12 replies to this topic

[Michael Colangelo]

Hey, PNW racers, NASA will be operating up here starting in 2013.
http://www.nasanorthwest.com

[mikea]

Certainly is interesting isn't it?

Lots of good discussion on the conference forum... for us 944 guys it's a weird one. We just dissolved 944Cup and built PRO44... now we could be running slightly slower cars but have a national field if we were to go 944Spec.

Biggest interest I see is in the SM community since it's basically the same prep across.

Biggest threat is SpecE30... as I think there's a ton of wanna-be PRO3 racers who would rather spend $10-15k on a front running E30, not $30k!

[Terrell Garrett]

This will be interesting. We already have problems with too few entries to fund races and now there will be more competition for the driver's entry fees. I sure hope a big part of their program is recruitment. Without significant recruitment of new drivers and with more and new races I see entry fees going even higher as entrant counts drop further.

Even at the cheap end of running junkyard motors in a spec class this is an expensive sport that very few can afford. It takes a great deal of time commitment and costs a ton of money to own and race any car. Because of this it is very difficult to find newbies, especially since the economy has not fully recovered. I welcome NASA's entrance but am concerned that this will cause the existing problems of SCCA and Conference to be deepened.

[Randy Thieme]

Echo some of Terrel's thoughts. I have nothing against NASA, but I wonder about their due-diligence in researching that there's already two competing sanctioning bodies in the NW and we're already hurting for car counts. Plus, corner-workers are already feeling overworked which is having an impact on the two existing bodies. If I'm not mistaken there was a point last summer where a corner-worker could have worked ten weekends in a row. That has a big impact on family life, etc.

New competition between clubs will probably not cause entry fees to go down much. I'm guessing the venues we race at will always charge their minimum rental fee so unless the venues themselves lower prices entry fees will probably stay where they are. Perhaps NASA can find an edge by offering HPDE days and test days. That's one area I would like to see some competition to bring down prices. With reference to PIR it's ridiculous to have to pay $100 more for a test day than the entry fee for the rest of the race weekend. If someone could combine a test day and race weekend into one event with a lower total entry fee, say $500, that would be most welcome.

[William Bonsell]

No sanctioning body does a better job than NASA in bringing the HPDE and Time Trial driver into the fold by running those events in conjunction with their club racing dates.. I did a NASA weekend at Infineon in early in the year. I ran HPDE and my son raced SM....it was extremely well run. There were two SM races on Sunday. A 30 minute morning race and a 50 minute afternoon race. SM was in same run group as E30 and others with split starts to avoid first lap issues. And I believe NASA actually pays corner workers...but don't quote me on this.

SCCA may be having car count issues in the NW, the opener at the Ridge notwithstanding, but, for the most part, Conference numbers have been very good including almost 200 entries at the September Pacific event. I think as traveling expenses have increased so much over the past few years, it is my feeling that most club racers, with the exception of those seriously challenging for a championship, will race closer to home if they can. Oregon guys will prefer PIR and ORP events and Seattle guys will prefer The Ridge or Pacific. NASA's entrance will provide more events at those tracks and that may ultimately boost local entries from local racers. Will close proximity and reduced travel expense trump sanctioning body loyalty? Stay tuned!

Bill-

[Terrell Garrett]

The corner worker issue Randy brings up is very valid. These people are amazing and for some crazy reason keep coming out to help us race for little recognition, no money, and only a free beer and meal. Pretty crappy pay if you ask me.

We need to figure out a better way to recruit and provide incentive to corner workers just to keep the existing SCCA and Conference programs running.

While I am all for free markets, I also realize the natural economic order. Too much competition leads to industry consolidation in the end. Three organizations cannot survive in the Northwest; at least one must fail. That is fine except there may be unintended consequences which negatively affect us all. Since apparently NASA is coming; if you want your organization to prevail you will have to be smarter than they are. It appears they are not dummies and run solid programs down South. This is a situation where smart people need to sit down and think outside the box.

Personally, I have already defected and cross the fence readily attending both SCCA and Conference events. Each organization has its strong and weak points and it seems that one's strong point is the other's weak point from the SM perspective. I have long thought that some alliance or combination would be appropriate and that is not a very popular position. In this scenario it may be necessary to ensure survival. Both are great groups and bring great things to the table.

[Jim Boemler]

There's been talk of consolidating the SCCA Oregon and Northwest regions for some time -- this could be the thing that pushes that to come about. Doesn't really fix the problem, but at least gives SCCA a chance to survive in the Northwest. If it doesn't happen, I doubt NWR will be around in 2014.

[Kyle Keenan]

I doubt NWR would just fall away Jim. With Autocross, Time Trials, and some of their other programs, the club would go on. Yes there's no point to there being two regions close together, but there's 115 SCCA regions in the country, and I doubt half of them hold road races.

[Jim Boemler]

I confess I was looking at the region through a road racing lens, Kyle. But I'm not convinced that NWR is strong enough financially to compete with a new national player like NASA. At least not on its own.

[Randy Thieme]

Oregon Region and NWR need to combine and go out of their way to facilitate getting an SCCA license. I don't mean lowering standards. I mean making sure schools are available so people can confidently expect to build or buy their car and get their novice permit all within a calendar year. IMHO that's the huge draw Conference has over SCCA - they make it so much easier to get a license.

[Michael Colangelo]

For what it's worth, it was very easy for me to get my SCCA Regional license this year using my Conference license and racing history. I got it pretty quickly, too.

[William Bonsell]

I would second what Mike says. With some DE and Autocross experience I was able to attend the SCCA school at Portland in 2010 and race on Sunday. Pretty easy. But, what NASA will bring to the table which might actually help both SCCA and Conference is their commitment to the HPDE and Time Trial program which is sorely lacking in the PNW.....car clubs offer a lot of DE days, but they are normally on weekdays as stand alone events. NASA brings those events to the track on the same weekend as their W2W racing. Thus exposing those drivers to all the excitement of a W2W racing event. Perhaps this will help increase the number of new racers which will increase numbers across the board I would think.

And as the past three years have shown me, the costs of transportation to events is a significant cost. Possibly why I don't race in Portland or ORP very often. I do not chase a championship, so should there be more events at Pacific or The Ridge, that would be a benefit to me, as it would be a benefit to the Oregon racers if there were to be more events at ORP for instance. So ultimately is loyalty to the sanctioning body more important than just racing more within a geographical area, regardless of who is running the event? Not sure what the answer is, but for me personally, I want big grids and as much racing as I can get. Oh, and I'd like not to have to spend 3 hours plus getting to and from the track.

Bill-

ps: and yes NWR and Oregon SCCA need to merge!

[Terrell Garrett]

The problem with SCCA licensing is that you are expected to make your decision to race or not race elsewhere. In order to attend racing school you need an inspected race car (not many out there to rent), full gear, etc. That is just flat expensive and represents a major commitment when you don't even know if you will like it or not. The downside is few are willing to go this path and take the risk that they may have spent their money for nothing. The upside is that you get hours and hours of great training with full passing and that is possible because you are in a real racecar.

Conference allows you to take your daily driver out and dip your toes in the water before making the investment. The downside is that you don't get the amazing SCCA training but rather only get to learn in Novice races and practices. The upside is once they convince you in the DE days that racing is cool, they have you from then on. Thus, more newbies.

Both have positives and negatives.

If SCCA is to survive a NASA intrusion the NWR merger is imperative. Also, a methodology for getting our hands on potential drivers at a much earlier stage is even more important. How that happens is for those smarter than myself to figure out.