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Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
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Topic: Belleville Midget Nationals - Is it all over? Email this topic to a friend | Subscribe to this TopicReport this Topic to Moderator
Page 2 of 2   of  25 replies
threadkillllllller
MyWebsite
August 07, 2012 at 10:55:14 PM
Joined: 01/31/2012
Posts: 993
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Good question. A lot of the answer depends on a lot of things. All of us that were there want to see it again and most of us are going to write some letters to people we feel could have an impact on determining the possible future of the event. Winner Jerry Coons Jr said on the mic after the race "I will do and have already offered to do anything I can to keep this thing going and there are others who feel the same". Don't send e-mails - they are too easy to delete. Type up and SEND (through the mail) a letter to anyone / organization / car owner / literally anyone you can think of who could play a role in getting this event back in the right direction. The next 200 or so days are critical - action now WILL make a difference. If you wait until May of next year you have waited too long.

robbie
MyWebsite
August 08, 2012 at 08:18:34 AM
Joined: 12/05/2004
Posts: 78
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I can relate my personal experience from last year. We brought our 2 cars to Belleville to run there.(the bright red 12 cars) The year before there seemed to be problems with the officiating, but our team did not encounter any first hand. It was just talk among some of the other racers. Also there was considerable mix ups with the line-ups that gave very little notice to some of the teams for which races they were to be in. No biggie... we made the show.
Last year was a different story. On qualifying night we had problems with the lap count for 12jr (Pelkey) as they scored him a lap down after he had stalled on the back straight and caused the yellow. They said there was a mix up with the scoring, and they apologized. The announcer came down and expressed his frustration at the way the scorers were, and said there were many bad calls that night.
Saturday though was much worse... At the driver's meeting they told us that we could take a wheel off of the car if we had a red as long as we did not change the tire. The 12s Sheridan was fighting for the 6th spot in the Main when the car in front of him flipped and went over the wall going in to turn 1. Some debris from the car scraped the bleeder bib off of the left rear wheel at the base. In the work area we removed the wheel, broke down the tire and put a new bib in. we remounted the tire, and put it back on the car. The official made us tag. He said what we did was against the rules. We told him to call the track officials and get it straightened out but he refused. We asked him to feel the heated tire to prove that it was the same one, he again refused. We went from 6th to the back.
The 12 jr car would see it's own problems... We learned the the trip wire for the scoring device was before the flagstand. Josh had passed Caleb for the 7th spot before the flagstand, but since the trip wire is before it,they scored him 8th. This was the excuse that was given.
Then the green/checker thing at the end had alot of people confused. If the leading car had passed the finish line, then the race for all intended purposes was either over or there should have been a green white checker where all cars would revert back to the last green flag lap. This was not the case last year. What they did confused alot of participants.
After we were loaded up one of the board members came by the rig and asked how things went for us, and if we would be back next year. I told him probably not. He asked if I would relay my experience to the rest of the board so that they could learn from the experience and make things better. I reluctantly agreed. This was a BIG mistake. The meeting was little more than an ambush by certain members of the board, followed by my character asassination due to one of my pit members driving our Razor around the track after the race. I was told that if I wanted to be a part of the "prestigious Belleville Nationals" that I would have to put up or shut up. I wasn't talking in the first place. But I did share with him that an event with no cars was not very prestigious. I had asked to leave the room several times, but not until they were done with their scolding was the door made clear for me to go. It was surreal. This was two cars that are parked this year. I had heard the stories candidly, but it was only when I had experienced it for myself could I understand what some had told me. Belleville is a great place, and many there were glad to see us, including certain board members. We did feel however that if you were not a local or a big name that the treatment was not the same.
Not being said too often, but let's acknowledge the 800 pound gorilla in the room. What I see is a shame. Belleville has so much history, and this event is a part of that town's identity. Many racers just fade away when these things happen, keeping their opinions to themselves. Maybe this post will shed some light.


www.abcmotorsports.com
(The Arizona 12 cars)

Desflur
August 08, 2012 at 12:15:07 PM
Joined: 10/09/2010
Posts: 428
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Reply to:
Posted By: darnall on August 06 2012 at 04:09:25 PM
The biggest thing hurting Belleville, and most other midget racing, is that you have a handfull of guys with a 40 thousand dollar motor in the car and many more in the trailer or shop....they can afford to twist them up to 11,000RPM and do an $8,000 rebuild on em every 5-8 nights. they can also afford to go for a hole that may close up because there are plenty more cars in the shop/trailer. The majority of midget owners have one decent motor and MAYBE a not so decent spare, one decent car and MAYBE a old chassis for a spare....they can't afford to run a motor as hard as you have to on the big tracks so they have no chance of winning or running top 5. They can't destroy a car and still race the rest of the year....There is way too big a gap in the "Haves" and the "Have Nots" in midget racing...the gap is manageable for the little guys on the small tracks PowrI runs on...it's manageable in the Tulsa Expo Center...but ridiculous to try on the big tracks. Add the fact that all the big teams and most of the small teams enter or rent out all their spare cars for Tulsa and you can see why 14 show up at Belleville and 240 come to Tulsa. USAC sprints and the 360 nationals also took away a few potential entries from Belleville (Larson, Abreu, Darland, Hines, etc) but even without those races on the same weekend you still would have had less than 25 cars at Belleville. The insane cost of diesel fuel and new tires for every session of track time are as bad for midgets as for sprintcars but engines are the biggest cancer in midget racing by far.


Your exactly right. Let these fools that wanted to open up the rules so they can spend 30,000-40,000 plus on motors go race with 14 cars and kill the races. This is exactly what is happening to the Knoxville 305s. Saw 18,000-29,000 dollar 305motors at Knox and Osky. Plum crazy gonna kill that class also when 305 was intended to get more drivers back into racing sprints. They don't want the race saver motors so makes alot of sense to go blow it on a 20,000 plus 305 motor


threadkillllllller
MyWebsite
August 10, 2012 at 11:49:35 AM
Joined: 01/31/2012
Posts: 993
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If you don't want to take my word for it - Three time champ Jerry Coons Jr's sentiments on the topic: http://www.indianaopenwheel.com/showthread.php?p=295880#post295880



parra
August 10, 2012 at 06:22:44 PM
Joined: 11/10/2006
Posts: 209
Reply

A similar thing is happening in Australia with just a group of Midget people with a history going back many years keeping them alive.I think the Sprintcar juggernaut has just killed them off with most of the young guys wanting to sit their rears in a Sprintcar.



Mister411
August 11, 2012 at 11:52:38 AM
Joined: 09/20/2010
Posts: 42
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Reply to:
Posted By: dirtface on August 06 2012 at 08:59:50 PM
Other than the chili bowl I think the last real large midget car count I've seen in the west was at perris when the USAC nationals were in town for the ovals against the USAC/ CRA . They had a double show and most of the big names were racing both cars was a great night . Then they were all in town for turkey night. Few years back not exact on the year. I miss them good times.


The Midgets have never ran the ovals.....

 

 





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