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So a group of us were doing some brainstorming this weekend at a VIR Regional about Club Racing in general. Especially after the "possible IT including into Nationals" talk thats been going around ex: http://www.improvedtouring.com/forums/showthread.php?t=23946

So, what would the "National" guys think of something like this?

1) Eliminate the distinction between Regional and National, its all Club Racing.
2) Create coefficients for events. Example: ARRC, June Sprints, Oak Tree National, Mid Oh Fest are all worth 1.5x points. Every current "National" is worth 1x points, and all the current "Regionals" are worth 0.5x points.
3) EVERYONE can race at every event. Just like today.
4) 6 events, with a max of 2 1.5ers count toward your season points.
5) The top finisher in the points for each division (SARRC, MARRS) etc becomes the "season division points champion"
6) The top 10 points finishers for each class for each class get an invite to the runoffs. At that time the can decide "should I go for the runoffs and try to become national champion, or try to become the divisional champion". If they step "down", the 11th place gets the invite and so on.
7) The top 10 that decide, go to the runoffs and compete for national champion
8) The next 10 can fight it at at the regional race for regional champion. (SIC, NARRC Runoffs) etc

This keeps the current race structure but makes everything OH SO MUCH easier, better, smarter, and less confusing.

You will have huge car fields at the 1.5 events with lots of competition, and the smaller guys can go play at the 0.5 point events.

Ding, done

-Tom

Tom,

Much of this is very appealing, with a few cautions:

1) Planning for the Runoffs is usually done months ahead--rooms reserved as much as three to four months in advance, Test day reservations made two to three months ahead, vacations planned as much as six months ahead--all of which would be thrown into some chaos if the participants weren't pretty certain of attendance many months ahead.  This system proposal would delay knowing until, possibly, only a few weeks in advance if the complexity of points calculations and the communications system from SCCA headquarters didn't start about mid-summer.  Even that is leaving some folks very short time to plan the trip, particularly those who might not be in the top five or so in running points totals in their division. 

2) Assigning values to specific "Super Events," such as the June Sprints, sounds fine but will certainly meet with some heavy argumentation about which events really are "Super."  I suppose that average yearly attendance at the event is a reasonable starting criterion, among others.  What other criteria could be used to determine those 1.5x factor events? 

3) Are you saying that, if one were to be the top point winner in a division and chose to go to the Runoffs, that that person cannot be the division champion?  How is the division championship, specifically won, if not by the person garnering the most points in your system.  I'm not clear about that. 

4) Are you saying that there would be a single race to determine the "Regional" champion, ignoring the points accumulated throughout the season?  A winner takes all for the Regional title, like the Runoffs is for the National title?  That would suggest that someone racing only the minimum races to qualify during the year could become the Regional Champion through one race and, perhaps, some lucky circumstances--very much like the Runoffs?

 

There are some possible benefits to having less distinction between National and Regional racing, but I need to hear more of the discussion to agree that this is better than what we have now--even though I don't care a lot for a one race, Winner take all,  system for a "seasonal" championship.

Tell us more. 

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Jack SSB Z4 #09

1) The only reason you can do that now is because more people from your division don't Club Race. If you had 30 T1 cars in the SE would you be able to book your Runoffs room 6 months in advance with 100% certainty? Today, there aren't really any/many divisions with more then 10 drivers in each class, so all it takes is 4 events run, and bam you can do to the runoffs. The above proposal only throws more "fish into your pond".

2) The way it would be done is each division can "mark" one of their events a super event. Great lakes chooses the June Sprints, NC chooses Oak Tree, ATL chooses ARRC etc.

3) We would have a "Season Points Champion", which I guess should be marked as the "Division/Region Champion" and a "Not Top 10 Regional Points Championship Race Champion". The wording can be decided later ;-) What we are trying to accomplish here is to have a "runoffs" for the "little guys". For example, the SARRC does the SIC, the NARRC does the NARRC Runoffs today. That race would stay and would be the "not top 10 in points" runoffs.

4) I described the answer to this in #3 

-Tom 

I sure like the idea of larger fields.   It is hard to get impressed or excited about Divisional wins with 1 to 2 or 3 cars.

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"Racing is LIFE..everything before and after is simply waiting" Steve McQueen

Chris Brannon

AS GTO 02


TRM Classics Inc., Jeg's, Kumho, GM Performance, Carbotech, and Pedders.

The thought of merging the two is out of the question in my opinion. Remember - Regional racing is where you get your feet wet before coming to play at a National level. Many many many driving mistakes are made at the regional level and that is perfectly fine place to have them occur. I personally trust 90% of the National drivers out on the track with me. I cannot say the same for Regional drivers when we go to those events.
 

