Regional/IT Tour at Gateway

[77ITA]

Travis... Mac, sorry you guys can't make it. Maybe I will catch you both later in the season at Nashville or Hastings? I like this little points battle we have, allthough I will need more power if I plan to stay a threat.

[tnord]

i plan on being at hastings, but to hell if i'm towing out to some assinine race 100 gajillion miles away in nashville. oh well, probably won't be many cars to race with anyway. i wish our points race would actually take place on the same track every once in a while. oh well, maybe next year we won't have so many races on the schedule.

jeff you've got good power. i was right on your rear bumper getting a good draft in qualifying at topeka, and you were still pulling away from me at a pretty good rate. your car should be strong at the rovals (unfortunately where the bonus race is).

[buldogge]

You're kidding about Nashville...right? It's in conjunction with the Atlanta region and there will be some HEALTHY competition from the SE. I'm sure there will be a pretty good turnout even though the track kinda sorta does suck.

Of course, you seldom seem to look at the other side...How do you think that haul to Hastings looks from St. Louis...???

i plan on being at hastings, but to hell if i'm towing out to some assinine race 100 gajillion miles away in nashville. oh well, probably won't be many cars to race with anyway. i wish our points race would actually take place on the same track every once in a while. oh well, maybe next year we won't have so many races on the schedule.

jeff you've got good power. i was right on your rear bumper getting a good draft in qualifying at topeka, and you were still pulling away from me at a pretty good rate. your car should be strong at the rovals (unfortunately where the bonus race is).
[/b]

[tnord]

and here's where you're not seeing the whole picture.

go look through the current mid-am standings for all classes. now take a look at how many times there are more than say.......5 cars in the same class actually RACING against each other. happened in SRF 3 of 11 races thus far, even SM has only had 5 or more cars in 4 of 11 events, ITA 5 of 11. no other classes EVER had more than 5 cars on the same track at the same time racing each other for championship points. seriously, what kind of 'championship' is it where cars don't even race each other on track?

furthering the problem is adding the Nashville event over the MAM weekend, no matter 'who called it first' during scheduling at the MiDiv convention. so now the very few handfull of people that might actually care about points are split in two, and we further the problem of not actually holding races, but rather parade laps for race cars. and btw, in regards to mid-am points, even if a MiDiv driver finishes 8th behind 7 SE drivers, he still gets 12pts because he is the first Mid-Am car to finish.

and yes, the hastings thing SUCKS for you guys way the heck over there, just like Memphis sucks for me, and i really don't expect to see many people from eastern midiv. as much as i don't like it, i'd be making the tow to STL/Memphis if we didn't have so many weekends on the calendar. but as we have it now, if i want to go racing/need points/whatever and this weekend's race is at Nashville/STL/MEM, i'm not going because all i have to do is wait a week or two and there will be another race much closer to home, saving me hundreds of dollars on fuel costs. i can get my 6 races in without hardly ever leaving my little area, same for you guys over there. it makes for a poor race on track, a poor social atmosphere in the paddock, and a poor financial situation for the regions.

cut about 5 weekends from our regional schedule and i'd bet you'd see more people from Kansas/Oklahoma/Omaha over in Illinois and Tennessee, and vice versa.

[OTLimit]

Of course, you seldom seem to look at the other side...How do you think that haul to Hastings looks from St. Louis...???
[/b]

We're thinking it looks pretty good. Chris' grandmother lives about 5 minutes from the track and is really excited about finally being able to see Chris race. He will definitely be there.

[IPRESS]

I got idea SOWDIV only has about teo weekends a year where regional only racers get to rae both days. MIDDIV think they have too many. SELL

[bldn10]

We obviously have some track location issues in the MiDiv. W/ Hastings on board the de facto Western Subdivision drivers have no need to cross the Iowa/Missouri/Ark. western state lines w/ 4 tracks. St. Louis and especially Memphis are now even more isolated. We will need some rules to spread fewer events around the Division and, hopefully, foster more head-to-head competition.

[tnord]

don't forget the new iowa speedway. something will likely happen with that as well. seems like it should be a cendiv/GLdiv race to me, but then again....all the Des Moines crew are MiDiv guys.

[OTLimit]

The answer is to cut back on the number of weekends. No one in Midiv will deny that allowing the IT drivers an opportunity to drive on both days is good thing for both the regions and the drivers. However, if the collective racing groups continue to demand the same number of races year after year, nothing good is going to happen.

For example, St Louis currently holds 4 weekends, including a super-school / regional, two regional/nationals, and a double regional (but only one race for points). One of these weekends needs to go (I'll say it because you're not likely to hear it from anyone else).

The Topeka group is going to have to make some hard decisions; they had 4 weekends this year, including two single Nationals with no IT. Entries for the June event were way down from last year.

MAM had three, but one of them is a school/regional.

Hallett and Memphis are both down to 2, which seems okay, but neither group is doing a school (and probably don't need to, but it would be nice).

Ideally, we would find a way to do a super school with a double regional; entries would be up, and it would be more of an incentive to hold the school, plus more regional drivers would show up because of a two race weekend. I can't really justify driving from St Louis to MAM for a single IT race, and I'm sure there are a lot of others who feel the same way about driving to Hallett or Memphis for a single race.

