[Jeff Lee]

From the article:
Those such as Gillig admitted that the local Modified participation had dwindled as the NHRA had alleged. Even he could see that there were fewer places to run Modified at the end than there had been when he started.

“Most of the tracks had switched over to bracket racing,” Gillig explained. “Those guys at the local tracks were itching to run national events. They were always quick to say ‘beat me and not my wallet.' The bottom line is that half of those guys couldn't shift a stick and they drove like little old ladies. That slowed them down. They went to automatics. We just didn't want to go to that.”

Sound familiar...today?