CLAY TWP — The Roskovski family was looking to buy a patch of land on which to build its own private dirt bike race track.

“Our son (17-year-old Jacob) had really gotten into racing, so we went looking for a private location, someplace out of the way that wouldn't annoy the neighbors,” Scott Roskovski said.

They found that patch of land — about 72 acres worth.

Earlier this month, Roskovski closed the deal on the purchase of Switchback Raceway and changed the name to Switchback MX.

Other changes are in store as well.

“The previous owner, Rich Butler, was good enough to allow us access to the track for a month before we closed on the property June 4,” Roskovski said. “We've been cleaning up the facility for the past few weeks, clearing out some trees and widening the track.

“Rich and his wife no longer had any kids involved in the sport and they live an hour away. His life was going in a different direction. I've always had a passion for this sport and we live in Center Township, 10 minutes away.

“We're excited about what lies ahead. This is a family business for us,” Roskovski said.

Once an avid motocross rider himself, Roskovski has been a county detective in the district attorney's office for 18 years. His wife, Stephanie, is chief operating officer at Butler Memorial Hospital.

Mrs. Roskovski assists with registration, concessions and book-keeping at the track. Their daughter, 15-year-old Sophie, is a cheerleader at Butler and helps out with registration and concessions at Switchback as well.

And Jacob, of course, rides and races.

“He's much faster than I ever was,” Roskovski said.

Scott Roskovski began racing at age 5 and did so for 18 years. He suffered his share of broken bones along the way.

“This is one of the most physically grueling sports there is,” he said.

At age 23, during his first race in the “A”expert class, Roskovski was involved in a wreck and dislocated a hip.

“A broken bone is a broken bone, but this really hurt,” he said. “I was laying in a hospital bed in Greensburg and got to thinking, maybe I should think about doing something else with my life.

“I wound up quitting cold turkey, went back to school, got married a couple of years later, had kids ... but my passion for this sport never left.”

Roskovski and his family have been watching races at Switchback for years. Now he's looking to make it better.

“I know he's got big plans for this place,” said Mark Brader, Switchback groundskeeper and a former racer himself. “He brought in all of that sawdust, sand and mulch (pointing to piles). He's bringing the track back to the basics and he'll go from there.”

Switchback MX consists of two outdoor tracks — one for supercross, another for more challenging motocross — an indoor dirt track and a three-mile hare scramble course through the woods. The only other indoor dirt track anywhere in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, New York or New Jersey is located in Lorain, Ohio.

Brader is a former Reading (eastern Pa.) resident who used to drive here to use the indoor facility.

“Riders come from all over the place to go in there,” he said. “They come down from Canada, up from the south, over from New Jersey ... everywhere.

“From December through February, there's 120 bikes a day running inside there.”

Roskovski said the uniqueness of the indoor track “made this whole thing feasible to me. It means we can always give riders a place to ride, rain or shine.”

Switchback played host to 5,000 riders — dirt bikes and quads — last year alone.

Admitting he has little knowledge of how to build a supercross or motocross race track, Roskovski has hired people who have knowledge of the subject. He said safety is the No. 1 priority.

“You make a track safe by where you position the jumps,” he said. “You don't want long straightaways right after a big jump because that encourages too much speed. You want a corner to follow a jump.

“In golf, the saying is 'drive for show, putt for dough.' In motocross, it's jump for show, take corners for dough. How fast you can make turns dictates how good you are at this.”

Time will tell how far Roskovski and his family will take this track.

“I do have a vision for it,” he admitted. “If we were to take these two outdoor courses and turn them into one big course, we could become a track capable of hosting national events and become nationally known. But that's at least a couple of years down the road.

“For now, we want to keep the customers coming in from all over, but we want the facility to be a place the community can enjoy as well.”

Roskovski and his wife are both Butler graduates.

“I was raised in Meridian,” Roskovski said. “This is our home. This is our chance to enhance it while doing something we love to do.”