What can the track owners do to prevent their track from disappearing?
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Become involved with the community. Join the Chamber of Commerce, Better Business Bureau or any of a number of community groups.
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If you have a big event planned how about calling the local Boy Scout Troop or the Lion’s Club to help with parking and you can donate money to their club for them to use on projects.
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Call the newspaper Sports Department and invite a reporter out to the track. Show him the facility; introduce him to your track champions and maybe some Jr. Dragster racers. Good ink about how the events are run in a safe manner and the people who participate come from all walks of life can only help the track’s image.
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Bracket racing is a game of numbers mixed in with speed, excitement and a little danger. If there is ONE THING that drives me nuts and makes it impossible to explain bracket racing to a newcomer it is tracks that display MPH during eliminations instead of leaving the dial-ins displayed. Leave the dial-in, show the ET and if someone breaks out by .001 the new spectator can instantly see what happened.
Will NHRA still be strong enough to help local tracks and help develop sportsman-racing programs?
That is a tough question and one that we will see answered sooner rather than later. The sale of the NHRA pro division will have a huge effect on all of sportsman racing for several reasons. If the new NHRA pro business decides to publish their own weekly paper it will take a lot of advertisers with it. This will make one of NHRA’s main revenue streams a lot smaller. The NHRA pro business will have a huge effect on the sportsman division as it gobbles up major sponsor dollars as it tries to make the NHRA TV package something you can tolerate.
I think we will see a new sportsman-oriented sanctioning body come out of this sale of the NHRA pro division. It might be a fresh version from the NHRA or even IHRA growing to meet the demands. One thing for sure, I think the change will be good as it could result in a new TV package for sportsman racing. Events like the Hemi-Shootouts, class eliminations, the variety of car in Comp and S/Stock are all interesting if you are a certified car nut. If the TV producers can have success with shows like “Pinks”, “Monster Garage” and the “Motorcycle/Chopper” shows then drag racing has a great chance to find a niche market.
One thing that has to change to grow drag racing on the local level is the speed of the event.
From start to finish it takes WAY TOO LONG to get a race event done. If you can get someone to come to the track to watch and they have to be there for eight hours to see the event, FORGET IT! They won’t be back. Now get that same person there and have the whole show done in three hours and you have a chance to get them and more of their friends back again. Two things come to mind: eighth-mile racing and no delays between rounds of eliminations.
Sure we need time trials, lunch breaks, track prep and cleanup, or do we? Why not try this: One time run for everyone. Run round one. Call everyone back for round two, round one losers pay $10.00 for a buy-back (everyone can afford that, right?). After round two it is regular eliminations. Absolute round-robin for three or four rounds then from about quarter-finals on give them 5 minutes after the end of their round to be in staging and ready to go. Don’t go get them, don’t call for the racers who are late, just start the racing. The racers, like myself, who with my son race two dragsters, will figure it out.
If we don’t make some changes to the “show” we put on it will get worse and worse. I have seen car counts diminish for 10 years. Prize money is getting less and less against what it costs to get to the races, not to mention what the racecars cost now!
How can bracket racers and sportsman racers see their prize money go up?
Put on a better show that is fan-friendly, help promote the local track and work with track management to make it happen. When the track manager sees the spectator gate money increasing he will offer racers more money to make sure the pits are full and the show remains a quality attraction for the new drag race fans. Track owners are looking for more income by charging the racers additional fees for time trials disguised as dial-in contests, reaction time challenge, etc. When these options replace a real time trial and payment is not optional I think it is 100% wrong. They are emptying the pockets of the wrong people. One hand will feed the other. Local stock tracks in Iowa have been figuring it out for decades; the drag strips are just doing a poor job selling 125 to 170 mph local racers as entertainment.
Have lower prices at the gate starting 30 minutes before eliminations that DO NOT apply to race teams or their crew who show up late to race. This is a spectator discount, not a way for racers and crews to get in cheaper!
I know I can rant and rave about how bracket racing is good enough to watch as a spectator. I can still sit there and explain it to friends and they always begin to enjoy it, they just don’t understand it. If the dial-ins are left on the scoreboards during eliminations this sport is easy to explain. If they are removed to let the mph display the people will just leave, as the whole concept will make no sense to them.
I know, I rambled on quite a bit. This is a passionate subject to me and I know people would come watch the bracket races and sportsman classes. It has to be affordable, fun and over in a hurry to make it work. It will take cooperation between racers and track owners. Can it be done? I think so. What do you think?
Until next month, I hope to see you at the races in July.
