I emailed all the people who run Lime Rock and showed them this thread. Will see what happens.

 

Great.. now PCA won't get any dates .. I've always liked Lime Rock, bumps or no bumps but of course I prefer no bumps.

 

At what price per day would you eventually stay away from a track? 300, 400, 500?

 

$200 is border line, any higher than that would keep me from going. At that point WG is more attractive, even with having to pay for a hotel.

 

I can't see paying more than $200/day for a race let alone DE

 

The whole track needs paving and there needs to be major safety improvements. I have seen many more roll overs at LRP and "big ones" than any other track. I won't even consider running in the rain anymore with the undulating / frost heaved / glass-cement surface. Oh and lets not forget the swimming hole that is 40% of the paddock.
Other than wood frame buildings and tower; that no capital improvements have been done to the track surface, run offs and containment systems with years of running at capacity makes one wonder. We (the racing -performance driving community) put a lot of money in the grass roots businesses of Lakeville / Lime Rock but most of the home owners do not or did not make their money in the area. I comes down to the track pressing a plan and their "grand fathered" rights, then with that in place (security) setting up the long range finance and re-building it. That Barber sold out and went and put the money right into another location speaks volumes.

 

I used to pay $75 per day when gas was 75 cents per gallon.

I now pay $250 and gas is $2.50 per gallon.

I guess that my limit is what 100 gallons of gas cost, per day...

 

They will only care when they have open days. They even have the ***** to sell "I helped pave Lime Rock" bumper stickers for $ 5. PCA and BMW clubs will need to get together to have any impact. It will make a nice little pitch n putt golf course.

 

I doubt PCA and BMWCCA pulling out of Lime Rock would make much of a difference. Though there are a lot of fine tracks here in the NE, they are always booked - heck you can't even find an open day at Pocono that's not on a Wednesday in February!

With the popularity of DE's growing, if PCA and BMWCCA pull out of Lime Rock, other clubs will step in and keep the mad cycle going.

I do wish Lime Rock would finally pave their track...

-Z.

 

I wouldn't necessarily say that popularity of DE's is growing. In my personal experience in 2005 it was easier to get into events and 2004 was easier than the year before that. Sure, 10 yrs ago I could get into an event for $90 and two weeks notice but I think it peaked in 2003 and there's been a bit of a decline since.

If one chapter does decline their handfull of dates the other PCA chapters or the other car clubs will get pick up the dates. LRP can easily recover from that. However, if several or all of the local PCA and BMWCCA chapters decide that enough is enough and decline their dates LRP will have a significant problem on their hands. That qty of dates (30+ days?) could never be made up by the likes of other smaller Car Clubs (Ferrari, Corvette, Viper, etc) or the non-marque clubs (CART, PDA, etc.)

It'll be interesting to see what the next 12 months holds for LRP.

 

When the rates were raised for 2005 and the contract issue came up, I looked at Dale's track schedule and found over 30 PCA days at LRP and about 20 with BMWCCA and another 10 or so with PDA, Ferrari, Audi, etc. If you could have convinced everyone to boycott LRP, I doubt they could have filled the days or recovered financially that fiscal year.

Would that ever happen? No.

 

First WRC/Speed, now this. Even LCMT was a little circumspect about raising rates this year. I love LRP. It would be a shame to lose her. As a friend of mine has remarked, "when you slide at Lime Rock, you're doing it on Mark Donhue's oil." I am a little (very little) sympathetic to the fact that they can't derive revenue on Sundays and that its location is in an extremely exclusive and expensive area of Connecticut so perhaps fees should be a bit higher than some other tracks.

While from what I can tell, there certainly seems to have been a rise in interestin track events over the past decade or so, LRP is setting itself up for the big sleep IMHO. This is strongly reminiscent of the golf boom of a few years back. Here in the Northeast there was a lot of overbuilding and now many of the courses are hurting. The ones without first clas facilities fare the worst. LRP survives because of its location and the lack of tracks in close proximity to one of the largest populations centers in the US. If it was a ten hour tow to get to, they couldn't get away with this. Sooner or later there will be enough product in the NE, that they will start having to provide value for $$$. Whats sad is that it is very rare that business people are smart enough to recognise that the tide has turned and the jig is up. If they react too late, well its too late and they're out of business. In LRPs case this would be a real shame as its one of the top five most historic tracks in the US and I would certainly not like to see it go the way of Bridgehampton.

 

Agreed. Bridgehampton, RIP.

Me @ the Bridge in '94:

 

Recent pictures from Lime Rock at www.improvedtouring.com. It looks like they've been busy over the winter.

 

They are doing what they need to do to hang on to ALMS and Busch North. DE participation was down in 2005. We (HVR) lost money at Lime rock in 2005, and CVR needed instructers and had openings for drivers in September. NNJR and CVR are the last to see the effects because they pretty much fill up with their own members. They both also run 5 run groups and have deep pockets.

It looks like Shattenbaum gave up on LRP. Jersey Shore and HCR were at $200. Mid Ohio was $285 for 3 days. WGI was $300 for 2 days of open tack, Mosport was $360 for 3 days, VIR was about the same. FORE!