[Speed Raycer]

For example, St Louis currently holds 4 weekends, including a super-school / regional, two regional/nationals, and a double regional (but only one race for points). One of these weekends needs to go (I'll say it because you're not likely to hear it from anyone else).
[/b]

I'll second that! We've become oversaturated. It's great to have all of the new tracks available, but there's still only the same pot of drivers to pull from. Sure, more are added every year, but I'd guess that it's balanced out by the guys that get out (either permenantly or temporarily).

Nobody seems to want to give up their piece of the pie (races), even though the slices (driver entries) are getting smaller and smaller and the price (track fees) stays the same. A couple of bad race weekends and any region will be hurting BIGTIME.

It'll be interesting to see how many ITers show up for this bonus race weekend.

[tnord]

I'll second that! We've become oversaturated. It's great to have all of the new tracks available, but there's still only the same pot of drivers to pull from. Sure, more are added every year, but I'd guess that it's balanced out by the guys that get out (either permenantly or temporarily).

Nobody seems to want to give up their piece of the pie (races), even though the slices (driver entries) are getting smaller and smaller and the price (track fees) stays the same. A couple of bad race weekends and any region will be hurting BIGTIME.

It'll be interesting to see how many ITers show up for this bonus race weekend.
[/b]

i'm guessing the problem will get worse before it gets better.

from what i'm told, KVRG already has tentative plans to add back IT races to the national races next year. i believe we will also drop a weekend.

KVRG lost their ass on the school/regional, and i'm guessing the dbl regional as well. my guess is the dbl in july will be gone and moved back to a couple weeks after the STL super school to provide a fast track to a national liscense.

[buldogge]

We agree completely on these points.

Why do you think I haven't been "racing". There's no race in showing up to lap with 1 or 2 other ITS cars especially new-builds, rookies, etc.

The only dates I get a race at are those where Bill shows up...and I screwed up by missing Hallett.

Hopefully...points aside...the RACING will be better at Nashville, simply because of stronger entries (I'm referring to ITS at least).

We shall see...

and here's where you're not seeing the whole picture.

go look through the current mid-am standings for all classes. now take a look at how many times there are more than say.......5 cars in the same class actually RACING against each other. happened in SRF 3 of 11 races thus far, even SM has only had 5 or more cars in 4 of 11 events, ITA 5 of 11. no other classes EVER had more than 5 cars on the same track at the same time racing each other for championship points. seriously, what kind of 'championship' is it where cars don't even race each other on track?

furthering the problem is adding the Nashville event over the MAM weekend, no matter 'who called it first' during scheduling at the MiDiv convention. so now the very few handfull of people that might actually care about points are split in two, and we further the problem of not actually holding races, but rather parade laps for race cars. and btw, in regards to mid-am points, even if a MiDiv driver finishes 8th behind 7 SE drivers, he still gets 12pts because he is the first Mid-Am car to finish.

and yes, the hastings thing SUCKS for you guys way the heck over there, just like Memphis sucks for me, and i really don't expect to see many people from eastern midiv. as much as i don't like it, i'd be making the tow to STL/Memphis if we didn't have so many weekends on the calendar. but as we have it now, if i want to go racing/need points/whatever and this weekend's race is at Nashville/STL/MEM, i'm not going because all i have to do is wait a week or two and there will be another race much closer to home, saving me hundreds of dollars on fuel costs. i can get my 6 races in without hardly ever leaving my little area, same for you guys over there. it makes for a poor race on track, a poor social atmosphere in the paddock, and a poor financial situation for the regions.

cut about 5 weekends from our regional schedule and i'd bet you'd see more people from Kansas/Oklahoma/Omaha over in Illinois and Tennessee, and vice versa.
[/b]

[JIgou]

I know a bunch of you know this already....but PLEASE let your RE and local race groups know about the conversation and feelings regarding too many events. The folks organizing and putting on the races need to understand that even the racers are getting spread too thin.

Jarrod

[tnord]

a link to a list of all MiDiv REs;

http://www.midiv.org/Code/RE_Editor.htm

[77ITA]

jeff you've got good power. i was right on your rear bumper getting a good draft in qualifying at topeka, and you were still pulling away from me at a pretty good rate. your car should be strong at the rovals (unfortunately where the bonus race is).
[/b]

Thanks Travis. I probably do have a few horsepower on some of the Miatas, but not enough to make up for my complete inability to get the car through the turns. I generally do well at gateway and I'm looking forward to going out on wider tires this weekend to (hopefully) grab some much needed points.

[m glassburner]

I'll be there in a rented ssc neon...mike

[IPRESS]

Good Luck to ya Flip!

Keep the tires out of the air.

Mac

[Speed Raycer]

now that was hawt.... and I wasn't even driving today!

[IPRESS]

RESULTS PLEASE

[tnord]

i texted you the results mac.

as much as i you and i will hate it, congrats to jeff for the win.

1) Jeff Seelig
2) Jim Lorenzetti

talked to jim tonight, and he said his car was cutting out when it got hot. he's thinking it's the dizzy, apparantly a common honda problem.

not sure from here, but i THINK

3) Todd Prather

Denton won the dash.

stay cool tomorrow fellas.