new ideas not crap.

[Don Nerone]

Buy 5 frount wheel drive compact cars fron the auction that run. Most of the time u can make a deal with the acton for signage. the cars will cost $250 to $350 each.
Buy 5 of them.
Get 5 of ur crews in the promo.
Dont tell anyone that ur dooing this.
When the track opens on sat night the cars are in the infield and 1 2 3 go..the crews start striping and fixing these cars for a race that ur going to have last that night.
The anouncer says u changed ur mind and ur going to auction them of tonight..
sell them for $25

Don62

[Tweety16]

Another thought on the Don's idea about the front wheel drive auction cars. Advertise during the week that 5 people out of the stands will have a chance to drive a racecar for FREE! The track would of course have to provide helmits and fire suits and if done at a track like Orlando use the flat track to keep the speeds down. Draw the names at intermission and make the Fan Race the first feature. Give a nice big trophy to the winner. Do not allow any ringers and keep the race short, 5 to 10 laps.

[Matt Albee]

Another thought on the Don's idea about the front wheel drive auction cars. Advertise during the week that 5 people out of the stands will have a chance to drive a racecar for FREE! The track would of course have to provide helmits and fire suits and if done at a track like Orlando use the flat track to keep the speeds down. Draw the names at intermission and make the Fan Race the first feature. Give a nice big trophy to the winner. Do not allow any ringers and keep the race short, 5 to 10 laps.

Not a bad idea, but the track insurance carrier might have something to say, especially in light of the death that happened during the school bus race a few years ago.

[Frasson118]

I don't see a difference, as far as insurance goes, whether a driver is from the pit side or the grandstand side. As long as the proper releases are signed, what's the difference? It's not like there is a license or any type of PRE-requisites to be able to drive a racecar. Sign on the dotted line, and wear the proper safety gear, and hop in a racecar.

[Mike Bresnahan]

Everyone refers to how great things used to be on here... full fields, packed stands, great times..

Here's how I remember things being when I started racing in 1993.

Pit admission: $15

Race fuel: $3.50 per gal.

4 late model tires, mounted: $400.

Pit slabs: FREE!!

Practice Nights: Never

50 lappers: Once a year.

Full time Crew members: Only The Nascar guys had them...

Shock Dyno: "Whats that?"

Enclosed trailer: "Wow, he must run one of the big series's up north or something."

Classes: Late Model. Sportsman. Street Stock. Mini Stock. V8 Bomber.

Engines: One rule for each class. Period.

Payouts are a little more now but the cost is a hell of a lot more. But in my opinion the purse is secondary these days. Back then it was about the purse... Now its about the COST. Make it cheaper, for all classes, and more cars will come. Cars = excitement = fans.

[Matt Albee]

Everyone refers to how great things used to be on here... full fields, packed stands, great times..

Here's how I remember things being when I started racing in 1993.

Pit admission: $15

Race fuel: $3.50 per gal.

4 late model tires, mounted: $400.

Pit slabs: FREE!!

Practice Nights: Never

50 lappers: Once a year.

Full time Crew members: Only The Nascar guys had them...

Shock Dyno: "Whats that?"

Enclosed trailer: "Wow, he must run one of the big series's up north or something."

Classes: Late Model. Sportsman. Street Stock. Mini Stock. V8 Bomber.

Engines: One rule for each class. Period.

Payouts are a little more now but the cost is a hell of a lot more. But in my opinion the purse is secondary these days. Back then it was about the purse... Now its about the COST. Make it cheaper, for all classes, and more cars will come. Cars = excitement = fans.

You bring up a good point Mike. And since you're a racer you can maybe shed some light on this.
Is it the cost of racing, or would cost really be an issue if the purses were bigger? The costs you describe in the old days were still pretty big money for guys trying to get started in stock car racing. Or for a man trying to support a family. But there seemed to be far more guys that could manage it then. I think that's because the purses were more in line with the costs. I guess what i'm asking is...forgetting track owners who insist that they can't pay higher purses, if the purses were where they should be now, would more race cars be on the track? Or are the costs just too high no matter how good the purses are?

[kendo]

Or are the costs just too high no matter how good the purses are?

Purses are not the issue if you have the burning desire to race.When I raced in the early 90's we raced for $25 and a trophy and there were 75 street stocks in the pits!
Hoosiers were $60,Cam2/VP was $3.75/gallon,tow fuel was $1.25/gallon...The costs have almost tripled yet wages have not increased much if not at all in the last 20 years.

This is supposed to be a family sport,yet $100-120 to get your spouse & 2 kids/crew member into the pits weekly is simply insane and out of reach for most.

[Mike Bresnahan]

When I'm looking at an event, I look to see what 5th pays. Not that I don't hope or expect to win, but if I'm not good that day, have bad luck or just out classed, does 5th cover my costs? Or at least my tires? But its not just the weekly expenses.

