Actually they look/run great!
Have seen them at OSW & Auburndale, drove to St Pete for a Sportsman show but it was rained out.
Of course, they need to run against other (Late Model) Sportsman cars.
Single file restarts are awful. We never had problems running double file restarts up north. I think Oldschool’will back me up on this example. Josh Todd had em covered at the Brann race, but a double file restart allowed the 99 to hang it out there and actually get ahead of the 7 and make a race of it. Go to single file restarts and I’m out. Are you racers or not?
Well said Old School. Single file makes racers happy, double file makes fans happy.
I go to see a RACE, not a bunch of equally fast cars chasing each other around.
I’ve always preferred dirt anyways, but asphalt becomes less interesting all the time. Too many races won from the pole. Inverts may help some, but say they invert 6, all 6 are basically the exact same speed. This produces 1 of 2 things… follow the leader, or cheap shots dumping the guy in front of you.
Excitement isn’t the guy starting on the front row winning… fun is the guy from the BACK row winning.
double vrs. single-lack of cars at showtime
Double file re-starts put me out of business, and I don’t own a race track, so I have no skin in the game anymore. you guys can say what you want, but the double file re-starts are 1/2 the problem with racers not affording to race.
In the old days, (early 80’s)They all would come here to race from up north, with single file re-starts, so it cant be that bad.
PS - ABC bodies, radios/spotters, and mirrors have RUINED asphalt racing.
Dirt guys race without any of those, and they learned to look further ahead than their hood pins.
If you need a spotter to make a pass, or to miss a wreck that happened 15 car lengths ahead of you… you’re a driver of a fast car, not a racer.
Agreed.
You know, I also like sports car racing.
The latest Daytona Prototypes (which are anything but prototypical, but never mind that…) are a little tougher, but as a rule, like indy cars, if sports cars touch, they are done.
So…they don’t. Single file restarts, “clean” passing, all that.
It’s good, in fact I am very excited to be going to the upcoming historic sports car races to help a team, but it ain’t St Pete!
Re: Mirrors…It was all going so well until then…
C’mon man, Ernie Bass could have driven the thing at speed backwards with a mirror!
The dirt guys are mostly sideways so the mirror would be facing Bubba outside of turn four and not be useful to “block” one’s opponent, I would think.
[QUOTE=Frasson118;165866]PS - ABC bodies, radios/spotters, and mirrors have RUINED asphalt racing.
Dirt guys race without any of those, and they learned to look further ahead than their hood pins.
If you need a spotter to make a pass, or to miss a wreck that happened 15 car lengths ahead of you… you’re a driver of a fast car, not a racer.[/QUOTE]
Yes, but let’s not forget, some of the drivers do not even have drivers licenses that are in supers today. Therefore, spotters, mirrors and radios are necessary.
Racing today is not like it was 20 years ago, back then you did not have a 14, 15 or 16 year old kid driving where daddy renter a super late model and put junior out there to take the green. That contributes to wrecks on double file restarts and more cautions than laps.
There will never be an answer on how to make a better show, if you qualify them the fast cars will be up front, if you invert the whole field guys will sandbag. If you do heat races there is a chance of getting tore up. I know I do not have an answer for it.
abc
Last time I check “up north” the cost to just hang an outlaw late model body, to be competitive, and run up front, was way more then a ABC body. , do you know what the lap time difference at NSS would be with a good wedge body, against a not so good one??
-Radios are a safety item. Period.
-If you think the car count is bad now, take out all the little rich kids, and your down to 2 or 3 cars. I thank god we have some kids that want to race at all, if there paying for it or not, without them there is no future in racing.
-Last but not lease, if you like how they do it up north, move back up north.
over and out, “single file, increase the car count” Vince
We’ve listened in on a lot of Outlaw SLM cars here in Michigan using a scanner and can say the radios are not used to block. It is a good safety feature. One track that does not use radios is Kalamazoo which runs the Klash and no radios. Lots of bad wrecks because cars run the bottom in turns that have a high inside wall so drivers can’t see much in front of them. Radios would definitely help save on wrecks at that track for instance.
[QUOTE=turnleft;165870]Last time I check “up north” the cost to just hang an outlaw late model body, to be competitive, and run up front, was way more then a ABC body. , do you know what the lap time difference at NSS would be with a good wedge body, against a not so good one??
-Radios are a safety item. Period.
-If you think the car count is bad now, take out all the little rich kids, and your down to 2 or 3 cars. I thank god we have some kids that want to race at all, if there paying for it or not, without them there is no future in racing.
-Last but not lease, if you like how they do it up north, move back up north.
over and out, “single file, increase the car count” Vince[/QUOTE]
If we moved back north we would be watching snowmobiles race in the winter and you would be watching gators because you wouldn’t have enough butts in the seat to keep a go cart track open.How would you like that?One needs to watch and learn from the other before all of them fail.There are good and bad things being done in both parts of the country.But NO promoter seems willing to go experience another tracks racing in another state anymore.Their used to be promoters workshops during the winter months.I suppose that doesn’t happen anymore.It probably died with leaded gas and full service gas stations.Guys used to pull down here from up north and sometimes you even had a guy or two come from florida or Georgia up north.PUMP gas and diesel prices are down a little bit right now.So how many promoters are dialing ONE DAMN PHONE NUMBER to try to get some guys from the Midwest to come down and run some of the big payout events like the upcoming Governors Cup or Showtimes big late model race in two weekends or Auburndales.I bet that’s a BIG FAT ZERO.Come on guys nobody has this thing figured out yet,you can see it in the car counts and fan attendance.ALL promoters and track owners are slidind down the same slope.Things CAN AND COULD be changed but not if they don’t want to listen and change or take the attitude move back where you came from.Thats just a bunch of lazy B.S.
