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

Looks like you can add Brent Marks in the 19m out of PA and Chad Kemenah to the part time Outlaw roster.

Correct, Logan is the grandson, Jacob is his son.  Logan is actually a year or two older.  They are planning on running two cars out of one hauler, they have been doing this for over a season now and this year they already ran 410 races in Florida, Georgia, Maryland, New York, New Jersey, Indiana, Ohio, Iowa, and of course PA without the WoO tow money.  I can assure you they don't have 8 motors(I'm not sure they have 3) or 6 cars.  Bobby Allen never did either, he still builds the cars like he did when he was the driver.  This is as old school an operation as your going to get in todays WoO and I think it will be fun to follow.  They may be running all the races, but I can assure you they're running for money, not points.  I wouldn't be surprised if they have to sit out a night or two or put a 358 in and make laps one night, but if anyone in the country can make an operation like this go, Bobby Allen is the the builder and innovater you want.  

nope, no chance at all per the Fairboard meetings the last couple months.  Both shows in 2013 were $$$ losers

I was there , crowds seem to be "decent"  but i guess not enough. Ya think its still the economy ?  Or lack of devout fans ?  Personally i drive 3 hrs to get to knoxville to watch outlaws and usually will make at least 1 weekly show a year. The 360 and 410 nationals are an annual trip for me too. My point being .... its dam depressing when the 'mecca' of sprint racing (my words, relax) cant draw enough people for 2 WOO shows. 

Other tracks obviously don't lose money or they wouldn't keep booking them.  The bottom line is selling enough tickets.  Why do you think Knoxville is having trouble selling WoO tickets?

Just a thought about this but is it possible that the weekly shows are good enough that for those single Outlaw shows people actually decide not to come because of a higher ticket price and larger crowd, so they just save their money and time and go to the weekly shows and the Nationals?

http://gph.is/XMLGff

Are the sanctioning fees any different from track to track? 

I think you maybe onto something there....the fan that spends $15 for the weekly show won't go to the WOO show b/c it's double the price. However I do know people who rarely go to sprints but will go just b/c the outlaws are there but apparently enough people don't do this or else you'd see more shows. 

I thought the crowd was good during the outlaws show but difficult to judge b/c the size of the stands.  Definitely more than the regular night. 

It's unfortunate but happy the WOO is there at least once not counting the Nats. 

Keep It Real

Very gd point. 

I think there are multiple things at work here.

The ticket price is too high ($30 for a regular Outlaw show paying $10,000 to win, yet you can go to the Nationals for $42 for the prelim nights (and see the same amount of cars and them racing for double the purse $$) or pay $15 and see 3 classes of sprint cars (410's, 360's and 305's) at a weekly show and see just as many cars, just as good or BETTER racing.

The local fans skip the Outlaw shows (the Outlaw shows are much less exciting than the weekly shows IMO), and the nights the Outlaws are there are always LONGGG and drug out for no apparent reason (why can't the Outlaws hot lap prior to the support class and then TT right after the support class hot laps/TT??  For 3 years now it's been, the 360's hot lap/TT then the Outlaws Hot Lap, then a break, then we time trial the Outlaws, tehn another break for the National Anthem and invocation, then 360 heats, then WoO heats, then another break, then the C-main for the Outlaws, then a break, then the Dash draw (which is essentially a break), then the 360 B (if they have one), then the Dash, then the B-main, then the A-main for the 360's, tehn a break, tehn the A-main for the Outlaws (and we drag that out with the 4 wide salute even when the weather is threatening (happened last year).  No reason not to run a timely show by using the support class to fill in the dead time instead of continueing to create dead time.

The format sucks (weekly shows have an invert of 6 in the heats and 8 in the feature.  Hardly ever did anyone win from the front row.  Outlaws invert 4 in the heats, then 4,6 or 8 in the dash.  Just eliminate the dash, it's a waste of time and pays no $$$ to teh drivers, once they are strung out, after lap 2, just throw the checker...

There's more "entertainment" options than there were 20 years ago when they ran 2 day shows.  Iowa Speedway, Iowa Barnstormers, Other events @ Wells Fargo Arena (concerts for example), movies (the change to HD television and streaming makes this even more of a competition).  Not to mention the AAU culture for youth sports (I know kids that play baseball, softball, basketball, volleyball or swim that do so YEAR ROUND, those used to be seasonal sports.  hard for mom or dad to go to the races if they are traveling to a tournament every weekend.

The lack of being "up to date" with technology and customer expectations (how do you get kids 12-30 in the gate if there isn't use of technology (have a scannable QR code for those with smartphones so they can access replays, video, etc. on their phone throughout the night instead of looking at the scoreboard for those things)).  The bathrooms (especially the women's) MUST BE UPGRADED if they want to even begin to compete with the before mentioned "entertainment" above.  The restrooms should be nicer than what people have at home.  (Face it, a family coming for the first time, may make it their ONLY time due to how the restrooms are).

