Sunday, May 21, 2006
And The Brooms Were Silent
I have seen a number of strange things over the years at Oxford Plains Speedway. However, last night may have been the strangest ever as we used NO Speedy Dry! It may have been the first time in history a short track ran with out the necessity of drying the track from some kind of spill. My hats off the the drivers and crews for the excellent job.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
Well, it does make the evening go quick doesn't it?
I can just imagine what some drivers and crews in the stricty stock division are thinking.
Hey, we spend hours working on the car all week, we pay good money to get in the gate, and our race is over in six and a half minutes.
I wonder if those drivers are thinking, yay us for speeding along the program, or, what a freakin' waste of time.
Bill, I can't exagerate the good will you will engender in the pits if you'll just increase the high points strictly race, at least, to 30 laps.
Interesting view point. We have been back and forth regarding whether we should qualify for the Strictly race and send guys home or break it into two. So far, the view that it is better to break it in two has prevailed.
I can't imagine any drive wanting to spend any more time at the track to ride around under caution. The races went quickly on Saturday night because all the drivers and crews did a good job and lady luck was smiling upon us. We know that means a 4 hour night sometime this summer.
See FanMark's comments on neracing.com about his positive experience with the show Saturday night.
I don't hear any complaints about the field being divided into two features. The beef I get is that the races are too short.
"[expletive deleted]," one racer told me, "even the mini stocks get 30 laps."
But don't take my word for it. Walk through the pits some Saturday and ask the drivers and car owners what they think.
If you asked them what they would do if they could make any one format change, I imagine most would say make the "A" race, at least, 30 laps.
And getting to the fan who thought it was so great to get out of the track in under two hours, lets look at the Saturday night stricty stats I was able to call up on the web. Discounting 100 lappers, we find the folowing.
5/14/05
A: 1 caution (12 minutes:58 seconds); B: 0 cautions (6:25)
5/28/05
A: 1 caution (10:59); B: 0 cautions (6:42)
6/11/05
A: 0 cautions (6:09); B: 0 cautions (6:26)
7/02/05
A: 0 cautions (6:21); B: 0 cautions (6:55)
7/09/05
A: 1 caution (9:16); B: 2 cautions (14:55)
7/23/05
A: 2 cautions (15:35); B: 0 cautions (6:28)
7/30/05
A: 1 caution (12:21); B: 1 caution (9:16)
9/03/05
A: 0 cautions (6:25); B: 0 cautions (9:02)
4/29/06
A: 0 cautions (6:06); B: 0 cautions (6:40)
5/05/06
A: 2 cautions (12:03); B: 1 caution (10:11)
5/20/06
A: 0 cautions (6:21); B: 0 cautions (6:24)
So, of 22 races I was able to find, no 20 lap strictly race had more than two cautions and no single race lasted more than 15 minutes, 35 seconds.
Clearly, whatever is dragging out your race card, it is not the strictly division.
In fact, of these 22 races, the A teams averaged 0.7 caution flags per race, for an average race time of 9 minutes, 30 seconds. Perhaps counter-intuitively, the B teams did even better, averaging 0.4 cautions with an 8 minute, 7 second race time.
So, the stats tell me you could add 10 laps to both strictly races and not drag out the program by more than 10 or 15 minutes, on average.
Tell you what, give it a try. If either race runs longer than 15 minutes, I'll buy you an entire pallet of those mythical 25 cent water bottles you're forever going on about. ;)
I know you are not going to want to hear this but the Strictlys get 40 laps. I know it is 20 per race, but that is the trade off we have made by allowing everyone to race by splitting the division into an A and a B race. I will talk to some guys this weekend and see what they think.
As for the good money at the gate, what would you think if the pit price could be made the same as the front gate price? I would do it in a heartbeat if we eliminated the race purses. It is hard to pay the bills with 452 adults in the grandstand like last Saturday night.
Post a Comment