Is club racing going to die?

another factor to consider is all of the new tracks. at least 6 tracks have opened in the last 5 or so years. the new tracks have spawned new schools and riders groups. from 10 years ago to today the schools and riders groups have increased 20 fold. 10 years ago if you wanted to ride a motorcycle on a racetrack you had to have a license and you had to travel many many miles. today you can spend an average of $200 and ride all day long at a "track day" and get more than twice the laps you would get at a race weekend, and to top it off, the laps are at your own pace and at your leisure. you can actually have an enjoyable weekend as opposed to having a race weekend crammed down your throat at a blistering pace. the only ones actually enjoying a race weekend are the ones that have been doing it for 10 years and know exactly what to do and when to do it and how much to spend on it.

my first gnf in novice ltwt twins i was in the 5th wave , i was gridded past t12 and up the hill, when the flag dropped i had to almost drag my knee through t12 in first gear and procede on to the front straight. i finished 12th i think.
its been a while since ive seen grids like that.

 

Economy for me.

Got laid-off last year. No disposible income. No more $500 weekends at the track.

 

there is only one winner in a race. There are only 16 winners per weekend if they run 16 races.

but there can be 100 winners at any given trackdays. You can be the big shot, the hot stuff, the fast guy at a trackday. You do not loose at trackdays.

10 years ago the only way to ride on a proper race track is going racing. There were no options. Now adays trackdays run on the same course as club races do, and have more dates to offer to fit people's schedules.

Trackdays charges 130-160 avg a day, and you get 6-8 15min sessions (about 5 races and 1 practice, which is about the same as a race day). The same race day would cost how much? and you have to pay gatefee. For someone who is not looking for competition, or not fast enough to win, there is no reason to go race.

and now that laptimers are pretty cheap, and you can view race times online, you can certainly find out how well you would do if you go racing. So if you are doing a laptime that will allow you to finish 20th in a WERA novice race, how many people shy away from racing because there is no prayer for them to finish in the top half?

They come back to trackdays and say "I will practice until I am faster, then I go racing".

Now you see a few fast novices in WERA/CCS who have never raced before, then show up and win races, where have they been? trackdays. How many more are waiting their chance and quietly practicing?

 

My opinion.....and it is just that....an opinion.....

1.) Ditch the Solos....
2.) 8-10 lap sprints...both days...
3.) Track days are fun....but they ain't racing......racing is the best!

 

WERA does race at a huge number of tracks some of which are AMA level facilities. I really enjoy the four tracks in the CMRA series:
Oak Hill Raceway, Henderson TX
Motorsports Ranch, Cresson TX
Texas World Speedway, College Station TX
Hallett Motor Racing Circuit, Hallett OK

But I am not sure I understand. Is it that track rental fees would be higher due to more tracks?

I could see how this would make a big difference.

 

on another note, it is much easier to get people to sign up for 6 6-lap races than 3 12-lap races. And would you pay twice as much money per race for a race twice as long?

race orgs need to worry about the profit margin, and the short race format is much better for that.

one very good example.

Last year CCS send out a survey to see if people want to get longer practices, or longer races. the result of that survey is all the sprints changed from 7 lappers to 8 lappers.

Well yesterday (at least) at VIR, we are back at 7 lappers, because (I was told by Kevin Elliot) that everyone pretty much told him they can barely do 8 laps and races should be back at 7 laps. So when they add a free lap to the races (same fee structure), entries goes down because people were too tired to enter 4-5 races a day.

So in this case, CCS makes more profit by offering less.

if WERA changes every class to a solo format, how many races would you enter? would WERA gain or loose money?

Racers have a lot of opinions and have a lot of requests, but a lot of them are not realistic (when put in reality) and racers always forgot Race orgs must do whats good for the race org first, racers second.

 

I can say 'amen' to that I've done three trackdays this year in addition to racing, and there is really no comparison for me in the adrenaline level, the competition, and the comraderie. Track days are like 'motorcycle masturbation' - it may be pretty good, but it ain't the real thing

 

I said that because the racers need all the practice they can get since we usually don't go to the same track more than twice per year.

 

Agreed, except for maybe in the area of safety.

