Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
Moderators: dirtonly  /  dmantx  /  hosehead

If tracks got paid (a decent amount of $$ even), they'd be lined up around the block wanting dates.

Let's say that the WoO got a TV contract worth $5,000,000 for the season and they televised EVERY race and had an 80 (dates) event schedule.

Using the same model that NASCAR does, 65% of that $5,000,000 would go to the tracks, so each track would get a check for the amount of $40,625 up front. That means that that $78,000 fee it's supposed to cost for purse/sanction fee is much easier for the tracks to justify.

Also, the WRG would end up with $1,750,000 in YEARLY revenues to pay for advertising, operating expenses (officials, office space, personnel, etc.), so they wouldn't NEED to raise their sanction fees.

This also means that ticket prices wouldn't have to increase.

The thing is, NO ONE is going to pay the WoO to televise their races (they don't get ratings, it's a niche sport) and it is EXPECTED that when the NASCAR contracts get renegotiated that they will get FAR LESS $$ in the new contract than they did in the old one (Drivers are actually starting to take pay cuts as evidenced by Ryan Newman's comments about re-signing with Stewart-Haas).

haha right. A snowball in hell is more likely than WoO getting tv.

Gotta go after what works... smart small time marketing and promoting. Gotta think outside the box. Simple as that.

I was told by a Fairboard Member after the Harris Clash that several board members commented on maybe they should have a modified show like thaty once a month, and then another said "Once a month hell we better do that every week.

Was also told 5 to 6 years ago by a former board member, that they wanted Cappy to look into a mid-week stockcar type show.

If thats what they want seems to me that they most definately let the wrong person get away. Face it Toby has connections with those (the stock car crowd) people.

I'm sure Toby has good reasons for leaving, and wish him luck.

If thats the case you may have hit upon something. If the powers to be in Knoxville are interested in adding more modified shows , Knoxville then becomes a competitor for the same drivers/fans as Marshalltown. Kind of hard to promote 2 entities when there competing for the same $$$$$$$$$$$$. Just a thought

If Knoxville would try this I think the best night would have to be a Thursday night. That way they would not be going up against Osky on Wednesdays and Marshalltown and the State Fairgrounds of Fridays.

Thursdays wont work for that either. We all have real jobs! IMCA racing is not someone that gets paid money to drive a car or for that matter make good money to justify leaving work early to go racing. The only nights that have a snowball chance in hell of working at knoxville is a wednesday friday saturday or sunday. Sunday mainly mason city, stuart, and vinton race. spread out quite a ways. Sunday is the obvious choice if they expect to make money on those deals (off the pit passes of course) but then you also have to run them early enough so people can get home to sleep before work.

It would be hard to turn a profit with the overhead Knoxville incurs running stock car/mods weekly on any night. The Harris Clash works because it is a once a year deal and it gives those type of racers a chance to 'shine' at the most famous and nicest dirt track probably in the entire country. It is a cold hard fact the economy is in a funk and it isn't easy for the average Joe to spend 50 bucks on admission, gas and some concessions when you look at what groceries cost. The government claims there is little to no inflation ... to bad the government doesn't shop at the same stores the rest of us do.

i agree no offense but $15 even for a sprint car race is rediculous. They have to bring ticket prices down some to get some people in the gates. especiallly on stock car and modifieds. i mean lets face it not all of the fans of them are all that well off.

I agree with you on the working ( I also work for a living), I was just thinking Thursday because it does not seem to interfer with another fairly close track that is already running.

Sunday would be a good night, Stuart is far enough away and Mason City and Vinton are definately far enough away as not to be a problem to them.

And nothing says they have to sanction with IMCA, unless of course you would lose points from running a non sanctioned track.

But My point was if the fair board was serious about this - they let the person (Toby Kruse) with the best chance of pulling it off get away.

Keep It Real

I have been around the racing at Knoxville since the super modified days. Before the weekly sprint car title was even adopted. The thing that made Knoxville "special" was; it was the place where the bravest of the brave, best in class, the type of racers in thier own area were the best, came to compete. Whether you were from Knob Noster, Mo, Blair NE, Ellston IA, Gregory SD, if you knew anything about racing and you knew what "Knoxville" meant.

There was one class, one type of car, the drivers became known as the best in the country. Once a year people from other concentrated sprint car areas would come. The likes of Dick Gaines, Ron Shuman came to Knoxville and showed they could compete and were the best in the nation. Like wise Knoxville weekly drivers like Jan Opperman, Eddie Leavitt, Earl Wagner, Doug Wolfgang and many others could travel the country and win at Manzanita, The Hulman Classic and other major events.

When a fan of a sport expect something exceptional, I think that is timeless. Even though market impacts have changed. To draw focus and maintain the title "Sprint Car Capital of the World", I think the leadership at Knoxville has to remember who and what brought them to the dance to begin with. What worked then, worked for a long time and will most likely work in the future.

In the past the formula was pretty simple, The best drivers, best cars, best racing format for those cars. The fans came. People recognized it for what it was. Then over the years many other came.