That is not saying there aren't groups of drivers that race in "Regional Only" classes that have the talent to drive nationally. I just would not leave blinders on looking at car counts and forgetting how you felt the first time you attended a Regional race on your Novice license.

Joel
 

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http://www.RaceLabz.com
570-655-7272

There should be only 4 regional classes with only 50% as much track time as National:

• Open wheel fast
• Open wheel slow
• Closed wheel fast
• Closed wheel slow

ALL the rest should be National groups and the grids should be HUGE to make it exciting to watch. There should be NO championships for Regional just trophys according to the GCR

This should cause most drivers to aspire to National competition...

As for living on track with scared rookies, well don't move 'em up till they're ready but make sure that is indeed what they want... Heck 1/2 the fun of running regionals is to make yourself sharper by starting at the back in a 70 car field and picking your way through a buncha goofs and trying not to wadd up yer hot rod!

Right now there is no incentive to the big fish small pond guys to move up because they can win a championship in a class by showing up whoopdee doo...

~s

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NayKid Racing & Lux Performance Builders of the HEAVIEST & FASTEST T1 cars EVER period.
KUMHO Tire/SRT/Corsa/BELL/Forgeline/Mintex/Redline/Nike

again I'll express my opinion that all of this misses the point;  they may be good ideas in the short term, but do nothing long term.

 

the rules must be completely rewritten, not purely for club members, but to phase in interest by the millions of real motorsports enthusiasts, while grandfathering enough classes together to keep the current membership mostly on track.

no one wants to see old MG's running around with supertrapps.

no one wants to spend $100k+ per season club racing.  There is room for a couple of classes with that budget, but overall costs are too high, some deliberate, some by stupidity.

no one cares about racing in complete obscurity.

further, running around a track with 1-5 other cars in your class may be fun but is not racing.

running around a track with 6 different classes on track at once is not racing.

no one wants to race against people with unlimited incentives to spend $300k to overbuild and run a cheater, or even simply legal but perfectly prepped, car that should cost $50k to run with some rules tweaks.

This is all fixable.

Road Racing in the United states, with proper rules and marketing, should draw thousands of competitors per weekend, every weekend across the US.  It would draw regular television and large paying spectator crowds, along with substantial grass roots sponsorship, as well as bigger sponsors at the peak of the sport.

Further, the racing could be just as good at 40% of the cost by revising the rules sets, which were made to:

1 cater to evolving past member desires

2 promote exclusivity

3 whether fully intentional or not,  increase costs to a ridiculous level. 

 

Fixing these rules would multiply attendance.

 

Further, revising class structures to minimize cost and maximize 'sex appeal' and the racing experience would exponentially multiply attendance. 

Promoting spectators and TV would put us in a position to dictate sites, build new tracks, race more cheaply, and far more often, and do it against better and more competition.

So, until i can devote the time and money to start a good alternative to the SCCA, or to push the SCCA into this model, I am afraid I'll just continue to give my opinion and hope the membership listens.
 

I agree with Joel, we need to keep the distinction there. Working both Regionals and Nationals for most of my time flagging I can tell you there is a HUGE difference in many cases, both in the strength of the cars and the strength of the drivers. The differences between national and regional are huge in classes like SRF, FF, GTx, FV and C/DSR. Combining regional and national is a recipe for disaster.

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Lance Snyder
Atlanta Region F&C

Elaine Dickinson: You got a letter from headquarters this morning.
Ted Striker: What is it?
Elaine Dickinson: It's a big building where generals meet, but that's not important.

Ya know what?

They combine newbies with vets in all kinds of other series, NASCAR, NASA, BMW CCA, PCA, POC I could go on but it works and if the National guys can't handle it then maybe it is them who need more training...

It would also make for more entertaining racing and I thought that's what the corner workers and spectators (spectators, yeah right) were there for...?

~s

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NayKid Racing & Lux Performance Builders of the HEAVIEST & FASTEST T1 cars EVER period.
KUMHO Tire/SRT/Corsa/BELL/Forgeline/Mintex/Redline/Nike

cbramey:

again I'll express my opinion that all of this misses the point;  they may be good ideas in the short term, but do nothing long term.

 

the rules must be completely rewritten, not purely for club members, but to phase in interest by the millions of real motorsports enthusiasts, while grandfathering enough classes together to keep the current membership mostly on track.

no one wants to see old MG's running around with supertrapps.

no one wants to spend $100k+ per season club racing.  There is room for a couple of classes with that budget, but overall costs are too high, some deliberate, some by stupidity.

no one cares about racing in complete obscurity.

further, running around a track with 1-5 other cars in your class may be fun but is not racing.

running around a track with 6 different classes on track at once is not racing.

no one wants to race against people with unlimited incentives to spend $300k to overbuild and run a cheater, or even simply legal but perfectly prepped, car that should cost $50k to run with some rules tweaks.

