With some of the top Asphalt Sprint Car teams in the country set to do battle in The King of the Wing Southeast Tour and National Tour season opener on the Florida-Alabama Gulf Coast, promoter Tim Bryant and Series Director Davey Hamilton jointly announced today the event dates have been moved forward to April 17 & 18. ?Given the distance that most of these teams travel to race with us on the Gulf Coast, we felt the high percentage of rain for the weekend was unfair to put them through?, stated Bryant. ? We know the possibility looms that the weather could change, however we simply played the odds to protect the teams from making a wasted trip?. Hamilton, an Indy 500 veteran now making his mark promoting big time national Sprint Car events, added, ?taking the safe approach for our race teams will insure their return just 1 week later, and will only increase the hype leading into this season opening event?.
They are right on the money. The panhandle forecast is ridiculous; a 90% chance of rain all weekend. The difference is they actually called me today. Me, a guy who is entered but has never raced with them before, and they cared what I thought.
My car is ready to roll in the trailer, so I get to be a spectator somewhere this weekend.
After calling to get a count they knew they probably figured the car count was going to be low so better to give a few more weeks to get the count up. Plus most guys know a restricted 410 is still going to walk the dog on a 360 especially at those two tracks.
They have cars coming from Canada, California and Washington. Cancelling on a Tuesday, in the face of a 90% unfavorable forecast, is for the participants, especially if they are towing for several days to get here.
Check the series history, an open 360 has won more races than the restricted 410’s.
[SIZE=“4”]The release was March 28th. Good thing with the weather coming in. Spoke to Davey several times and he is trying to get the Winged Sprints back to being a Major draw for the Fans. Good luck to all the Florida Sprinter taking the treck to the far North (of Florida). Should be a Hell-of-a-SHOW!!! [/SIZE]
360’s will be fine on a small track, I said tracks likes Mobile and Pensacola. Let’s see how good a 360 does there. Ask any veteran around sprint cars and they will say the same. Don’t fall for the smoke and mirror show. He’s doing a great thing for the sprints but it will be better when everyone’s on the same engine package. I think the series will grow if people continue to show up. No buddy buddy system like the TBARA, we all see what happened there.
That race usually draws teams from around the country, so it makes sense given the current weather predictions. It’s one thing if you’re Citrus County cancelling a Saturday show on Wednesday to save your teams a two hour drive, based on a 50% chance of rain, versus teams that could be driving for over a day and taking off from work, and there’s a 90% chance of rain.
Now we need these guys to get into New Smryna since the TBARA isn’t running at the moment.
If this is in fact based on a front moving through the call to cancel is correct. Weak cold fronts are notorious for stalling and/or backing up once they reach the gulf of Mexico. I applaud the decision given the travel distances involved. Calls like this build loyalty not tear it down.
Call them now or wait till all the teams waste their money on traveling for nothing… Hmmm. Sounds like a no brainer. Why take a chance on waiting their money?
It’s been raining off and on since about noon and the main line of storms isn’t even here yet so maybe they made the right call.
Mark Twain once said “climate is what we expect, weather is what we get”. But he also had a character named Nigger Jim so I’m not sure we should listen to him.
I live about 2 miles from the track and it sprinkled on and off all day from noon until about 730 PM last night when the bottom fell out, it was still sprinkling when I got up this morning. So I guess though it’s difficult, they made this difficult decision quite correctly.
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