Rule changes: We had TWO successful Late Model Touring series. Both had basically the same motor rule: steel head flat top chevy. They all made between 515-550 HP and there were a dozen guys building them. - Then came the 9:1's, Then the Fords, Ford 9:1's, Specs, etc.. And every time a new combination was successful everyone felt thats what they needed... If they couldn't afford it, they quit. Cause why bring a knife to a gun fight?

ABC Bodies: Once these became mandatory, no more Kens fiberglass selling fenders for $45... Nope, now you gotta pay $95 because this one has "the approved sticker". Is the racing any better? I don't think so. Now you spend a week making sure you hang each panel to fit templates and measurments. Thats a lot of money and headache for a HOBBY, especially when theres a pretty good chance you'll be doing it again before the next race.

Practice nights before the shows: If the working man can't get off work, along with at least two or three crew members, he's not going to the race the next day. Spend over a thousand dollars just to show up and still be a day behind the competition??? No thank you.

Perception becomes reality for racers. Do you have to buy practice tires to win the race? No. "but damn everyone else is, and I cant afford them so why bother?"

So now the guys that do this for fun have quit coming because its now a job and not a hobby.

As far as the purse being more and making a difference? Not really. Not to me. I race for the fun of it. The expenses are constant and consistent. Until it gets cheap enough and easy enough for the casual racer to come back, we'll have small fields and relatively small purses. And thats across the board in all classes, not just Late Models.

[Matt Albee]

I can certainly agree on the costs. Silly rules made by people who shouldn't be making rules. Charging the racers for everything. Charging the fans more for less.
I know the tire prices have gone crazy, race gas too. But that can be pinned to the jacket of the track owners. The track owners fall all over themselves to get a tire company to be the official track tire, then they tell everyone that's the tire they have to use. But the tire maker charges the track extra to get their sponsorship money back. The track owner charges more per tire because he's being charged more. And of course the track owner can charge more, because you have to use his product, you have no choice. Same goes for the racing gas. Too bad if your sponsor wants to buy you some racing gas, the track says you have to use their gas and you have to purchase it from them.
I've read threads on this site talking about no competition between tire brands means much higher costs. I've been told that tires could easily be $25 to $30 less per tire if the tire makers were allowed to compete. And i've seen race gas that sold for $3 less per gallon than the brand at the track. But as long as the track owners can force racers to buy only one product, the prices are going to be crazy.

[zerofor]

The problem is both the cost to build an upper division car and the payout itself. I remember well being from Ohio,a period in 1972 Ed Howe pulled down to Columbus Motor Speedway and ran off a string of 6 consecutive wins.On every one of those 6 nights his winners take was around 1500-1600.What would that translate to nowadays?Five of those races were the usual 35 lap Sunday night cards,and I think one was a 75 lap Memorial day championship affair.Nowadays I think they are paying around 700-800 to win.And remember the cars that were being run in the early 70's were basically your present day street or super stocks with a quickchange rear end.Do you see the connection?I also remember Jim Cushman holding the late model track record until around 1971 at 16.10.Now its well into the fourteens.Tube frames,lighter weight and smaller components made the cars both quicker and tremendously more expensive.Not to mention just the cost of the racing fuel AND the fact that damn near every top team has diesel powered tow rigs and diesel's more expensive than pump gas.I think if you took a class like the modified minis which now quite resemble a late model from a distance and paid them 1000 to 1500 to win,you would build up a good class of cars people would enjoy watching.THE LATE MODELS HAVE TO BE PAID MORE.You can't pound a square peg into a round hole,no matter how hard you try.And how about a sportsman or street stock class with engine limitations where they could run non ethenol fuel that you can buy at any marina for about 5 bucks a gallon?I raised that question about the fuel to a guy I used to race against who still runs an open wheel modified just last summer when I was up north and being a struggling unsponsored guy I could tell I got the wheels turning in his mind when I asked him that same question.If you would run 4 divisions a night the money you are paying those extra classes each night now could be put into the purse to help build the other classes up.Those classes all need some good paydays every now and then to build up interest and car counts.You can alternate classes each week.Hell every track down here does THAT now.You have to remember this whole deal we now know as stock car racing didn't just start because a bunch of moonshiners had fast cars and wanted to have fun,like NASCAR and the big TV networks would like you to believe.That sounds romantic to a bunch of girls and teenagers watching the race on TV,but the facts are times were hard and IT WAS A POTENTIAL WAY TO FEED THEIR FAMILIES.Same thing with the G.I.'s that came back from WWII and Korea and had trouble getting jobs right away since so many factories and such hadn't converted back from their military uses.These guys still had to eat and you could find old cars anywhere for 5 or 10 dollars and so many of these guys worked in the motor pools in the service the thought was,if some guy wants to hold a race and pay me 300 bucks to win it,what the hell.I'll go for it.We have to get back to the point where you AT LEAST BELIEVE you may come out ahead.

