[bill dedman]

Handicapped bowling LOOKS exactly the same as bowling without handicaps. Handicapped golf also, looks identical to "scratch" (?) golf.

Handicapped drag racing looks NOTHING like heads-up drag racing.

It LOOKS like one of the drivers wasn't paying attention.

Some folks say it isn't even drag racing.

There's a reason that NO Professional categories feature elapsed time handicaps.and, I believe it has everything to do with visual appeal.

The alternative to what we have now in the Sportsman ranks, is NO "Eliminators," and class-racing only, where everything is heads-up with no competition between different classes of cars, and a much smaller payout (than an Eliminator) for a class win.... That totally-different way of doing things would have to have begun back in the '60s before they started combining different classes for one "prize" winner. The payouts would never have been very large, so the big-money Stockers and Super Stockers with expensive parts and modifications would never have been built (no motive) and the result might have been that, now, almost anyone could afford a race car.

The "Eliminator" money would have been split up and dispensed to the class-winners. There would be NO ...... Eliminator winners.

But, that didn't happen, so, we have what we have; a "hobby," the entry-level of which requires an expenditure that includes $400.00-worth of tires, and a cash layout of at least $15,000.00 for a car and ancillary equipment, and that is for a bare-bones budget.

In this economy, the number of people who are willing to part with that amount of cash for a "hobby", is small, indeed.

It didn't have to be that way... but, it is.