This is all fixable.

Road Racing in the United states, with proper rules and marketing, should draw thousands of competitors per weekend, every weekend across the US.  It would draw regular television and large paying spectator crowds, along with substantial grass roots sponsorship, as well as bigger sponsors at the peak of the sport.

Further, the racing could be just as good at 40% of the cost by revising the rules sets, which were made to:

1 cater to evolving past member desires

2 promote exclusivity

3 whether fully intentional or not,  increase costs to a ridiculous level. 

 

Fixing these rules would multiply attendance.

 

Further, revising class structures to minimize cost and maximize 'sex appeal' and the racing experience would exponentially multiply attendance. 

Promoting spectators and TV would put us in a position to dictate sites, build new tracks, race more cheaply, and far more often, and do it against better and more competition.

So, until i can devote the time and money to start a good alternative to the SCCA, or to push the SCCA into this model, I am afraid I'll just continue to give my opinion and hope the membership listens.
 

All good points. If you get it figured out there are some people from IMSA and CART that would like to hire you.

I'm there to be entertained but I'm not there to clean up a huge mess when some novice in a much slower car gets descended on by a flock of national caliber cars at speed, I've seen it before and its NOT pretty... for anyone. There is more to it then the drivers.. there is also the cars. A FV that is perfect for regionals would get its ass trounced on at the nationals and in some cases may be dangerous. I'd rather let the ones piloting the vehicles decide when its time to move up then be forced. Come work 3 or 4 regional weekends then the same amount of national weekends with an open mind, I think you'll see a staggering difference in not just car quality but also driver readyness.

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Lance Snyder
Atlanta Region F&C

Elaine Dickinson: You got a letter from headquarters this morning.
Ted Striker: What is it?
Elaine Dickinson: It's a big building where generals meet, but that's not important.

I too agree that there needs to be a complete restructuring, and agree with many of the points on here.  I really think that the first step is scrapping the current class structure and starting over with a structure that makes sense, via progressive prep levels.

From my cursory glancing over at the solo (autocross) rules, that were completely redone a few years back, it seems that they did a really good job there.  Maybe we use that as a starting point.

SBW- you are an active solo guy (or at least were fairly recently)- would that structure work as a starting point for club-racing?

At the end of the day, we need to try and get down to no more than 20 strong National Classes.  This would also potentially give competitors at the Runoffs 20% more track time (in theory, anyway).

I also agree that vintage cars should stick to vintage racing or regionals.  I personally think that there should be a 20-25 year age limit for cars in national racing, when it comes to production-based classes.  That would be cars built from 1983 onwards. There should be a single prep level for prod classes. Not a more extreme prep level for antiques, and a limited prep level for new hardware.  That alone would "weed-out" most of the vintage cars, and would lead to more interest in younger people.

I also agree that there needs to be more of a partnership between regions, tracks, and the national office in terms of promoting a "crown jewel national" in each division, much like the June Sprints.  This would be a promoted, full spectator experience, that would serve to get people interested in the SCCA again.  Watkins Glen in the Northeast, The Rose Cup in the Pacific Northwest,  Sebring in the Southeast, etc...  Make these "crown jewel nationals" count for 1.5 times the normal points to encourage more people to run them- both in and out of division.  I suggested this multiple times over the last few years, but the written suggestion has been ignored.

The club seems to be listening now- at least to certain things.  They must finally realise that the situation that they have created has resulted in a serious downward-trend in terms of participation.  Hopefully their eyes and ears are open, and will continue to listen to the feedback of the members of our club.Keep writing letters!

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Jason Berkeley
#57 T1 Corvette
BMG Management / Central Auto Body / Pabst

jasonberkeley:

I also agree that vintage cars should stick to vintage racing or regionals.  I personally think that there should be a 20-25 year age limit for cars in national racing, when it comes to production-based classes.  That would be cars built from 1983 onwards. There should be a single prep level for prod classes. Not a more extreme prep level for antiques, and a limited prep level for new hardware.  That alone would "weed-out" most of the vintage cars, and would lead to more interest in younger people.