If you can cut and bend sheets of aluminum, then an Outlaw body is much cheaper than going with a template body. Motors in some of the Outlaws can be pretty pricey, but some tracks don’t need the horsepower and can run cheaper engines and still run competitive.
And I have no problem with letting “spoiled rich kids” race because when I was racing in the 70s and early 80s their were guys that had more money to spend than me too.They were just all 15 years older than me.I was a kid,but a poor one.And it sure felt good to outrun and finish ahead of somebodys cubic money.
I live here, I’ll stay here as long as I very well please. But again, funny how they can do double file restarts up north without issue. They never whine about going to single file restarts. Drivers control the cars, use your heads and double file restarts work just fine. Based on the argument that you quit racing because of double file restarts, all you are telling me there is northern racers are superior. I won’t go that far, but again, use your head and double file is fine. What next, plastic bubbles around the cars?
Please, do not get me wrong, I do not think that they should not race, but that is part of the reason for some of the wrecks on double file starts/restarts, it is inexperience. On asphalt tracks especially the bullrings you really do need a spotter, crap happens quick.
I am still a supporter of having the supers, mods and trucks in 3 seperate series, visiting different tracks on a set schedule with time in between the races to do maintenance, fix,rebuild the cars if needed and a chance to build up some money to race again, then the tracks can concentrate on building their lower support classes such as sportsman, pro late models, street stocks, bombers, mod minis, kid 4cyl, figure 8’s, busses.
Racing will not survive with they way the tracks are working against each other, but until the promoters,owners decide to step up, it will always be business as usual.
[QUOTE=exnyer;165877]Please, do not get me wrong, I do not think that they should not race, but that is part of the reason for some of the wrecks on double file starts/restarts, it is inexperience. On asphalt tracks especially the bullrings you really do need a spotter, crap happens quick.
I am still a supporter of having the supers, mods and trucks in 3 seperate series, visiting different tracks on a set schedule with time in between the races to do maintenance, fix,rebuild the cars if needed and a chance to build up some money to race again, then the tracks can concentrate on building their lower support classes such as sportsman, pro late models, street stocks, bombers, mod minis, kid 4cyl, figure 8’s, busses.
Racing will not survive with they way the tracks are working against each other, but until the promoters,owners decide to step up, it will always be business as usual.[/QUOTE]
That is why it continually limps along on life support, year after year, never really thriving, until a track owner runs out of money and patience and the next guy comes in thinking that he will be the one with the magic formula. It will survive, but is it really considered living?
Have you guys considered that maybe there are fewer new people starting to race and many existing racers finding other things to do ?
I remember years ago the bass fishing community started the campaign “Take a kid fishing”. This was to ensure the future of bass fishing.
Is anyone really working on introducing racing to younger people ? Oh wait, y’all bitch about the 15 year olds racing, you’re killing the future of the sport with that mentality.
Both sides of the KidsR(ace)Us argument are valid. That is…
A) The money involved drives other cars away from the track.
and
B) The money involved is bringing cars to the track.
BUT, here is the deal. To draw an extreme, if a late model was $1000, I would have got my kid one, and a second one for myself.
In other words, you get more young ones, medium age ones, old ones, you name it–if they can afford it.
The trick is to mostly negate the money with appropriate rules. That way you get not only the rich Dads/guys, but the almost rich, maybe even lower on the scale, along with them to fill the field.
Initial investment, tires, tow vehicle, race gas, bent parts… It would be plenty expensive if the tracks gave out engines.
Another rediculous extreme, but it is really quite simple. Cut costs, get mo cars.
[QUOTE=OldSchool+;165886]Both sides of the KidsR(ace)Us argument are valid. That is…
A) The money involved drives other cars away from the track.
and
B) The money involved is bringing cars to the track.
BUT, here is the deal. To draw an extreme, if a late model was $1000, I would have got my kid one, and a second one for myself.
In other words, you get more young ones, medium age ones, old ones, you name it–if they can afford it.
The trick is to mostly negate the money with appropriate rules. That way you get not only the rich Dads/guys, but the almost rich, maybe even lower on the scale, along with them to fill the field.
Initial investment, tires, tow vehicle, race gas, bent parts… It would be plenty expensive if the tracks gave out engines.
Another rediculous extreme, but it is really quite simple. Cut costs, get mo cars.[/QUOTE]
Here is what I do not understand, We are different from up north, back home we only get about 4 maybe 5 months to race so yes there is weekly racing, but down here we race all year, why do the promoters race every saturday night and they try to run either the supers, mods or trucks. I love to race but there has to be some downtime somewhere.
A perfect example was the last 2 races of the triple crown at desoto, it has been rescheduled but… the next race would have been the week before the gov cup and the last race would have been the week before christmas. Could you imagine telling your kids that they did not get christmas gifts because daddy needed tires?
One track I visited this year started a new entry class with 4 cylinders and the track has put together several cars that people can rent and race for a night of racing. The track also a fast version of the same 4 cylinders for more experienced drivers. Seems to work and draws new drivers into the sport. Usually, they put on a pretty good show for the fans too.