A subject for discussion on a winter's day.

[Mark Yacavone]

When we did our nostalgia races, I always had a S/SS combo. Yes, a few were late model , GT type cars. But whenever I was out and about, promoting the next event, people would always ask if we were having the Super stock or A/FX cars again. They knew that they were the best performing cars on the property.
I would usually start the show with them, right after the intermission, speeches, special awards , etc. Sometimes , maybe a fast Gasser match race pair.
The point is, people who go to the races, maybe once or twice a year, want to be entertained.

I go out to a Summit race once in a while, and the first thing that happens is they start out with Big Wheel races, then Juniors, then maybe Sportsman bracket, including the duallys and tow vehicles. God bless them all , and everybody has a place to race, which is fine ...but it is just plain boring to a casual race fan who wants to go out to the races on a Saturday night. Most of the spectators are the families involved.

I guess it's no big secret why spectators come out for the "street car" and no prep , 10.5 etc events . They want to see that stuff that covers about a half mile of track, within a quarter. LOL

[Rick Schilling]

Originally Posted by Rich Biebel

One big problem we have is we got to complicated....

Drag Racing was supposed to be 2 cars line up and race to the end.
Winner crosses the finish line first.

Todays racing is anything but....

Boy, is that ever a true statement!

It wears me out trying to explain to someone everything that is happening at a drag race and why it is happening.

With all the different classes and rules, even people who are otherwise car savvy, have a really hard time grasping the whole concept.

[Rich Biebel]

Rick I gave up trying to explain it even to my old friends....that raced !!!

I show them how my t-stop works and show them my weather station and my laptop and prediction software.

I explain how it all works and NO IT ISN'T JUST TURN SOME KNOBS AND RUN 8.90 !!!! Sure at times it all works as expected. Just like every other car out there.....there are times it doesn't.....

For me the challenge in .90 racing is managing it all and keeping the car as good as I can...….and it can be a real struggle as any .90 racer will tell you.

I've raced practically every category there is/was and flat out racing was limited to Class runoffs going back many years for the most part.

[fastlane]

Originally Posted by Rick Schilling

Boy, is that ever a true statement!

It wears me out trying to explain to someone everything that is happening at a drag race and why it is happening.

With all the different classes and rules, even people who are otherwise car savvy, have a really hard time grasping the whole concept.

It can be solved by going back to the way it was in the 60s when I started racing. Run class all heads up then the winner of each class runs in a handicap for overall eliminator. It worked well before and can work again It will make more racers whos cars are not up to par work on them to improve there performance and if they don't want to they can go bracket racing. NHRA has made class racing just glorified bracket racing as it is now. The fans will understand what they are watching. And most racers will be happy.

[1320racer]

all I see here is a bunch of old guys nostagic about the way things were and perhaps when they turned on more win lights.

[Dennis P Chapman]

Originally Posted by 1320racer

all I see here is a bunch of old guys nostagic about the way things were and perhaps when they turned on more win lights.

One day you will be old to.

[Lenny5160]

Originally Posted by Dennis P Chapman

One day you will be old to.

He is old! He's also realistic about it.

[Dennis P Chapman]

Originally Posted by Lenny5160

He is old! He's also realistic about it.

Being realistic is fine some people don.t like change but we all know thinks change all the time not going to stop.

[Billy Nees]

How does any of this have anything to do with "splitting" the pros and Sportsmen? We're old, the pros are old and the B-O-D is old. You're old too Ed. Your kid, not old.

[Ed Wright]

When bracket racing came along, we lost the slow guys to that. Ended up with very small car counts in Stock Eliminator. I asked some local guys why they moved to ET brackets. "Because I have a chance doing that". Mattered if we were fast back then.

We used to have Stock Eliminator, Super Stock, and Modified Elminator every first & third Sunday's at Tulsa. Some of us also ran at Fort Smith, AR second & 4th Sunday's.

Ran off National Records then, run more than a tenth under, you break out. I was often the fast car at Tulsa, about a tenth over my own record.

Now it's all dumbed down to bracket racing. Hard to get motivated to try to make it any faster. Seems very strange to figure ways to slow it down, that can be easily undone for heads ups, which won't effect your lights.