Forum: SCRAFAN.COM Forum (go)
Moderators: ljennings

410 sprint cars don’t need to apologize to nobody for nothing

Forget monster trucks, drifting cars and bearded ladies

Roy is right, you have diluted the fan base with fifty classes

One strong series in So Cal

The rest of the world will bob along merrily in its wake

Race sponsors will pay the big purse when the economy improves

Pay the top three (stars) then more money towards the bottom

Let the promoters make a profit

More track prep for better races

Not too long, not too short

Qualifying, four heats, B-main, intermission, make the main insane

No support classes

Won’t be easy, would you have it any other way

“Slim Pickins did the right thing and he rode the bomb to hell”

JMO

Go Rip

Great Idea !

Cuz I like hearin this again "Roy is right, you have diluted the fan base with fifty classes"

LOLLLL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Maybe the concepts you posted above will take off !

"

The above Comments are satire & for entertainment
purposes only

Hell I've been bitchin about deluted classes since USAC came up with the freakin fidgets

ROB

BTW Big Mike your right on !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ROB

1. 410 sprintcars do not need to appologize !! they just need to race .

2. its hard to forget the world we live in . monster trucks and drifting have huge following . im not a fan of either . in utah at rocky mountain speedway the local sprint car program runs the same night as monster trucks , and the stands are packed !! . is the sport of sprintcar racing being compromised as some purists suggest ? some would call it survival and some might say thats innovative .

3. this is america and sprint cars dont do it for everyone . fans choose to see what they want to see . thank god we can have 50 different classes . some guys are happy just to race a pure stock . the pas has already proven that it could not run on sprintcars alone during the scra era .

4. one strong series in so-cal would be great , especially if it was not usac .

5. the momentum created at ascot for sprintcars and the days of scra are long gone ! i like to think we could get back there . as long as usac runs openwheel cars they will be the road to nascar which is where the marketable young tallent will go . setting the bar will be difficult at this point . we had it and let it go .

6. there is always someone great trying to help the big purse . its been allcoast construction lately , big thanks to them . but even here we cant wait for the economy to comeback , our sprintcars could be long gone by then !

7. only the racer knows how important start money is , well and a few othersn  !

8. if the promoter does not make a profit he is out of business ....some people want to complain about prices at the pas , its not like they are making disneyland money there . they are doing what a lot of businesses are doing these days . what ever it takes to survive ..

9. we just dont want too much dust . heavy tracks are good , slick tracks are good , its why we race dirt , its never the same .

10. as long as we are not picking pills for starting position , its all good .

11. no support classes at the track with sprintcars is good , only if we have enough cars . promoters used to make the money from the front gate , now it takes both gates . what we do need is transitional sprint car classes , classes that are grooming drivers and owners . we should have a sprintcar champion at every track . if we had 305 or 360 sprintcars running with the hobby stocks or modifieds maby we could win back some fans , how could you not love a sprintcar .

this is just the opinion of someone that works really hard keeping cars at the track !

Drama , Controversy , Rivalry 

One support class is enough at a 410 or 360 sprint car special event - an open wheel support class. Keep special events special. jmho.

I agree with the above sentiment, mostly...

I have really enjoyed some of the Late Model / 360. Wing / Non-wing, special events this season. My thought on support classes is have one that can draw a decent show. I think that is why the Lightning Sprints work pretty well. There is 18 - 20 of them, they put on a decent show usually and roll on and off the track...

All season long, up and down the southern end of the state and it looks like car counts are down across pretty much every class including the budget and limited classes. With some notable exceptions... Micros and 600 Sprints seem to be thriving. Those races are pretty good. W2W in Victorville also has a solid weekly show with a decent count. Lemore and Plaza also come to mind.

I am totally up for watching the "support classes" when they are entertaining. It is not even too horrifying to me to have a class that has limited cars and the action isnt the best... but two or three of those and you lose the people who are already wavering from the cold, dust and late event finish time with their kids needing to hit the sack at a decent hour.

I miss the days of C main, four eight car heats, B and Main. I don't want to be sitting here missing the days of three seven car heats and a main...

As long as the back gate income is critical to the promoters, there's no way that we'll ever be able to get to a one class program.  The numbers just don't add up.

Tucson Osty

"410 sprint cars don’t need to apologize to nobody for nothing". That says it all! Thanks Mike.  