[fred23]

The days of racing being affordable are long gone......zero, you mention the GI's working in a motor pool....thats exactly how my dad got started......and when he came back home he raced here at ORlando and eau gal lie......but they could build their own cars, build their own motors and use the same tires for the whole year.......and COMPETE.

Everything now is manufactured .... the only car you can actually build in your garage with stock parts is a bomber/strictly stock etc.....

Don said something to us in tech one night that really brings this point to light..... my dad was running a sportsman and of course had all stock front end components minus uppers and shocks......there was a debate at the time about being able to use after market hubs for safety......Don says to us" they used to run the same thing at Daytona and ran 150 mph".....Anyone back in the day, could build a NASCAR Stock Car and race if they wanted to......right in your garage or shop, hell they didn't even have 5 point seat belts or racing seats yet.......now you can't build a mini stock in your garage and compete.....technology costs money and takes someone to put up a lot of money to create a company to come up with it, sell it or build it.......also,you have to have a built racecar because cars today are not built in a manner that you can take one from a salvage yard and race for the most part.

[Matt Albee]

Mike mentioned the cost of the body work as being a major expense. I remember the days when stock car bodies came from junk yards ( sorry, re-cycling yards ) and back row budget buys from used car lots.
I kinda miss those days, at least the cars were interesting to look at instead of the cookie cutter cars we have now.
This thread might just be on to something. Start classes for tuner cars, let racers buy their tires and race gas wherever they want, stop making things more expensive by opening for practice, simplify engine rules per class, and get rid of expensive bodies that look like hell anyway.
I think any one looking for a competition/race director should be looking at Mike Bresnahan .

[Winger]

There's some really good idea here. One thing you can't do is get the cart ahead of the horse. As Andre' pointed out, you have to provide a show. If you start doing something to draw in more fans and the show sucks, you may have lost them forever. Have a good show regularly and the fans will come. Then you can use different schemes to keep them.
I think Zero pointed something out in a very constructive way. Races paid 1000 to 1500 in 1972. That translates to $5590 to $8385 today using an "Inflation Calculator" available on the web. Yet purses have gone down and expenses have gone up substantially. I do believe purses make a difference. Bubba started paying higher purses and had a good car count. When he dropped them the car count dropped.
Jimmy, I noticed the point about having a class for "ricers". A class that's not strickly stock but with tubular frames and the 4 and 6 cylinder engines. You basically have that class with the mini-stocks now, except they use sheet metal bodies. That class seems to be dying. Guys were buying expensive motors, late model chassis, etc., etc. Some of the guys have as much money in them as some of the modifieds do. Yet they race for $300. I like the idea of using the stock bodies though.

[zerofor]

I AGREE FRED, speed costs money and the only ones that have that kind of money to burn are the NASCAR boys with their corporate money deals.And NO tracks or racers on the local level have those kind of resources.The closest thing you have to that present day is the World of Outlaws or the Lucas Oil latemodel series.I remember when the national news outlets covered a major story in1971 about something up to that point they had ignored.Stock car racing!!!! And the occasion was the first million dollar corporate sponsor deal in NASCAR.Back when Richard Petty signed his deal with Andy Granatelli and STP.Now that's chickenfeed in NASCAR but probably about what it takes to campaign a latemodel team on the local level.Problem is Joes Garage or mom & pops carryout can't give a guy that to get their name on the side of a car and Budweiser or Long John Silvers aren't going to.NEVER gonna happen.Not to a guy who just runs local tracks series ,etc.The dirt tracks went through this back in the 70s.All the good local sprint car teams left for USAC because that's the onlyplace that was paying enough money to (kind of) keep up with car costs.What followed was a lot of dirt tracks going under due to crappy car counts and crap shows.When USAC disbanded the Worldof Outlaws came along and they started following NASCARSbusiness model.And this was summed up in three words.PAY MORE MONEY!!! What other way is there to draw corporate interest? There are two ways I can think of to draw more new participants.Feature your v8 bomber,mini stock lower budget classes more (and givethem some better payouts)The other thing is something that was already touched on in this thread.Keep a four cylinder class or bomber type car or two on hand at the track,and either rent or luckynumber away a chance to race for the night.Keep points for anybody that participatesin this and present them with a trophy,gift card,track merchandise etc at the end of the season.This could lead them or their friends into getting further involved or at the least bring some fresh butts into the bleachers.

[Don Nerone]

Well it didnt take long to change the direction of the tread!!
We nead to give the tracks ideas to help fix them and were are back to what is or has been bad.
The cost of food bread and milk have gone up more than the cost of a racecar in the last 20 years...I get that everyone cant aford a SLM but all the clases are gone and we have to make some new racers and fans if the old ones arent comming.
Lowering the cost or raising the payouts wont bring most of them back..
Like i saw on a post ....we need new blood in the pits and grandstands...
Ok new or old ideas redone...
Any one know Ray Cozone??
He was a golfer that showed up to the track and won a ride in a track owned bommer.
Boy did i hook him forever.LOL

Don62