Patrick Drives a Super Late Model on asphalt #77, and he is a formitable contender I might add. We interviewed him in a pre race setting and I think he said it was the 5th race in this car. Bill Thompson builds a beast of a motor. He is also the builder of Shawn Smiths engine. You were right about the 2 series working together well. I don’t think there was a hitch any where.
There was 3 announcers calling the race, Rays, ours, and VSP’s. A whale of a job they did. There was always something to keep the fans mind occupied.
When you think about the Qualifying and heats think about the 31 cars that spent their hard earned money to get to the show. Only 30 cars started the feature, so 31 went home. Now I know from personal experience thats dis-hearting. By qualifying, heats and B-mains and last chance, it gave those 31 cars track time and another opportunity to get in to the show and I for one would feel a whole lot better about that scenario. I realize it is time consuming but I honestly think with a little more tweaking and a little more experience under our belt we will have the premier dirt Late moidel series in the country. I think we have the highest car count of any in the country now. Now these words are me talking, so its only my take on whats happening. Bob…
PS: If any of you get Stock Car racing magizine, there is an article in there about the series. Bob…
Yes it was a very late night which is really odd for our track we have a good history of getting done fairly early usaly by 11:00pm anyways…Randy hit the track about 2am for his feature race in the street stocks.It was a pleasure getting to meet & talk to Kip (egoracing) and Jim (winger),wish I could have gotten around and met more of you.We had a blast
How about wreck of the day…MiniStock(?) that flipped in turn three/four and kept on driving without so much as slowing down. Of course, he pitted shortly thereafter to change the shorts.
First, Denise it was very nice to finally meet you, even though it was brief. We had a long drive ahead of us!! Maybe next time we can get together earlier in the night.
Bob, thank you so much for the videos. Clay and I watched them yesterday and really enjoyed them. The quality is great and you are doing a good job!! See you in Waycross!!
I have been with the United Dirt Late Model Challenge Series every race except the trip to East Alabama Speedway, and I must say each event has produced a great show. The event at Volusia Speedway Park met nearly all the expectations of those responsible for putting it on. It would seem the the lateness of the hour was more than made up for by a spectacular showing of 61 dirt late models, the heats and B Mains & last chance race, capped by the intense drama of Patrick Williams giving his all to catch Johnny Collins.
People who complain about the late show have their point, but that in my mind that was far overshadowed by the response to the reason for the event: The Scott Thompson Memorial.
Joe Linebarier & Rick Anges, announcers for Volusia & the UDLMCS will be on Inside Florida Racing (insidefloridaracing.com) at the beginning of the show tonite, and of course Joe, along with Randy Dye and Billy Ausburn will be covering this event on Trackside Tonite at 8 PM (tracksidetonite.com)
We are truly sorry for the late night. We got caught between a rock and a hard place so to speak. With the storms in the area, IF the track had watered the track and a storm hit it may have put a stop to the night so they held off and the rain that did some was a hard sprinkle. They watered the track in late and got it TO wet and that made the show go long. BUT (There always is one isn’t there) the track did stay tacky and had bite, it got a little rough but it made for some GREAT racing.
As for the number of heats and Consi’s, if we took more from each heat and only ran 2 consi’s there would have been WAY to many cars in each consi for the amount of laps they would have gotten to run.
On dirt you cannot easily have qualifications early. With the temps in Florida during this time of year that would necessitate a re watering and surfacing of the track before any racing or by the end of the night the track would have been so dusty by the end of the night you would not have been able to see the cars. During the cooler months you can get away with an earlier start as witnesses when the Super Lates and Sprints roll through the area.
We do want to say THANK YOU to all of the fans who came to support the sport we all love and again, sorry for the late night.
As for me specifically, I wish it had been an earlier evening, but so be it, it was a great show with cooperation between promotors racetrack and drivers!!! I’d take that over a 10:30 show for $20 with 15 cars any day. Great job putting this together and keep up the good work. You will get more of my money in the future if you do. Once the show got going, I did think it kept moving pretty well and you guys did put on a great show for a great cause. I can’t say that I knew Scott at all, but he would have been proud of the show in his name - he would have had to been.
Loved seeing Rob Underwood and Shugart out there - brought back some memories. Anybody know was the Peacock kid related to JT Peacock?
I also have some pictures up on my site. I’ll be putting some more up in the next day or so. Clicking this link will take you right to the Scott Thompson Memorial Index Page 1.
The show ran late and things happen. I do understand. But I have never heard anyone say they wanted to go to the races to see some qualifying. They go to the races to see some racing!!! We’re talking about a big 1/2 mile track here, not a little 1/4 mile track. If you just ran heat races to qualify, instead of qualifying, the show would have been better. Don’t get me wrong, the show was great!! Yes, they over watered the track, but you have the choice to change how YOUR show is ran. WE,as spectators, Pay to see a good race. In my opinion,WE don’t pay to see qualifying!!!..So you could have changed your show to make it better…it was a great show, but please don’t make it sound like it was all Volusia’s fault that the show ran late!!! Yes, they could have not put so much water on the track, But you could have done away with qualifying…which everyone hates!!!
[QUOTE=Zeigler Racing Engines;12400]First, Denise it was very nice to finally meet you, even though it was brief. We had a long drive ahead of us!! Maybe next time we can get together earlier in the night.