I want to thank bentaxle for starting this whole series of threads when he asked back in mid November "How Can We Increase Non-Wing Car Counts in So-Cal". That's been some good reading that really got me thinking. I should clarify that I don't have any problem with other classes, I have many friends in everything from "fidgets" to 360's. That's all good racing and part of the family. I just feel that in order to grow "Non-Wing Car Counts in So-Cal" you need to focus on a premier series. New fans are confused when they come to the races and there are three or four classes and a show that drags on for more than two or three hours. When I helped sponsor a car at Ventura years ago I would regularly drag a dozen friends to share this great sport. I can't tell you how many times through the evening the question was "when is the main event"? By the time I explained that we had one Focus main, one Senior Dwarf main and one Pro Dwarf main before the Sprint Main, I had lost them. They would never come back, no matter how good the Sprint Main was (and they were stunning!). My own wife won't come to the races. "Too long, honey, and too cold".

That's just one small point in a huge and multi-faceted picture.  Core fans like myself are in the pits and involved and loving it and don't notice the time flying by and the cold never bothers us! But it matters to people in the stands. I understand that promoters have been forced into this format by economics and I am not laying blame. We all need to quit blaming promoters and ourselves for the problems besetting this sport. We are just now (hopefully) coming out of the most destructive recession since the Great Depression. Millions have lost jobs, homes and even lives. That's the main reason the stands are nearly empty, people couldn't afford it. I can't believe how much outstanding racing I have seen in the past five years and it's due to reslient and determined promoters, car owners, team members and drivers. Now we need to steer towards refilling the stands and the pits. It starts with no apologies or blame, just survivor's pride in the greatest of all motorsports.

I want to blow some more, but I gotta go to work!

Mike you hit the nail on the head"they will never come back"I would bet that with the way the shows are done now if you brought 1000 new people to a show if you were lucky maybe 10 would ever come back,that is exactly why I wont bring a newbie until the show is tightend up.

JMO

ROB

Peace, Out.

from: central coast of cali.

Mike btw do you have any more of those "whats holding up the delay" shirts I'll take a XXL

ROB

You're aboslutely right about #8.  ....some people want to complain about prices at the pas, it's not like they are making disneyland money there.

Took the family to Disneyland last Friday.  They took $16 just to park the car.

thank you for starting this thread .  as long as we keep pushing good qualtity ideas , some how some way they will take root and grow . i am like most on this board , i love sprintcars ! i am a huge fan of sprintcars . what i am a bigger fan of is the sportsman racer , the young gun , the guy that works his ass off all week to support his family and still finds it within himself to field a car on saturday night ! im a fan of the guy that shows up at the track without the good engine yet still believes down deep in his heart he can win ! we keep trying to look out for the big guy , he will take care of himself . its the little guy we need to focus on , because eventully he can become the big guy . plants and trees dont grow from the top down . the great pyrimids werent built from the top down  . without a strong foundation , without deep roots we have nothing to hold solid . every large successful racing body supports sportsman racers , nascar , nhra , even usac with the .25s . a couple years back nascar was running commercials promoting local tracks and local heros that ended up being big time heros . is it really so hard to see that we need to start at the bottom and work up ?

Drama , Controversy , Rivalry 

Thanks to all of you for this thread. I am witnessing a conversation without name calling.

     I have been attending races since my daddy took me down to Balboa Stadium in 1951 to watch jalopies and midgets. I was too young to realize that some of the drivers there were probably also guys that raced at Indy and maybe even won there. But it didn’t matter. Now you know my pedigree. It is probably not much different than yours.

    I am primarily a 410 sprint car racing fan. The midgets are a close second. I have attended races where the only fans in the stands are the wives and kids of the drivers. Truth be known, that is what most short track racing is. I don’t think a promoter could make any money promoting an event where the lightning sprints are the headliner. That goes for pony stocks, street stocks, dwarfs and many other classes. But that is the meat and potatoes of most of the small tracks across the country.

    So what is promotable? NASCAR, NHRA and Indycar. The Rolex sports car series is only there because of the big sponsorship they are getting. Look into the stands the next time you see the Daytona 24 hour on TV. They are empty. It is racing for TV only.

     So what’s in between is the street stocks and the aforementioned big boys of racing? Sprints and midgets. We had a brief golden age with Thursday Night Thunder and then we slipped back under the water.   