The Outaws "lack" of being a promotional entity.  They expect the tracks to do ALL promotion and don't do anything to help them out.  Some of the sanction fee (rumored to be $20,000) SHOULD be used to PROMOTE that event.  Love em' or hate em', NASCAR is a PROMOTIONAL MACHINE for their tracks, drivers and teams and to be part of their "group", you are EXPECTED and OBLIGATED to attend sponsor functions for the Tracks or sanctioning body, TV and Radio interviews, and promotion of NASCAR.  What does WRG ask of the teams and drivers?  They should be leading the way setting up TV interviews and Radio interviews in EVERY market the WoO have a race at (even sattelite interviews).  I've seen Rusty Wallace, Dale Jr. and Tony Stewart on my local TV station 2-3 times per year promoting NASCAR races in Kansas, Chicago, and Iowa Speedway (and I live in central Iowa).  yet, the WRG doesn't get Schatz, Pittman, Stewart, etc. on even LOCAL radio stations in the market???

It is very difficult to turn a profit holding a show.  Purse is $54,000, sanction fee is $20,000, so to just make back your purse and sanction fee $$, you have to sell nearly 2500 ADULT tickets.  Plus you have the normal expenses to operate such as electricity, water, insurance, payroll, etc, plus your fixed expenses (taxes, payroll taxes, advertising,etc.).  My guess is you're looking at close to $90-100,000 for a ONE DAY show expense.  SO, that means you have to sell a MINIMUM of 3200 ADULT tickets to break even (to turn any real profit, you need to sell another 2000 tickets or more).

A few years ago the Outlaws were asking Knoxville to give them $5 for every ticket that was sold for the Nationals for them to sanction the race (that ended up being the year that Knoxville went to un-sanctioned) which would have equated to nearly $400,000, and they also wanted Knoxville to pay $100,000 toward Television and the normal $20,000 per night Sanction Fee (since then, there have been less and less Outlaw shows @ Knoxville).  That's $580,000 that they wanted from Knoxville for the Nationals, I'd "bet the farm" that they haven't asked Williams Grove or Charlotte for those same fees....

I personally wish they'd have ZERO Outlaw shows @ Knoxville this year.  The longest nights I've spent at the track (outside of weather delays) the last 10 years have been at Outlaw shows (and most of those nights the car count was LESS than a regular show yet takes an hour or two longer to run).  Take that sanction fee $$$ and start building up your own "special events" offering big purses for the racers yet affordable tickets for the fans (let the locals race for $10,000 to win, $800 to start a couple weekends a year and see what additional racers show up on their own). 

tape delayed on MavTV with Live PPV still available is what I've been hearing.  Non-sanctioned.

I was there every week last year.  Outside of the April shows, the worst 2 crowds of the year were the Outlaw events.

Live TV is very expensive to produce though due to the equipment needed to send the signal out live and there are always the unknowns that can happen as opposed to taped delay where you can edit it down and show the best parts. The thing is if you want it live you would have the option of renting it on Turn2 still, otherwise if your just casual about watching it you can wait for it to be showed on MAV. I would love for them to show it Live on MAV but I don't know that thats gonna happen.

http://gph.is/XMLGff

The SPONSORS want it televised (thus tape delayed).  Doesn't matter to most sponsors if it's live or tape delayed, but it's much easier to justify the expense of their sponsorships if TV is attached to it).

The companies that sponsor races for NASCAR aren't just looking at the # of butts in the seats, they are looking at how many eyeballs are watching on TV too.

Knoxville has ~ 25000 in attendance (the same people go every day pretty much, some go just the first couple and others just on Saturday) and maybe they get another 150,000 to 200,000 to watch on TV via Tape Delay.  If it was your company, are you ponying up $100,000 to be in front of 25,000 people or to be in front of 200,000 people ($4 per person vs. $0.50 per person) with the POTENTIAL to be in front of 1,000,000 people (that was the peak viewership of the Nationals when it was on Live TV) which would be $0.10 per person).

It's all about ROI for those sponsors and TV is probably a MUST in order to get any sponsors to sign on.

Thanks Vande for enlightening me. I had no idea of the $$$  demands that WRG was making of knoxville over the nationals. Not being a weekly regular I didnt pick up on Outlaw shows being that much longer.  I do know that Ive never left an outlaw show there before 11:45 . I guess ill be coming to more weekly shows than Outlaw shows , dont really care whos racing there as long as its sprints.

Do you have the numbers to substantiate the statement that you keep making that "they make a killing" on the internet broadcast.

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But you're a "hard core" fan.  Sponsors are trying to reach the "Mass audience".  The hope is that a non "hard-core" fan will stumble across it and watch on TV (the mass audience is not purchasing it on PPV through the internet or watching it in person).

Whomever is the sponsor (FVP, Casey's, Big Game Tree Stands, etc.) has already gotten in front of you, there just aren't enough of you to consitute the expense, thus TV is a must for any sponsor to dole out the amount of $$$ racetracks need from title sponsors for large events (I noticed the World Finals didn't have a title sponsor this year after having Lowe's Foods and Peak Motor Oil in the past).

Kind of sad that even though the World Finals had the attention of basically all dirt racing fans in the country they still didn't have a title sponsor.  I'm not sure what that says.

Says to me that TV is very important  (and the Outlaws TV deal came together too late in the process to obtain a sponsor).

Or, they just wanted too much $$$ to be the sponsor could be another possibility...

The $5 a ticket thing wasn't "a few years ago", it was 2004 or 2005. Went over like a lead balloon, they dropped it then.

yep, and the relationship between the fairboard and WRG has been contentious at best ever since....