What happened with Gingerman??? Granted my past track record hasn't served me very well there but it is still a nice place to go. I looked on "that other racing series" and they are only doing Grattan. Have they gone belly up or are they not offering any dates? As well, is there any way that we here in the N.C. could possibly see a date at good ol IRP again or possibly the new GP track. Granted that one may never happen, but in a sense, if at all possibility, it would be nice to try IRP again if the availability of AIRFENCE would be applicable?
Gingerman - cost too much and we've lost money at every event. Can't afford to run there but wee are in negotiations for 2003. IRP - had less to do with walls than with potholes and unavoidable bumps (even at Nelson you can go around them). But the walls definitely added to it - and air bales wouldn't have helps all that much in T15, it just needed more room where the grandstands are. Indy F1 track - they have no interest in renting even to the AMA right now much less us. They feel that running too many events will lessen the specialness of the events they do run (keep in mind this place ran only one race a year for many decades). The NC region sucks right now but hopefully 2003 will be better.
Is there any way possibly for an extra VIR round. That's about our only chance for another venue. I still am a little confused as why they don't run North and South courses at once. Keep in mind that I have yet to race there, so this might be a "stupid" question to the "holios."
Originally posted by Mongo I couldn't have said it any better myself Originally posted by Mongo Costs to much? Wow, I find that hard to beleive. Anyway, the suggestion I have on helping the turnout at Gingerman is to make it a combined Northeast, North Central and Mid Atlantic regional round. Kinda like Nelsons ussually is. I figure most of the North Central guys are driving 5 to 7 hours to Nelsons so why wouldn't guys in the other regions I mentioned drive 5 to 7 hours to race Gingerman? Make it a combined regional with double pionts and you'll draw the entries. If you just get guys there once I know they will want to come back. Gingerman is an awesome facility. Suggestions to improve on the current NCR schedule would be to add 4/13-14 Hallett Motor Racing Circuit, Hallett, OK and 7/6-7 Road Atlanta, Braselton, GA- This will bring us back up to nine rounds and add two venues. Are you sure you want the first race of the season for the NCR guys to be the Cycle Jam? Seems to me that you would want to give guys a sort of warm-up round to shake the cob webs out after a long off-season. Hence the addition of the Hallett round. You're going to be there anyway. Looks like every other region will be at Road A in July. Why leave the NCR out? You also mentioned in another thread that you didn't even attempt to contact Gateway for a date in 2002. Why? I think you said something about not liking the NASCAR track thing. A lot of poeple like racing there. I'm just as concerned about saftey as the next guy but I don't see a saftey issue at Gateway. I don't think I've ever heard anyone complain about Gateway. Have you received compaints? I know the NCR isn't a very strong region for WERA but with the schedule that's been put together you're certianly not going to grow it.
which is part of the reason we've decided to move back down south this winter. same two tracks all year gets pretty old after awile.
I thought there were alot of complaints about 3 rounds at Nelsons for the NE region? and you were going to look into going to a different track?
We had alot of complaints about "forcing" the NC riders to Road A and needed to ease the crowding we had last year. There is no way I'll ever put a track in western Michigan on the regular Mid Atlantic schedule unless it's a Cycle Jam type of deal sorry. The NE region is based on riders form NY, NJ, NH etc.. putting Gman too far from them as well. Just as a point - DC to South Have is 666.3 miles so about 11 hours, from NYC it's 756 miles or 12 hours, from Rochester it's only about 7 hours granted but that's the western end of the NE region... Hallett is a possibility I guess but how far is it from say Indy? (don't worry I'll ook it up and see what we can do). You have to remember Jason that the vast majority of riders are nto as willing to travel as you and your Dad are (a problem I have too since when I was in Cinti a trip to Roebling wasn't out of the question, I enjoyed the long trips - but that's why we went Endurance racing). As for Gateway - they did not call us back all last off season when we tried to request dates. The have not returned calls we made during the season. I am getting the impression that there are other forces at work here given our competitors SOP that is leading them to not have anything to do with WERA so I see no point in continuing what has proven to be a futile effort. My comment about it being a NASCAR type track is that I do not like them, period. I like roadcourse with lots of runoff and when I have a good reason to not run races at a NASCAR track I'm actually happy about it. Not that it can't be run safely but I do not like the track, those who do seem to like it because it's near to them rather than because it's a good or challenging roadcourse (kind of like the Nelson uber fans - and even they have the fact that Nelson is a cool layout going for them).
The VIR south course has one turn - the Oak Tree Corner - that is really cool but it has no runoff and the access road to the SOuth Paddock is about 15-20 feet from the track and about 5 feet below it. So, a decent highside can put you over the fence - or even worse, on the fence, a lowside will put you into a guardrail (protected though it is) at the outer edge of the track surface. I think it works great for track days but don't feel it's safe enough for full racing - especially in light of the fact that the North Course is great all by itself.
Hallett is 11 hours from Indy (being the approximate center of what I'd call the NC region) so that puts it out of range sorry.
The logistics of ruinning a number of regional races in Canada is a bit overwhelming but I'll check into for 2003.
Mostly because we'd have to work with a Candian sanctioning body - which rules do we use? Who gets any profit? Who takes the hit if it's a loss? If we do a straight track rental what funds do we take for entry fees? and so on... Shannonville I know will not do a straight track rental (the owners own RACE or something like that), Cayuga might and that's what I'll check on.
I'm trying for another round there but they are booked solid. Barber - no opening until the museum and all of the other bits and pieces are 100% complete per the Project Manager last week. This will most likely be 2003.
We used to do an early april; twice I worked at IRP in a sleet storm , and at a late Aril Grattan race sunday was cancelled because of an ice storm, who'd a thunk it??? And today (Dec 5) in Cinci it was close to 70???