   When I have attended the races at Perris and the Lightning sprints came on, I like others tended to look upon them as a break in the action. So we can’t understand why the track has a break in the action also. Face it, we like our race cars to roar. The lightning sprints make a noise like a gnat passing gas. The track is too big for them, a well set up lightning sprint car seems to go around the track without having to lift. Sometimes the only drama is when one of their motors makes like a grenade. 

   Two things might help the Lightning Sprints excitement level. Take the wings off and or shorten the track.  Instead of what has been done in the past about shortening the track, how about a compromise? Let the CLS boys shorten up only on the turn one/two section of the track. Leave the work/staging area as it is at turns three/four.  It isn’t much, but it might help.

One nite as I was whining about tin tops at Irwindale, Walter Hauser, one time partner of Bob " backem in Bob" Mhiele says "racin's racin". Good answer! To get up and leave when other classes run is disrespectful to racers who are serious about their racing. I get a lot of flack from some dorks because I enjoy Dwarf cars. Well, as Ricky said when he won at the Ovals, "they can kiss my a**". Just Kidding!

But hey, good to see activity on this board

WINGS RULE

WOW! You guys have made my day. I agree with almost everything you are saying. I have been wanting to get involved in this conversation for a year and now you have pushed me into my first post. Here are some points I would like to make.

1. The issues you are discussing are not unique to sprint car racing. They apply to all forms of short track racing. We must fix all short track racing to save the tracks or there won't be any place to race sprint cars.

2.You guys are racers and hard core fans. I salute your passion for the sport! We need many more like you. There are other voices that need to be heard. The sport has 3 groups. They are racers, fans, and promoters. All 3 must be in this conversation. I haven't seen much from regular fans or promoters.

3.This is 1 or 2 threads that are easily missed in all the other discussions on SCRAFAN. The season is over and there isn't much news so this is a good time to make some noise about fixing these issues. I am worried that after the holidays, there will be news about the 2014 season and this topic will disappear once again.

Several months ago I got the idea that what we need is a site dedicated only to discussing the problems and solutions we face to fix short track racing. So I tied a yellow flag to the back of my office chair and "pushed off" for the first time. The site is shorttrackautoracing.com and it is online now. The first page is my views on some of the things that created our current situation. The second page covers some of my ideas for "fixes". There is lots of space for your comments and ideas. I hope it will be used by fans, promoters, and racers, both dirt and pavement, and with and without fenders. We are all in this together, and together we can return short track racing to the great sport that we know it is.

I agree with your most recent posting, and have enjoyed for years your SURFNSPRINT postings. I also applaud the originator of these subjects. There were many illuminating postings of substance and well thought out. I have been around racing since the mid fifties, starting on the east coast. All shows with the exception of an occasional midget race were one class and startred at 7:00 P.M. and you were on your way home by 10:00 P.M. Most shows would have 35 to 40 cars and you had a full night of racing. There were races on Friday, Saturday and Sunday afternoon at different tracks all with in an hours drive of each other and the attendance was great. You had the same group of drivers running all three shows; places like:Riverside Park (Mass.) Waterford Speedway (Ct.), Stafford Springs (Ct.) and Thompson Speedway (Ct.) all were paved and ranged from 1/4, 1/3, 1/2 and one mile in distance. all except Riverside are stil in business today and are enjoying continued sucess with the same format.  When I moved to the Los angeles area, I spent all my weekend races and Thanksgiving at Ascot. Again one class and in at 7 and out at 10:00 P.M. and world class drivers every weekend.

When I moved up to the central coast 17 years ago I had my first experience with the multiple classes and what a shock to my racing senses. It took me a while to tolerate the mini stocks, drawn out four and five hour shows and the cold evenings. At first it was four classes and four mains. Now it is kiddie races (a royal pain and waste of time) and some nights, seven classes. They keep creating different classes for one reason and one only; to create a back gate income at the expense of the fans who have to endure hours of poor racing to see one good quality race.

I wish I had the answer, because I do not enjoy racing with all these mediocre classes, but I still buy my season ticket and seats. I do not think the promoters have any choice but to do what they do or all of them would belly up. The old adage of: If you want to make a million dollars in racing or promoting, you hve to start with two million.

I wish all the promoters sucess for 2014, but I fear that with all that is going on with our Government that they will have a tougher year in 2014 than they have had in the past. Maye if they ran the feature race earlier more fans would get what they paid to see and could go home earlier and be satisfied with their evening out.

That would be Bob Meli.