Knoxville doesn't need modifieds, concerts, tail gaters, over the top partiers to succeed. What they do need is that brave person who can drive a sprint car faster than any one else and someone to watch them do it. Thats not too hard to do.

I know many folks involved with the track and the community, believe me, they know what got them to this point.

Yungwun24-Well my belief is 1000 people at $15 is $15000. but 1500 people at $10 is the same amount. so youve lost nothing but youve gained money in other places. Shirt sales repeat business, food sales, beer sales, its simple business but then again many farmers dont see that because they get the same check every month from the government.

Fireman-As for imca its just the only option for more cars around here the open stuff is virtually non existent around here which sucks because its fun! if they sanction imca they might get a few more cars. if they dont theyd still get cars its knoxville id give my left n** to win there.

ThePurple73-As for what knoxville needs trust me im not scared to drive balls to the walls and im not afraid to crash. but guess what sprint cars have over priced most of us that have the guts and determination where we cant afford a car and there isnt people out there handing out money to get a car either last i checked.

Keep It Real

i agree the food prices are fair ive spent way more money for less food and way less quality food to boot. i realize my ticket numbers are a bit drastic in representation but i think the casual fans are all thats left out there anymore unfortunately the diehards are there everynight its now the casuals you have to bring in to make them a diehard. its a tough deal but to be honest the fairboard needs to hire someone and walk away not stand over them and criticize. i realize thats hard but sometimes its the best thing

$15 dollars isn't squat for a Single working guy, but $15 for a married guy and his wife with 3 kids even at a discount rate by the time you get the kids a dog & pop is a lot of money to part with every weekend.

Dam Fairboard made you have kids

What will they do next

We go to a lot of races during the year. One of the biggest complaints I hear at tracks is the length of the program. Knoxville does an excellent job with track prep and does have good facilities, plus the Museum. So they are wayyyyyyyyyyyyy ahead of the curve from a customer service stand point. But to draw a weekly or special event crowd from Lincoln, Kansas City, Souix Falls, Minneaplolis area you have to be conscious of fans travel time. I think many people that are long time fans like time trials, 4 heats, a "B" then A main. Period. You can start the show at 7 and try to be done at 10/10:30 pm. So drive times even though lengthy can be accomlished with out additional expense of a hotel. Have professional announcing that educates new and repeat fans.

People that are sprint car fans look at Knoxville as a Mecca of racing. They want to see a good professionally ran show. I for one don't like to sit additional hours at a Sprint race watching someones cousin Homer trying to keep his Modified or whatever car from spinning every other lap. You can see that at any local track and I am not traveling hundreds of miles and spending hundreds of dollars to watch the support events, especially at todays prices.

You have the hard cores that are folks like us on the boards that will be there no matter what. But for the occasional and just interested fans, you have to consider time and travel as a major aspect.

Purple what you dont get is they dont want to add modifieds and stuff to the current program they want the saturday program to be just that sprintcars. they are looking at the addition of another night of racing at the track to help recoup the losses. apparently you dont get that part or didnt quite get that out of what you read previously. the sprint cars are loosing the track big money no ifs ands or buts about it. they can put on a weekly modified deal on a sunday and pay $500 dollars to win and get a decent car count and enough fans to pay the purse which in turn makes up for what they lost on saturday.

I do get what the point is, I understand what you are saying. My point to not loose money on Saturday, is to make the show more professional and to the point, like it used to be, and that worked excellently for many years. I have no idea what the current financial situation is on race nights. But the track obviously couldn't survive all these years and built what they have and fund the Nationals with winnings and sponsorships, if they didn't have a good handle on it.

When I mentioned the modifieds as a support class I meant any support class.

The issue no one is thinking about at all is track prep time required to run 2 nights a week.

Chris Dunking and his support staff have FULL TIME regular jobs (and they take quite a bit of vacation time in order to prep the track for the big events like the 360, 410 and Late Model Nationals).

Adding another night of racing is easy for us keyboard jockeys to say they should do, however the question is who's gonna prep the track? Chris spends a lot of nights out there currently, adding another night of racing just means he and his crew have to double their efforts so they can race 2 nights a week.

I personally think that would be a mistake. Now, making each modified show an EVENT or Special makes sense, (you can't do it EVERY week). Make a Sunday Night Mod Show once every 6 weeks or so with a decent purse (like the Harris Clash Purse) with AFFORDABLE pit passes and you can charge $15 for adults. Try to do it weekly and you better drop it to $5 or you won't have 300 people there IMO.

The reason the Harris Clash is successful is becuase it's a ONE TIME a year EVENT. Make it so it's not anything special to the racers (OR FANS), and car count and fan count will suffer tremendously.

i realize what you meant but they still cant make money even by making the show run faster. the problem is there is no cars left that show up every night and support the purse and take home bmain money. 410s 360s or 305s if you dont have enough cars to help with the back gate youre still screwed when the purse is guaranteed.