I also agree that there needs to be more of a partnership between regions, tracks, and the national office in terms of promoting a "crown jewel national" in each division, much like the June Sprints.  This would be a promoted, full spectator experience, that would serve to get people interested in the SCCA again.  Watkins Glen in the Northeast, The Rose Cup in the Pacific Northwest,  Sebring in the Southeast, etc...  Make these "crown jewel nationals" count for 1.5 times the normal points to encourage more people to run them- both in and out of division.  I suggested this multiple times over the last few years, but the written suggestion has been ignored.

What do you consider young people? I'm really not trying to be negative here, becuase all this serves my best interest, which would be to get back into racing.

Young people are extremely interested in this sport. Tons of people WANT to do this. They can't because its WAY to expensive, and the pre-requisites are truck, trailer, and car. 20-25 year limits on cars would help out, as you can pick up an old Honda CRX for cheap. Even the Honda Civic Si is now going for about $6k in SSC and is still a capable car. Unfortunately, that is not where the price point ends. Minimum cost to get to a race weekend is around $1,000/weekend. Minimum races to qualify for the runoffs = 4 starts. Runoffs week is minimum of $2-3,000.

Assuming you need no replacement parts, never damage anything, and are somewhat successful the cost per year not including the vehicle is around $7,000

We all know that the cost of racing doesn't even begin to touch the minimum. Things need to be rebuilt and fixed. Cars get damaged.

There just aren't many kids coming out of college that would even remotely be able to afford this. You are talking more likely $10,000-15,000 of DISPOSABLE income per year just to race.

I've considered many many options on how I could just drive my racecar to the track, and rent a uhaul for the runoffs, but its just too much risk, and I wouldn't be able to really "race" as I'd be worried about damaging something and not being able to drive the car home.

There are potential solutions, but none of those look promising for fixing club racing. Cut the cost in half and we might be talking.

So, what would it take to get to and from the racetrack, including car and travel expenses for $500/weekend? Considering entry fees are $300 or more, it looks like a daunting task. How does one cut entry fees without comprimising saftey?

Should we have a mandatory rule that drivers must be a corner worker as well? I know some or many of you guys look at this with disdain, but if you want younger racers and more competition it should be a serious consideration. I'm more than willing to work on it.

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It's all about Hot Nasty Bad-Ass Speed.

You guys had better rethink the 25 year cutoff as that would mean 24 of 38 EP Runoffs competitors would be out of luck. In FP it would be 16 of 26 who would be gone.

The classes you think so lightly of also had entries that either matched or far exceeded the #s in any of the SS/T fields at the Runoffs.

I understand you are just floating ideas but try to come up with something that doesn't hose the other guys.

dhrmx5:

You guys had better rethink the 25 year cutoff as that would mean 24 of 38 EP Runoffs competitors would be out of luck. In FP it would be 16 of 26 who would be gone.

The classes you think so lightly of also had entries that either matched or far exceeded the #s in any of the SS/T fields at the Runoffs.

I understand you are just floating ideas but try to come up with something that doesn't hose the other guys.

 

Exactly. And than develop new rules to combine them.  Same with GP and HP.  Same with CSR and DSR.  Maybe you grandfather the older cars for a five year transition period.

Better yet- THROW OUT THE CURRENT CLASS STRUCTURE AND START OVER.

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Jason Berkeley
#57 T1 Corvette
BMG Management / Central Auto Body / Pabst

I think whatever they do they should adopt a policy similar to NASA's weight to power ratio.  It would allow alot of these different cars you feel should be eliminated a class to run in, thereby increasing class numbers (which is what we are after).  It will allow individuallity within each class and should eliminate alot of "cheating"

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Bob Mayer#38
2008 SE DIV. BP National Champion

It occurs to me that we might be barking up the wrong tree if we are trying to get more "young people" into club racing and still thinking of cutting off cars at a certain age limit.  Maybe we need some old racers for a recruiting function.

Most of the "young" people I know and have known did not have the kind of money that would let them begin racing in their early twenties, or even thirties in many cases.  They had too much career/family/growing up work to do to be able to spend time and money on racing, especially in a newer car.  They also couldn't really afford to risk their street car, even though they might have wanted to do that.

The young racers have been more often than not, folks who sacrificed some of the "traditional" family/career paths to give racing a try, spending much or most of their available discretionary money on racing, or had parents with some bucks to throw at it for them, or were involved in a cars job in some way. Those of us who didn't, started racing much later in life (45, in my case) because of career & family decisions. That is why there are so many of us "Gray Hairs" (o.k, White hair!)  in the club.

What we need is some magic way to provide some cheap, older cars to young racers to try out and learn (meaning, get "hooked on!")  Wouldn't it be nice if we had a way to scrape together a bunch of old Neons, or Miatas (if there are any not already headed to SM!) or Rabbits/Golfs--etc. that young folks could rent cheaply for a day or weekend of track experience?  Cars that were reliable, but cheap and not too slow, but pretty darned safe?  I know that there are many race cars out there that end up parked in some garage/field/backyard when they just don't cut it in class any more. 

