flatsics

This is no longer an aberration.
Why?
Competion from NASA, other sanctioning bodies?
Lack of interest?
Atlanta used to be big
Mid Ohio used to sell out
Putnam used to have two races, now they barely can support one.

Kansas,Mid America,Hastings,Mosport,Laguna Seca (wtf)...Mid Ohio....numbers are all pretty crappy.



Curious what you guys think.

PorscheDoc

We have talked about this alot lately here in the KC region. For us, I think this was a building year. Years at heartland park and the track surface coming apart and damaging cars dropped attendance....coupled with a poorer than normal economy didn't help. With the move to the new Kansas Speedway, we didn't know what we were going to have. Turns out the track was an absolute blast, and the facilities are world class. Hopefully the word gets out and we can turn it into a big event again. The venue doesn't get much better in terms of condition, fun, and location to amenities. Turn out was low this year, but it was a different time of year for us then normal, and it was coupled in between some other big events such as COTA and the same weekend as VIR. The guys I talked with all had a blast.

The NASA central region has just started up and are all about getting guys out racing, they have been real accommodating to everyone. They will find a way to get you on track and racing. And lets not forget about chump car. Lemons and chump car kind of started like a joke, but chump at least has turned into some serious racing. If you bring a junker that is going to break, you aren't going to finish well period. Teams are coming with very well prepared cars, have fuel/driver stops down to a science along with everything else, and there are some damn good drivers. There are some newbies as well and that is great too. It is cheaper entry level racing that honestly is alot more fun than a 20 minute sprint race. Getting 4-5 of your buddies out for some 7-24 hour endurance racing is a blast. IMHO, guys looking to get into racing are looking at those series first due to the affordability and when they find out how much fun those series are, they are hooked.

As a shop, the general race car crowd as severely decreased over the last few years. Big budget guys tightened their belts here in the midwest, and just haven't ventured back yet.

Astroman

You forgot VIR which now shares the weekend with BMW.

Did I see 23 people signed up for Kansas? Mosport and Laguna Seca with only 40-something?

I think bad weekend dates can explain some races like Mid Ohio this weekend (what a shame).

I think bad weather explains some others. For the love of God, one of these days I hope Road Atlanta gets moved to April.

Tough to say about others. I hadn't considered the emerging popularity of Chumpcar.

scott40

Agree on bad weekend for Mid Ohio- what were organizers thinking. Major family holiday. Not exactly good for leaving to go racing. The August weekend last year was much better, but that is occupied by NASCAR this year there.

Chris M.

I doubt the date was their choice. Sometimes they are forced to take whatever they can get.

Astroman

Yes I didn't mean to imply that Mid Ohio was PCA's fault. I know for a fact that MORPCA was unhappy with the "take it or leave it" date.

race911

Healthy numbers with PRC (Porsche Racing Club) here in Northern California--own run group(s)/tech/administration within NASA events.

Tom W

From the Nor Cal perspective and having raced with both organizations, I prefer NASA (by a large margin).

NASA has more race dates for us (PRC usually does 8, but you can easily do 10-11), they are not as rigid as PCA with regard to operations (much more customer friendly), and have a great refund policy if you need to cancel. We have enough routine commitment that we (PRC) get our own Porsche only race group.

PCA has few dates out here (used to be zero, now up to 3) and PCA always seems more concerned with the PCA organization than the racers. It's more effort to get registered and licensed, more effort to pay and much more effort to get through tech and registration. The guys in GGR appear to be trying hard to make it a more pleasant experience (thanks Andrew) but don't seem to be making much progress.

I know a lot of guys that race PRC refuse to race with PCA because it's such a pain in the butt. I try to support both, but it becomes ever harder to convine myself PCA is worth the effort.

txhokie4life

Well FWIW, I started in Lemons (one race) and Chumps for 3 years now.
I am working towards my PCA racing license.

The cost and effort to get into PCA racing is pretty high relative to the track time I can get else where (Chumpcar/Harris Hill membership).

You need 12 track days to get PCA qualified -- and that is hard when they don't consider ChumpCar -- or my HarrisHill membership days -- I have to burn even more family points trying to get out to PCA specific events.

Then I look at the schedule and there really aren't that many events, that I can make. The main Texas event (non-COTA) is held during Spring Break -- which is not possible for this family man.

However, I'm going to give getting sanctioned for PCA Club Racing a shot.

that's my story -- I'm sure many others have their own versions.

Mike

North Coast Cab

Totally agree

PorscheDoc

No doubt weekend conflicts play a role as well. It seems like there are so many events out there, that it only stands to reason guys will pick and choose what they will attend. Our club race is normally in April, kind of picking up the first race of the season for us midwest/upper midwest guys who have the winter blues, so they are usually fired up to come race. Move that event to June in a month where we have historically had a hard time filling HPDE's due to family vacations and other conflicts for people (and thus no longer host a June DE), and all of a sudden you have low attendance.




At the watkins glen chump car early this spring, there were I think 95 cars entered with over 400 drivers. That definitely has to take a hit out of other series. In the midwest we probably average 40 cars a race, but that is still 160+ drivers.

Veloce Raptor

IMO, date conflicts + the fact that the economy is still in the crapper in many parts of the country.

Astroman

Dang, what's going on out there in CA?

Back East, this is how it all goes down:
1) Register with a few clicks at ClubRegistration. Yeah yeah my emergency contact info is the same. Pay with a few clicks at Paypal.
2) Registration at the track: "Can I please see your driver's license? Find your name on the list and sign next to it. Here is your packet and T-shirt (usually black)."
3) Tech at the track: "First race this year? Any changes to your car? Tape this tech sticker to the inside of your windshield because it's going to pour down rain again this year."

I don't see how it could get any easier...

Veloce Raptor

For real. PCA is a great organization to race with IMO...

esscape26

Too many classes. You may get swamped by some cars if there are less classes, but I don't think anyone wants to drive around by themselves for class wins when you are not in the fastest class. Only the overall win then matters, so if your class is never the fastest, you don't go to the race.

For a classification example, for a 944, you probably have five choices of classes.

Although it may be opposite of what we are used to historically, the way to go is shown to be model-based with weight leveling the years/versions of the model. It is nice to have an individual category (series) chair, that 'model' is shown to work very well, too, with 944 Cup. Brings it to the racers.

P.S. It is not just PCA. Look at Laguna Seca race, SCCA had room for PCA and BMW. I have not looked closely at Summit Point lately, for example, more in our neck of the woods, but SCCA used to have 8 filled racing groups there back in the day. Now you can see the numbers are in Spec Miata, falling off in formula racing, etc.