. During the mid-1980s the RDA sold the promoting rights to MJS Promotions, run by Mike Powell and John Hughes, then a local Grand National sedan competitor and in 1987 the founder of the World Series Sprintcars. Under MJS the speedway became known as Winfield Speedway Park due to a naming rights deal with cigarette manufacturer Winfield. This saw the speedway join other venues around Australia with track sponsorship from Winfield including Perth's Claremont Speedway, Sydney's Liverpool City Raceway and the Motordrome in Newcastle. On 1 November 1985 Speedway Park held the first ever Australian Sprintcar Masters to coincide with the running of the first ever Australian Formula One Grand Prix being run on the then new Adelaide Street Circuit. The Masters was won by World of Outlaws driver Randy Kinser of the United States in his JPS-sponsored Gambler Sprintcar from local favourite Bill Barrows. Kinser was in Australia in 1985/86 as part of JPS Team Kinser which consisted of older brother Steve Kinser and cousins Mark and Kelly, with another cousin, Karl, being the crew chief. During the Sprintcar Masters a couple of the visiting Formula One drivers including Renault drivers Derek Warwick and Patrick Tambay were given the chance to do a few 'hot laps' in one of the sprintcars. The governing body of Formula One, the Paris-based FIA, was not impressed, and Warwick received a hefty fine for his laps.