Spec MIata isn't the answer, I think, because it has become pretty darned expensive at the National level to be competitive and keep fixing "Rubs" and such.  Perhaps at the Regional level it is more approachable, but the competitve juices at both levels seem to create a rise in the costs at both levels. Still, if there were a number of cars such as the SMs available in most Divisions for "tryouts" by young folks wanting to dabble their toes in our sport, it might be a good way to usher some non-Gray Hairs into our fold.

Yeah, I know---Liability! Insurance! Maintenance! Storage! Movement!  All issues to be contemplated with considerable care.  I also know that, had such a program been available when I was 20, 25,30, or 35, I'd have been willing to pay a decent penny to try out a racecar, even if it weren't in a formal race class, but just a test day at a track.

Yes, there are schools like Bonderant, Barber and Mike's "Go For It" all over the country now, but most are still pretty expensive for young folks, especially if a "race car" is involved, not a street car.

Maybe I'm just wishing for something that can't really be worked out and we will always have more mid-life folks entering racing because they can finally begin to afford some of it, but I would love to see some racing group finally say "look, we've got XX number of these older racers available cheap for you to find out if racing is really something you young men and ladies would like to do. 

It appears that some of the HPDEs are approaching this, and some of the private clubs, like Autobahn, are renting out some very useful cars for on track experience (Z3s at Autobahn, for one).  I don't know if those are cheap, but they are extant.

Are we so lawsuit crazy that we have lost all chance of anyone taking a really big shot at this idea?  I'm not talking about the level of a Richard Petty or Jeff Gordon program with the attendant high costs.  Old, safe race cars can still be a thrill to drive, and they will feel plenty fast enough to a novice.

O.K., enough brain puking about a tangent to the subject--but it needs to be addressed sooner or later, if we are going to be serious about encouraging younger folks to enter our ranks. 

 

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Jack SSB Z4 #09

Tom and his friends at the VIR Regional started a pretty good discussion here...

Tom is maybe a good example of the younger demographic we want = someone who is clueful, dedicated to racing and is resourceful enough to find a way to race despite the inevitable set-backs.  The ideas that have been posted are some great thoughts.  Many are close to what NASA does today and many incorporate new thinking.  It is often easier to mimic something we see elsewhere and try to apply it to our own situation - but your results may vary.

What we want (it sounds like) is a Club that can attract new members who will participate regularly - here we talk about Club Racing but we also want PDX particiapnts, Club Trials competitors, Workers, Solo competitors, RallyCross competitors and Road Rally competitors.  Some have overlaps in skills and financial commitment. But our focus here is Club Racing...so here's my 2 cents.

The Class structure has issues that need to be addressed.  If we re-write, we ought to consider a phased approach where we move in stages.  An example might be the older cars.  If you set an overall age limit (both fendered and open-wheel) then we need a place for Vintage because we don't want to push some people out just on the hopes of attracting newbies, rihgt?  So perhaps we should have Vintage as part of every event - that means some Operational changes in race groups for each Club Race weekend.  Otherwise we are just going to swell the ranks of HSR/VARA, right?  So maybe we start now with a Vintage group in each Region to let the targeted cars have that place in 2009.

I agree we need to find a way to rationalize classes - and it might not mean less classes.  We might even consider a Runoffs race format where 2 closely related classes race in a single group race due to participation and/or entry levels at the RO's.  But if they still met the minimum participation rule, they could race in their class during the year.  

It means more work for CRB to keep classes competitive - and I know many opinions show disdain for that process so I ask if each of us would want to pay for more staff at SCCA in our entry fees?  Today National Races cost more thatn Regional so it would push that up higher.  If you want more immediate and just treatment you can go the HP/weight/NASA route or the Pro Racing route based on personal performance + car potential.  But that's a hard task and I'm not sure the CRB process could absorb the extra work and improve at the same time without more salaried staff.

I also think we ought to have more use of the PDX (our version of an HPDE) as a stair-step to Club Racing and Worker recruitment.  That way people can catch the bug up to their financial limit and participate as a Worker and PDX driver until they can't stand watching all the fun we have and they pop for their first race car and get a license.  There's some gold in that mine which our competitors are using effectively.  You might even allow PDX track time to count towards Club Race School track time to make that step easier.

Finally, perhaps we should get some research on what our target demographic wants - our Solo/PDX crowd as well as our external targets?

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PaulG
56 T3