This was all descussed at the meeting that FASCAR had yes I know it was in Daytona but I made the 1hr drive to attend. I personally don’t like heat races just another way to get your car wrecked. I would also rather be done racing by a decent time. The added laps also make for better/safer racing you have more then 15 laps to get it done. Also if you don’t have your car dialed in during practice then the heat race is not going to help. I know some people show up late and have a longer drive but I sure the fans would rather be home in bed by 11 or 12 then waitng for the races to end.
Hear hear.
That is right Edm
it was written in sarcastic. Drivers and promoters have FORGOTTEN that people that sit in the stands want to see a show. It will take a promoter that has guts and to have drivers to stand behind that person to turn short track racing around. That track owner will have to go back 40+ years and change things. Go to 2 classes. Affordable classes. One to start out in with plans to move up or stay because you can afford it. The upper class will still be a class that is affordable so that the track will keep the class big. A track that has 2 classes with 40 cars or more in each class can put on a better show then 5 or 6 classes with 5 to 12 cars each. Most of you will disagree, that’s ok, however, you know what you have now and you know where it is headed. There is always club racing.
That would take a lot of guts but I can see something like that working.
I’m gonna go “old skool” on y’all, and pass on some history here.
When we ran at St. Pete, Tampa, Bradenton, and Inverness ahem…cough, cough…(showing my age here…LOL) “back in the day”, there were TONS of classes and cars in the pits every week. (Super) Late Models, Thunder Cars/Sportsman/Outlaws, Street Stocks/Bombers/Strictly Stock, Sprint Cars, Super Sixes, Mini Stocks, Figure 8s, Mini Stock Figure 8s, you name it. Every class ran at least three heat races, except for the Figure 8 classes (which ran 15-lap features) starting promptly at the posted start time. The next heat race was coming out of the pits lined up behind the pace car as the previous heat winner was taking his victory lap. The first four weeks of the season, everyone drew for a heat race starting spot (and yes, the pill draw would put some fast guys up front, but not for very many race weeks). The finishing order of the heats was then inverted for the feature lineups, putting the fast guys in the back. After those first four weeks of racing, the points were then averaged out to determine the fifth (and subsequential) week’s heat race lineups. Then the heats were still used to line up that night’s feature (again, inverted, with the fast guys still in the back). If you missed two weeks in a four-week period, you started in back of the fast guys in the heat AND the feature. You wanna talk about some the best racing I’ve ever seen in nearly 40 years around this sport? How 'bout three and four wide with the (Super) Late Models on a 1/4-mile track (St. Pete)? Outside passing from the back. We came from the back MANY times at those tracks to run up front nearly every week, and DIDN’T tear the car up all that often. Why? Because they were racing for the season points in the features. Oh yeah - that, and (at least at St. Pete if I recall), we ran 25-lap features for $1,000 to win in front of 10,000 race FANS. I just saw on the front page that they had a “packed house” of 1,500 fans at Punta Gorda for the ASA race…? If that’s a “packed house”, I’d hate to see their parking and grandstands (i.e., small…??) My high school gym held over 3,000 people when it was full…
So here’s my suggestion/opinion:
If you’re afraid of tearing stuff in a 8- or 10-lap heat race, you should find a better driver. Or, better yet, still afraid…sit it out. Not saying you HAVE to run in a heat race. If you don’t run the heat, you start in the back of the feature. Take a four-week average of points, split the field evenly into two heats up to 24 cars in the class. 24-36 cars, split it into three heats. More than that in the class, split into four heats. For the feature lineups, invert the heat finishing orders. For example, three heats of say, 10 cars each. The 10th place finisher in each heat will start 1st, 2nd, and 3rd in the feature. 2nd place finishers will start 4th, 5th, and 6th, etc. Now, if a car or driver doesn’t want to start up front (i.e., rookie driver, new car bugs, damage from a heat race/practice crash, etc.), place them at the very rear of the field. The driver or owner would have to let an official know their intentions before intermission (or before feature lineups are posted) and the feature lineups are posted, so they can be corrected. And again, if a car/driver misses two or more weeks, they basically have to start at the rear of the field for four consecutive race weeks.
Make the “fast cars” come from the back. As a race fan, I like to see passing and action, not some “follow the leader” NA$CAR crap. Maake the drivers RACE, but RESPECT, their way to the front.
Thank you Mr. McKinley, I thought I was the only one that remembered how a real race night was run. Get ready though cuz, now your going to hear how they don’t want to scratch their car and you can’t learn anything about your handling in a heat race, and I want to be able to get home early. Damn I miss the good old racing. Fast dashs, heats, either a crack the whip or a austrailian pursuit and then after a brief intermission it is time for the features…Thanks again Rick
Amen, Jimmy McKinley. There are still places around this country that run programs like that. Mostly dirt tracks.
However, you do need enough cars to run heats. I was at a race this spring that had 3 cars in one class and they ran a heat and feature. Now that was exciting to watch as a fan. NOT!! I will give the track credit though. They had another class with only 2 cars and they ran only the feature. Needless to say I will not go back to that track until I hear things have changed significantly.
Yep, I wont let you down. Some of us are not rich, we dont have much for help or time and we have to work Saturdays. Nobody said anything about not being able to learn anything in heat races. If 9 cars show up, a heat is pointless. I can understand them if you have enough cars. I miss the good ole days too when racing got done early enough to the point where the kids could come down into the pits and look at the cars and talk to the drivers. In the good ole days as a kid that’s the reason I am into racing now.
