Matt has his opinion, I have mine. The major difference is I actually attended all the meetings (including the Secret One) that he can only provide hearsay evidence of. Be that as it may:

Matt states, "I also don't remember any of this being as severe an issue before all of this nonsense started back in spring 2005, and now it is. Can you 'splain that Lucy? It seemed to me Florida was relatively happy and there was none of the current talk."

If you look at the SARRC rules (available on the SEDIV website), you'll notice that rule 5.4 was added in January of 2004 (which is before all "this nonsense" started). That rule, which requires that all SARRC races be SCCA-sanctioned events, is a direct result of CFR threatening to run the August 2003 Daytona Double SARRC weekend under a NASA sanction since doing so was not specifically barred by the SARRC rules. I don't know all the reasons, but back then (early 2003) some within CFR were obviously reacting to being told how to run their race program and were making plans to take their ball and go home. In that instance cooler heads prevailed, but rule 5.4 was added to the SARRC rules to close that particular loophole.

I don't know how far back it goes, but there have been varying degrees of friction between Central Florida Region and the rest of SEDIV at least since I first got involved in SEDIV meetings back in 1997. Much as CalClub on the West Coast regularly threatens to leave SCCA, so has CFR. It's not CFR being a big bully, it's more along the lines of "We've got one of the most successful programs in the country, what are you guys bringing to the table that makes it better?" A lot of people despise Tony George because he pulled out of CART and "ruined" open-wheel racing in the US, but he owned the crown jewel of the CART series and had no say in how things were being run. It's a simple power struggle (or a desire to control one's own destiny) in both cases.

Although CFR RE Rick Balderson told me face-to-face at the 2007 Jekyll meetings that it's much ado about nothing, let's suppose CFR DOES split off from SEDIV. How does that make things worse for the racers (or Atlanta Region)? Other than National drivers, there aren't that many racers that leave the state of Florida now except for those "special" events like the SIC and the ARRC (and perhaps Barber now that it's back on the schedule). I would suggest that even MORE Florida National drivers would attend out-of-Florida National races because they'd now get credit for their two allowed OOD events without having to drive 18 hours to Texas, CenDiv or Summud Point. Some changes to the SARRC rules would be required should CFR continue to want to play, but removing the scheduling conflict rules would probably make even MORE weekends available to the racer. And the downside to this is...?

At this point in time, I'm not aware of any proposals on the table (or even being discussed) to further limit the number of races any region can host. Should any come up for discussion in the future, I will contiue to express my opposition to my RE. I'm also willing to wait out the current discussions going on within CFR. Regardless of the outcome of all this, SEDIV, Atlanta Region and NCR will survive. Will it change? Certainly. Is change a bad thing? Absolutely not. Change is not a nuisance, it's a fact of life.

And Matt - although there's no chance you'll change my mind and I'm sure I haven't changed yours, I'm equally sure that you'll continue to flail on this issue until your last breath. What I CANNOT figure out is why you haven't connected the dots and put Barry Hair in the middle of the current uprising in the NARRC series.