It Ain't Easy, But Local Racing Can Survive
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09/15/2015 Frank Buhrman |
Since colleague Jeremiah Thalheimer wrote his thoughtful
article, ‘The Plight of Local Racing,’ I’ve been thinking about that topic,
because local racing has been an important part of my life for more than half a
century (ouch!), and without it, I’d have a void that couldn’t be filled.
Every year I try to take a couple of weekends to head out on the road and visit new tracks, one with an old friend and one solo (unfortunately, the latter didn’t happen this year). The variety that’s provided - 80+ tracks overall - has given me a small base of experience to make a few suggestions.
It’s easy to see that anybody can build or run a race track anywhere (as long as zoning and permitting regs allow it), and expertise isn’t a requisite. It’s kind of like the restaurant business: far too many places start off (and end with), ‘My friends always said I was such a good cook that I should open a restaurant.’ Some smaller tracks still have disgusting restrooms, disorganized concession stands, websites that can’t be trusted, and race night procedures that drag a show out hours longer than needed. Those are just the correctable issues.
The big problem for a promoter is keeping all the interested parties happy while still paying the bills and maybe even making a buck occasionally. That’s not easy, and very few promoters have formal education in such things. Sometimes those interested parties don’t agree, either, and that’s when trouble starts.
This years ‘buddy’ racing weekend was to eastern North Carolina, where we visited Dixieland Speedway in Elizabeth City and County Line Raceway in Elm City. Both had decent crowds, but neither had great fields of cars; I don’t think I saw a regular division with 15 cars at either place. Small car counts, in my opinion, eventually will affect spectator attendance.
The economy is responsible in large part for the small car counts - there’s been precious little ‘recovery’ over the past decade for the working folks who build and race cars, and I’m sure there are a lot of empty garages out there that used to house late models, street stocks, pure stocks, etc. That makes it tough for a place like County Line, which has two or three other tracks within easy driving distance running some of the same classes (late models in particular): make your drivers mad, and they’ll go someplace else. Unfortunately, that situation can lead to dividing the field into four- or five-car heat races, or at County Line, practice sessions with as few as four or five cars each. I’ll maintain that you don’t bring in any new fans with either of those. So who do you please, and who do you tick off?
I’m not sure I can answer that, and I’ll quickly add that I’m hardly condemning County Line Raceway, which seems to be doing something right, because it’s surviving and putting on a sustainable show every week. It even has a track mascot for the kids: ‘Roary, the County Lion’ (I hope I spelled his name right).
I do think, though, that there has to be a middle ground somewhere when fan-friendly and racer-friendly policies don’t agree.
Maybe somebody should try an advisory board that includes members of both, although that could just add another problem - finding time to get those people together to talk.
There ARE tracks that seem to have just about all the bases covered. This past weekend I visited Lincoln Speedway in New Oxford, Pa., and saw a packed grandstand and full fields (31, 31 and 24 cars) in all three classes running. The main feature had such an incredible finish, with four cars battling for victory, that I thought the wrong car had won, until the scoreboard clarified it for me. Lincoln has great concessions, decent restrooms, a good race program and a fan-friendly atmosphere. They had holiday weekend fireworks, too, and I haven’t seen so many kids and young people at a track in years.
My solo road trips in 2013 and 2014 had to have their schedules modified late in the going because tracks I had planned to visit closed. I can’t say which closures were more because of the economy and which were more because of correctible issues, but I know there are steps that can be taken to improve the odds, and I hope enough promoters take them that I still have choices as long as I’m able to head out on a Friday or Saturday night.
Every year I try to take a couple of weekends to head out on the road and visit new tracks, one with an old friend and one solo (unfortunately, the latter didn’t happen this year). The variety that’s provided - 80+ tracks overall - has given me a small base of experience to make a few suggestions.
It’s easy to see that anybody can build or run a race track anywhere (as long as zoning and permitting regs allow it), and expertise isn’t a requisite. It’s kind of like the restaurant business: far too many places start off (and end with), ‘My friends always said I was such a good cook that I should open a restaurant.’ Some smaller tracks still have disgusting restrooms, disorganized concession stands, websites that can’t be trusted, and race night procedures that drag a show out hours longer than needed. Those are just the correctable issues.
The big problem for a promoter is keeping all the interested parties happy while still paying the bills and maybe even making a buck occasionally. That’s not easy, and very few promoters have formal education in such things. Sometimes those interested parties don’t agree, either, and that’s when trouble starts.
This years ‘buddy’ racing weekend was to eastern North Carolina, where we visited Dixieland Speedway in Elizabeth City and County Line Raceway in Elm City. Both had decent crowds, but neither had great fields of cars; I don’t think I saw a regular division with 15 cars at either place. Small car counts, in my opinion, eventually will affect spectator attendance.
The economy is responsible in large part for the small car counts - there’s been precious little ‘recovery’ over the past decade for the working folks who build and race cars, and I’m sure there are a lot of empty garages out there that used to house late models, street stocks, pure stocks, etc. That makes it tough for a place like County Line, which has two or three other tracks within easy driving distance running some of the same classes (late models in particular): make your drivers mad, and they’ll go someplace else. Unfortunately, that situation can lead to dividing the field into four- or five-car heat races, or at County Line, practice sessions with as few as four or five cars each. I’ll maintain that you don’t bring in any new fans with either of those. So who do you please, and who do you tick off?
I’m not sure I can answer that, and I’ll quickly add that I’m hardly condemning County Line Raceway, which seems to be doing something right, because it’s surviving and putting on a sustainable show every week. It even has a track mascot for the kids: ‘Roary, the County Lion’ (I hope I spelled his name right).
I do think, though, that there has to be a middle ground somewhere when fan-friendly and racer-friendly policies don’t agree.
Maybe somebody should try an advisory board that includes members of both, although that could just add another problem - finding time to get those people together to talk.
There ARE tracks that seem to have just about all the bases covered. This past weekend I visited Lincoln Speedway in New Oxford, Pa., and saw a packed grandstand and full fields (31, 31 and 24 cars) in all three classes running. The main feature had such an incredible finish, with four cars battling for victory, that I thought the wrong car had won, until the scoreboard clarified it for me. Lincoln has great concessions, decent restrooms, a good race program and a fan-friendly atmosphere. They had holiday weekend fireworks, too, and I haven’t seen so many kids and young people at a track in years.
My solo road trips in 2013 and 2014 had to have their schedules modified late in the going because tracks I had planned to visit closed. I can’t say which closures were more because of the economy and which were more because of correctible issues, but I know there are steps that can be taken to improve the odds, and I hope enough promoters take them that I still have choices as long as I’m able to head out on a Friday or Saturday night.