It must be a very difficult to maintain the balance between offering an affordable product and making money. It seems as though the best plan would be to maximize revenue while not appearing to gouge the lifeblood of the club, the racer. If you could generate additional cash flow while increasing value to the racer (additional classes, special longer races, shootout type races, etc) you should be able to grow the organization in terms of participation. You have to look at what keeps people from racing. I would bet the primary reason is cost.

The title of this thread is interesting to me because I believe that motorcycle racing has a real special opportunity to grow but the window will be short. F1, Nascar, and just about all forms of 4 wheel racing are losing market share while MotoGP continues to grow. I wonder if car club racing is experiencing a decline or growth.

Motorcycles are hot right now and in most instances (excluding 205 mph tickets and stacks of dead pubescent boys every year) they draw the positive interest of the non riding public. You would think that the AMA, Dorna, and the rest could capitalize on this. If they did, it would have a trickle down effect to club racing.

I just know that this sport is absolutely the greatest, most fun, most rewarding, and challenging way to spend your life.

 

That is the very reason why I don't race .

 

i agree also. the recent availability of track days has probably pulled some numbers away from racing. those that simply want to get on the track

but in the end i think track days are good overall for the sport. allows different levels of track exposure.

 

There is also a big saftey factor to consider as well. In 8 race weekends I have seen 3 riders lose their lives and a few others seriously injured and taken away in the helicopters. I've been to many more trackdays than race weekends and have seen far fewer serious injuries and no deaths. Not that trackdays aren't dangerous but the risk level is significantly less in my experience.

 

but think about it this way, maybe you only get 10 entires per sprint race because the classes are so diverse
10 x 6 = 60

but you combine classes and now have 20 entries per race
20 x 3 = 60

yep they have school where i grew up


and, the fact that racers cannot do 8 laps is partly dues to them only having to do 6 laps regularly and they want to 'save themselves' for the last race. this is also why a lot of club racers dont attemp an AMA race, "26 laps you gotta be freak'n kidding me!, even 16 laps will kill half the field"

Honda only pays 1 race per weekend per bike VIN# because a rider could potentially win 6 classes on the one bike, right now Yamaha riders can collect on every class they enter and can also ride 'up' a class. for a while Suzuki wasnt paying a middleweight in an unlimited class

 

you hit it on the head for me. that is exactly what i did. track days for a couple years, got some lap times recorded, compared with racers and judged when i was ready to race.

 

Been doing the Track Day thing...

I have now deluded myself into thinking I'm "fast enough"... (Thank You XT Laptimers!)

Will prolly race CCS 'cause it seems cheaper overall, AND I'll be runnin' a 1K (02 R1) as a newbie.

Paying for transponders, plus (Last time I looked) slightly higher race fee structure (Thought it was ~$5 more per race - It all adds up) is making me lean towards CCS. This isn't a 'slam' on WERA, just the cold facts (Although I may be wrong about WERA costing more, my information is old)

I'd rather race WERA 'cause some of my friends do...

What do people (Who've raced both clubs) here think the main differences are between the two (WERA & CCS)?

 

Re: Been doing the Track Day thing...

oh boy! here we go

 

Cool people race WERA.


Dan and Sunny race CCS.

 

WERA is the way to go. CCS is eh.

Racing and trackdays, kinda like apples and oranges. Going fast on an open track doesnt mean you are going to turn the same time going into turn 1 with 20 other guys.

Racing has no substitute.

 

I have never raced and have only done trackdays so I can't comment on which is "better"..but how could you consider a guy who goes out on the weekends and does a trackday bad for the sport. At least this person is not going out and being a road champ on public streets. I can't see how trackdays could do anything but introduce more people into the club racing world. my 2 cents.

 

I'm with CHIP.

This way you can also run similar events on separate days.

C Superbike Saturday
C Superstock Sunday

The only downside of this is that entries could actually go down. Some people arrive Saturday (Regionals) Practice Sunday Morning, Race 3 or 4 classes and leave. There might be people that cannot do a Saturday and a Sunday. So you reduce the number of events they compete in. Or you could have Lightweight day and Medium Heavyweight day. Put the lightweight races on Saturday throw in the Formula Races then do the remaining races Sunday.

I think the solo 20's, 16's, 12's or in the aforementioned case 2's Take up a lot of time that might be better spent on more classes and more races. Now with that being said. I can't remeber the last time I saw a Solo 20 grid that wasn't well represented. So the customers seem to actually want it?