I don’t understand how some of you racers think that having Features only is somehow a BETTER show for the fans? I understand your logic about tearing cars up (although I don’t agree with it), but going as far as saying it’s better, is a stretch.
And I suppose we should pay the same admission costs to see less than half of the races we paid to see? Maybe the fans should pay MORE to get in, so that more money can be put into the purse, that everyone thinks should be raised too!
Here in Florida, it seems everyone is obsessed with “practice time”, and feel the need to be at the track by 3:00 for an endless series of practice sessions. I grew up at Asphalt tracks as a kid, and it wasn’t approached this way at all. One practice session per class, each car ran a Heat race, and in most cases, a consolation race was needed to set the feature line-up, and a Feature. Your Heat & Consi ARE your practice sessions. If you don’t want to tear anything up, than don’t worry about racing anyone. However, if you want to make the Feature, you better get your act together sooner or later. Every Friday, Don Diffendorf would show up late, after a 3 hour haul, have to earn his way in through the consi, and raced the feature from the back of the field… and NEVER got a lap of practice any week of the season.
Seems like you guys just wanna go fast, turn left, not crash, and be paid more for it than you are now. And we, the FANS, should be happy we are paying $10-15 for a 7 or 8 division show with 8 cars in each.
No Thanks!
At Volusia this past Saturday they had a pretty good field of cars… One practice session for each of five classes (five laps)… I noted that probably 15 percent of the cars took no hot laps at all… Two heat races in each class but their new Thunder class and five features… After breaking down our camera gear and loading the truck, stopping at 7-11 in Deland, we still got back to Orlando just past midnite… Good crowd and great racing and done at a decent hour too…
Have to say the OSW show went better than expected… pretty good racing too and the fans seemed entertained… The only problem I forsee is that the show may get over TOO EARLY… Had it not been for the super long Modified feature, the whole program would have been done by 9:30!!! As it was, we were done at 10:08… When I go to the races, I pretty much expect about three hours of action… At least FASCAR is giving a try at some different things… just give it a chance… Maybe one idea would be to run heats for any class with 14 or more cars…
Maybe we should go back to running heats and features but I would like more then 15 laps for the feature. I really don’t care about the starts because I’m one of the few that don’t mind starting in the rear but dang atleast give us more laps. The other problem with starting the fastest in the rear is that the ones starting up front sometimes don’t have a clue. I know if you scared to wreck stay home but cars cost more to repair then they did back in the day. I’m like alot of people and money doesn’t come easy and right now sponsors are hard to come by. I know the people in the stands want a show and I have noproblem with that and I would like to think that for the most part I try to provide alittle bit of that when I’m on the track.
I keep hearing about people being scared to wreck but honestly I don’t see many. I mostly see people who don’t have the money to fix their cars if they wreck. I always liked starting in the back myself, it always felt better to get a good finish starting in the rear rather then starting up front and finishing in the back. Even though pointless, as a driver I never minded heats, but as a fan when there are not enough cars to fill a field they were boring to watch. If we have 20 cars at the track then I am all for it, I think that is where the confusion is.
<— SCARED TO WRECK.
Can’t afford the repair bills.
THAT’S why I haven’t raced in two years
Not to be a wiseguy, but why don’t you race anyway? Have you been in that many wrecks? Is it that much better to have a perfectly good racecar sitting there and not being raced? I can understand not having enough money to get to the races, put new tires on, etc. but to not race because you can’t afford to fix it if something happens just sounds odd to me.
You always run the chance of your car getting 100% destroyed every time you pull out on the track, that’s just the way the ball bounces.
I have been in quite a few wrecks over the years. I havent raced because the car wasn’t ready. Me and Boneman busted our butts on it last week to get it ready for Friday night. I still have a few problems with it that need my attention but I will have it back out again pretty soon. I own and operate a VERY busy business and we have our first baby on the way which makes time a commodity.
I want heat races
I as only a fan want heat races if there are enough cars in a class. I am an old time fan from years ago when heats were the norm, but there were only 3 or 4 classes so each class had it’s fair share of cars. I am a car nut so any racing is good but I can’t get my head around so many different classes, it seems only common sense to cut down on the number of classes then if you really are a racer you will build a car to suit the classes that are available. These meetings with the drivers saying they only want features are BS I have to drive a minimum of 100 miles to watch a race I want to see more than a couple features. One more thing being afraid to race because you can’t afford to fix if you can’t afford to fix it FACE IT you can.t afford to race it so quite whining about the cost. Sorry if I ruffled some feathers but I pay good money to watch and I want my moneys worth too.
I can understand about driving 100 miles but let me ask you this. Do you honestly want to see 4 car heat races? As a racer it doesnt matter to me but as a fan I dont. Thats the whole point that I am getting to, whats your opinion?
No sir I would prefer less classes with more cars in each class. Then there would be enough cars to have decent heats. How many classes are needed to represent an enjoyable night at the races? Three or four different classes should have enough cars in each class to make an interesting night at the races. I think that there are so many different classes to choose from to build a car that each class gets weaker. If there were only three or four classes available then that hoped for 100 cars in the pits wouldn’t be divided so many ways. Once again hope I didn’t upset anyone.
Thanks for letting express my thoughts.
Tom
Didn’t upset me, I like hearing others opinions.
I don’t want to see a 5 car feature either and thats all the late models had.