Make Divisionals Great Again

[Steve Stickel]

"Back in the good-old-days, the old track owner would close for the Keystones. Now? Nobody even knows when these races are."

Connecticut Dragway schedule 1983, weekend of July 17th, Closed for Summernationals at Englishtown.. Those were the days, Going to the "Summers" was like being at the East Coast "Indy"

[official22yrs]

So TVD had one, over 20 years ago, was $12,000 to have it. NHRA got the gate fee, spectator and pit gate. All tech cars fee.
Only money you got was the food you sold.
So TVD gave out 10,000 free tickets, hoping to make money selling water etc.
NHRA says we own them $10,000 dollar. We switched to IHRA.

And we got over 15,000 spectators. Proved to Div 5 director Darrell, we can get spectators, to come to a Divisional event.
He told us, you can't spectators to come to this race.

[doglover44]

Originally Posted by official22yrs

So TVD had one, over 20 years ago, was $12,000 to have it. NHRA got the gate fee, spectator and pit gate. All tech cars fee.
Only money you got was the food you sold.
So TVD gave out 10,000 free tickets, hoping to make money selling water etc.
NHRA says we own them $10,000 dollar. We switched to IHRA.

And we got over 15,000 spectators. Proved to Div 5 director Darrell, we can get spectators, to come to a Divisional event.
He told us, you can't spectators to come to this race.

Noticing a lot of tracks are going IHRA lately why is that ?

[BKSG1198]

Originally Posted by doglover44

Noticing a lot of tracks are going IHRA lately why is that ?

Alot of the reasoning is what the sanctioning body is offering the tracks, when you're the new guy in town like WDRA or IHRA with its re-birth you're trying to come in and show you can do things better than the other sanctioning body. If you are an NHRA track and really have no interest in hosting a NHRA Bracket finals, NHRA Divisional or National event you might look into switching but, what a lot of people don't realize is what is covered when something happens. If you are a small track trying to count every penny, you might look into a IHRA or WDRA because of the cost factor, I talked to a track owner about a month ago and he thought about switching from NHRA and entertained the idea from other sanctioning bodies but, the on-track coverage and liability wasn't as good as it was with NHRA. I know everyone always wants things cheaper (NHRA license vs a WDRA / IHRA License, Chassis Certs, Entry Fees) but just like buying a new car, you need to read the fine print as to what is covered if you have an on-track incident with each sanctioning body.

As far as Divisionals go, I believe I touched on this before and as a promoter I talk to a lot of track owners on a weekly basis, I used to chat with DJ when Atco was open, a base LODRS event (No Alky) was a base $15,000 for 350 cars, anything over that they paid a % per car, when Alky was there, they had to increase the insurance and also the ambulance costs (Some don't realize there is tiers to an ambulance as to what the cost is)....for Alky you need to have Trama 1 Ambulance on site due to the speed an risk of accident. I can tell you I ran an event at a D1 track back in July and with a regular ambulance it was $140 an hour so x that by 4 days from 8am till 10pm each day and do the math. Other expenses, Announcer (Say you bring in an Alan Reinhardt, yes, he works for NHRA but he's actually an outside contracted employee, so he's not on the normal payroll), Employees besides the NHRA employees - you have ticket sellers, water box, staging lanes, speed shop, parking, top end, tower workers, time tickets, trash pickup, etc, etc. Port a Poties are a charge, Lights if you have to use them and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Just remember also when Alky comes in, they almost all have some sort of Gold / Silver card for finishing in the Top 10 in the Division or World. So unlike Stock / SS, .90 where you might have 110 cars show up and maybe you have 2 Top 10 National Finishers and your Divisional Champ who have Gold / Silver Cards all these guys are getting in for free along with their crew members. I believe Div Champ gets 8 free tickets, # 2-5 gets 5, # 6-10 gets 3 tickets, so if you're a low budget team and only need 2 tickets, you give 3 free tickets away to a few friends who might want to come down and watch....boom revenue not in the tracks favor, then the track also has to pay out the purse for the Alky cars basically off what is left over from us. So, when you look at the D1 race from August MG last year, Gold Rush stepped up HUGE for them to have the event because Alky was there and they along with a lot of other tracks are on the fence about having Alky at their events because of the cost and ROI especially when you only have 3 weeks to promote an event.

Like I said, is the opportunity out there to make them better? Maybe in certain areas but, it's also about the demographics, what's going on around that area at that time (Car show here, Concert there, Sports Game), the weather (too hot or too cold) and price point, can't charge people $50 for a ticket, it's got to be in that range where a family of 4-6 can go, have a good time and spend a little amount of a hamburger and soda, there is WAY TOO MANY options out there for people now. I mentioned 14 years ago about having a car show, a concert, autograph session for the show drivers so fans feel they are getting the best bang for the buck, and I got a good luck kid from the DD. As racers we could care less for most part if they had a concert, etc because we are spending time with friends after from all the BS in the world for 3-4 days. I think unless NHRA & the Tracks come together to push these events it's not going to happen, putting a Divisional Flyer in the National Dragster is absolutely worthless in my opinion, we all know the dragster is far from what it used to be, because of the once every month magazine, you have 4 National events, 5 Divisional Events, 3 National Opens results and 15 Divisionals Flyers shoved into one magazine. It needs to be a point every Monday / Tuesday of the week, NHRA should post of FB, this is whats coming up this week in your area. LODRS in Montana, LODRA at Maple Grove, National Event in Texas people will take notice.

One thing to see how all this will go will be at the First D1 race of the year at Cecil County, Jimmy just announced a $50,000 to win Pro Mod Invitational on that weekend to run with the Alky cars, so they are putting on a show that should bring some fans in because Pro Mods are big in that area.