George from MD

"I respected the magazine for it."

Me too. I wish the Pano editors would take the hint. And one of the more interesting articles in recent Roundel history was the 3rd Army taking back Nurburgring during WW2. Don't know if you saw it but really great stuff.

I guess we'll always have Excellence.

race911

Isn't Roundel hilarious in the selection of letters? And THAT hasn't changed since I saw my first copy in the early '80's.

Now, for the elephant in the room question. And maybe to a wholly different audience: Is PCA really relevant anymore? I speak as a former region president (Arizona 1986), and membership director of one of the largest regions (Golden Gate 1999-2000 where I was awarded some sort of membership growth award), among other things over nearly 30 years of membership.

Just a couple of examples: a huge Bay Area Rennlist following for a social conduit, and that our wheel-to-wheel racing is done outside of PCA Club Racing.

Alan Herod

Ken -- relevance must depend on the coast. Certainly from the social aspect you may be correct; but as a sanctioning body for performance motorsports, it is certainly relevant. --- High to Over-subscription to PCA track events on this coast. All track fully subscribed and it is a competitive environment with regions competing for drivers. The same cannot be said for some of the other interests where events must be shared with other clubs to have a significant number of participants.

Geo

I thought I read right here a year or so ago that Pano was dropping club racing because the average PCA member was a priss and not interested in racing. That disgusts me because (as I've written here before) there was a time when Porsche raced every car they made and every car was made with racing somewhere in mind. The average PCA member does not even care about the very thing that made Porsches great cars.

I wonder just how many cars at Parade get trailered to the event, driven a handful of miles at Parade, and then trailered home, only to sit in the garage until the next show they get trailered to? Don't get me wrong, I have a LOT of respect for those who do Concours. I just don't have the patience to be that **** retentive with my cars. But for the love of Pete, owning a Porsche should be about the experience, not the having. For that matter, I've spent virtually my entire adult life trying to live that way - value experience over having.

If I never took up racing some 21 years ago I'd probably be on my 3rd or 4th Porsche right now. But what fun would that be? Next year I will most likely be buying my first Porsche road car (Cayman S). I wouldn't trade my racing experiences for having any car.

To me it's sad the change in demographics of Porsche owners. Too many are more concerned about having (and being seen) than experiencing.

Mark in Baltimore

+1. PCA, at least out here, is extremely relevant. Just because there are other track venues or social gatherings does not mean that the club has lost meaning. When I have the time, I do both PCA and Rennlist fun runs and have made numerous friends from PCA and Rennlist. PCA does not and should not have a monopoly and, as such, hopefully realizes that it, too, must compete to keep its significance.

Manny Alban

Interesting comment. Looking over the registration list for the upcoming Zone 2 DE, there's more rear/mid engine water cooled cars attending than rear engine air cooled or fewc. People are not only driving their late model Porsches, they are using them as daily drivers and more often than not, taking them to the track. Heck, we've got a slew of GT3's and 996/997 turbos attending.

Racerrob

Manny, you are (or were?) a National office holder correct? Do you have any insight into the original question?

Manny Alban

Yes, I'm the national secretary of the club...at least until the end of this year On the Executive Council, the President and myself are active club racers. The VP and Past President have held PCA licenses in the past. I'm working on the VP. He owns a GT3 that he uses for DE. We also participate in most everything PCA has to offer.

PCA is diverse in its interests. PCA has over 100K members in all. 57K primary members. I don't have the numbers in front of me, but I believe we've got less than 2K licensed club racers. Unlike NASA or SCCA which are racing organizations/clubs, PCA is a car club with many programs to include racing. Pano, our club magazine, has to appeal to the masses. I love Porsche toy cars. However, it is one of the lowest rated topics people want to see in Panorama. The highest is Tech articles. Liek others, I have my own opinions on what I would like to see in Pano. More articles about our members and regions. Less about pro racing and new car articles. Club racing articles? Yes and no. I love racing, but I lose interest fast when I reading articles about how Joe Smith passed Steve Doe. I rather read about how Ernie took a brand new Cayman S and went racing with it. How Jupeman bought a 964 Cup Car and what's it been like to own one. What does it take to race and maintain a new Cup Car. Human interest stuff. Do I need to see the results in Pano? Not me. I can go to mylaps.com or pca.org to find all the results I need. If I'm really interested, I can come to Rennlist and get a decent overview of a race if someone started a thread about it. Heck, I didn't go to the NNJR DE at VIR, but after 15 pages, I felt like I did

We just did a survey and not much as changed since the last one. People still list Pano as one of the top reasons to join PCA. They want more tech articles. They don't want articles about toy cars They enjoy the Mart.

Send a note to the Editor and/or President. Trust me, all are read and discussed. Better yet, write an article and submit it to Pano. From what I hear, they are always looking for content. Hope to see some of you at Sebring.

TR6

I agree on the more human interest feature focus aspect of racing rather than just listing a ton of race results. That would bore almost anyone. I like the idea of focusing on one particular race (which is pretty much what Roundel does) and make it an interesting feature with lots of great photos. Or a particular individual or car for a racing story. I'll probably never race (although I do track my car quite a bit). But the racing heritage is what made Porsche cars great and I have an interest in the topic for that reason alone if no other.