Bob, thank you so much for the videos. Clay and I watched them yesterday and really enjoyed them. The quality is great and you are doing a good job!! See you in Waycross!!
Rebecca Zeigler[/QUOTE]
Rebecca it was nice meeting you aswell,Even tho it was briefley,I will meet up with ya soon again at one of the udlms races
I did not insinuate in ANY way it was ANYONES fault. I think they made the correct decisions. If they had watered the track and the rain hit the event would have been a rain out. They did not and the rain did not come. No ones fault. Volusia dropped heat races from there schedule and changed the events order to make thing faster.
Drivers want to qualify, Period. One of the events we did not qualify at we had drivers complaining and several called to verify there was no qualifying and when the found out they did not come. Statistically the events we did not qualify on in the beginning of the year had more cautions and ran longer because of it. I agree many fans do not want to watch qualifying but there were several loud cheers I heard in the infield with cars running around me when anyone broke the fast time. Nascar sells a LOT of tickets to there qualifying so evidently some do like watching it.
Dirt racing is not like asphalt and if you do qualify early the track would have been dust by the end of the night and you would not be able to watch the racing, OR they would have had to re water and roll the track after.
We as a series qualify for every race we can, it is even posted on the front page of our web site. I am sorry if you do not want to see it but some do and the drivers want qualifying. When I go to the Winter Nationals I go and watch ALL of the racing including qualifying. I also enjoy ALL of the classes and I enjoyed watching the streets and 4 cylinders after our feature was over. Then we had to load all of our stuff up. I got to bed close to 4:30-5am. Would I have like to be there about 11, Heck Yes, like it is I got about 9 hours sleep in 3 days. We give ALL of the drivers a chance to make the event, Heats, B mains, Last chance and the Main Event. That is one of the reasons there were 61 cars there and we are averaging 48 cars an event. If we only ran heats and took 4 from each it would have filled the field and MANY of the drivers that made the feature would have went home. That would make them think about coming to the next race and if it happened a couple of times they would not come back.
When we started the series we did it for the drivers and THEY put on one of the best shows on dirt, That is what the fans want to see. We devised a format that gives all of the drivers a chance to get into the feature and in many cases the drivers transferring end up faster because they have been on the track more and made adjustments to keep up with the track. If not it would be follow the leader racing and many people would be on here complaining about that.
Just wondering something here, and if it has merit:
Does this series have transponder capabilities, so that each car can be timed during group hot-laps? The UMP and WoO cars did this during Speedweeks and it seemed to work out well. They gave each group of cars about 3-5 laps of hot-laps, during which each car was timed for each lap. This way, it set a fastest-to-slowest order that was used for heat race line-ups (each hot-lap group also races each other in the heat races). It kills 2 birds with one stone, plus it also eliminates the advantage or disadvantage that some cars will inevitably get doing timed laps from car 1 through car 61.
This method eliminated time-trials, without losing the benefit that they DO provide to the drivers.
Is this technology too expensive to consider? Is there maybe a rental/lease program through Racing Radios or Racing Electronics?
It could be a solution that fans and teams could all live with!
Personally, I HATE qualifying. My vote says pill draw for heat position, and add a few laps so that good racers who pick poorly, and need a chance to move forward without bending up a bunch of equipment if they are forced into driving desperately. Somehow the Northen Modifieds can run without qualifying, not tear everyone up, and still handicap the fastest cars toward the back of the feature line-up. The fast guys still win!
I think everyone will agree the car count was great and the show was very good. But the point most of us that were there are trying to make is that the overall show was not fan friendly. Hardcore fans like most that post on the board will stay as long as possible for a show like the Thompson Memorial. However, what about the kids and the new fans? Was Saturday night going to make kids and new fans want to come back. Maybe, but most likely not. Just look at the recent major league baseball All-Star game. It started at 9pm and ended at 2am. What kids were able to see that? And baseball wonders why more kids are playing other sports.
I could have lived with qualifying if it had been a one lap timed run. And maybe institute passing points as a way of transfering to the A-Main. The ASCS uses passing points. So does the Chili Bowl. Just a thought.
We have looked at transponder systems but they require the track to have a line installed under the racing surface. The Transponders are a little over $250 each and the receiving system is not cheap. The system with 30 transponders was over $25,000. We would have to have over twice that many for a total of around $34,000. It would only be able to be used at East Bay as they have the under ground line. The system price dose not include the underground line for that price either and the drivers would have put down a security deposit for each unit in case of damage.
With the great unknown being car count it is hard to plan out an early start. One lap qualifying is an option but take away the 2 hour weather delay and the finish time would not have been that bad for the number of cars involved.
Hey Kip, I put together a few scenes for that Promo we were talking about
Sat. Call me tonight after about 9:30 or tomorrow. We have VBS every night this week. I have several ideas we can discuss. 941-322-2982. Thanks Bob…
Hey Jerry, Transponders are a great Idea but they are terribly expensive and like Kip said we’d have to get all the tracks to install an underground recieving wire. I don’t know what the answer is but 1 thing I do know we’ll figure it out to the satisfactioin of all. I don’t think we could ask for a better show than we had at VSP. We just need to do a little tweeking on the timing and presentation. Bob…
