It seems to me that...Races Are Too Long

[Miss BK]

It is sad to me that "Seebold" isn't a household name all across America. When I was a kid we all knew the names of the boxing champs. Cassius Clay, George Foreman. But fads change -- I really don't know who the main guys in boxing are today. Before Lance Armstrong's story, I had no clue who was into bicycle racing. Whatever becomes "cool" is what gets the coverage.

But success does not always equal fame. We already acknowledged we will never be like NASCAR, so we then must focus on other avenues to reach success...

The air show was a huge success, but I have no idea who those pilots were, nor did most of the audience. Nor are they ever likely to become household names or famous. All we - the audience - cared about was: Did the event keep us entertained without any annoyances like dead time? Did we get our money's worth? Was it exciting enough to draw us back next year? Were our needs met? (ie: quality public address system, ample food booths, clean facilities) Was it a fun time? The answer was "yes" to all of those.

That one-day air show (approx 6 hour show) over the weekend was a GIANT success, and multiply 28,000 by $8 = I'll bet none of them had to pay for their own fuel or entry fee.

[ferv888ipba]

I have announced boat races throughout the country for the Nor Cal clubs as well as for the USTS the last 15 to 20 years. I have watched with interest as we put on great races and the only ones who see them are the racers and their families.

Yet, when we go to Depue for the Nationals the local and Peoria papers estimate that we have about 50K for the weekend of racing. Why are the nationals able to draw, yet when we race at Depue on Fathers Day weekend and the stocks race the next weekend we can not draw flies. Why I ask? Then I look at my own kids. Not one of them is interested in motorsports and in fact wonder how Dad became so enamored. They are into the computers, baseball and other sports, not that it makes them bad, but they have other choices. TV, video games, and other things keep them from looking at other sports.

I think if you had a course where you could race 5-6 times a year you could build up a fan base. Promote the heck out of it, radio, tv, newspaper, parades interviews, get the drivers inneraction with the fans going, give them someone to cheer for.

The other area would be to do what USTS has done and put about a 4 hour program with full fields. Last thing a fan, or me the announcer wants to see is a 4 boat parade. Limit the number of classes. What did that heritic say, yes I did say limit the number of classes. I know in some areas the 25 classes are needed to accomplish getting the entry money to pay the insurance and sanctions. But, think about what that 10am to 6 pm schedule does to you, the fan, and the guy who gets to run only one heat becasue we ran out of time before his second heat gets to run.

I do not have the anwers to all of this, but I do not believe we can go back to what I and all of us thought were the "good ole days." I think we need to make these the "days", by figuring out what the fan wants and give it them.

I know some areas of the country have stock, Mod, Pro, Inboard, and OPC all running on the same program and I do not argue for purity and I think neither does the fan. They want to see a well run program, little down time, other things to do, while there and we can do it.

Ray

[AOFOffice]

Ray, I agree with your concept of local racing. Boat racing needs to start at the bottom and work up. We are trying to start at the top and work down. NASCAR started at local dirt racing tracks and moved up because the local races were successful.
I live near Cedar Rapids, IA with a waterfront and a strong racing support. (usually have 20,000 spectators at a local event, whether they are there on the water front for the races or because they are just hanging out is irrelevant). Cedar Rapids asked me if we could do a 2 hour race every Thursday evening! Yeah, they came to me! I had to turn them down. Why? Because there is not enough local racesr to come race every Thursday eveing. What a shame.
I could do an AOF race there every week end. (Cheap racing to build clout and support). It would bring back grassroots racing. Why don't I? Because it is not "cool" to race an AOF race. No one gets the picture. You have to start small and build a strong foundation. Get a few more hooked into our sport,,,then a few sponsors...then put on an APBA race and be "cool." because of the strong foundation set.
Just like Danny said, we need Unity and a plan and an understanding that we are celebreties only in our own minds.
Connie

[Tim Small]

Ray, The reason we have 50k at Depue in July is simple. PROMOTION,PROMOTION,PROMOTION. Every business for miles and miles has a flyer in the window for the nationals. In June, no one promotes the race. My dad raced at Depue in the 1940s, and always had huge crowds he said. They had a promoter hired by badger state club to promote all races before they came to town. Before anything else, if your race isnt promoted on TV, NEWSPAPER, OR RADIO, you are finished. Very simple. Hope to see you in Depue Ray.

[ferv888ipba]

Hi Tim,
Glad to see you on line. I think back to what we had with DePue a few years ago for the second race and we drew flys. This year I understand we had a better crowd, but we also had the Peoria and LaSalle papers run articles and schedule, we ran 3 days of 8 ads each day, and I did a couple of interviews with the radio station locally. This is what we have to do.

I will be at Constantine and you can not ask for a better spectator course and great full fields of racing. However your point is well taken about promo. Great place to race, lots of boats, great racing and a minimal crowd.

I would love to be able to race at Depue 6x a year and promote the heck out of it and get the grass roots back together. I love the USTS concept and think it is the best, now we need to build on it.

Health is coming back hope to see you in a few weeks.

Ray

[AOFOffice]

Ray, I think I will welcome you back to Constantine the most! When you are gone they make me talk, and I am not very good at it. lol
Connie
ps, I did throw in a couple of "Holy buckets!" just for you!

[Guy]

These so called elected officers of our motorsport were in the majority self centered frauds! They defrauded sponsors, defrauded spectators, defrauded the events, defrauded other racers, defrauded the events status amongst events, lined their pockets at the expense of their own members and the clubs involved and did other clandestine and shamefull things that took years to uncover that made us here ashamned we ever got involved with such dishonesty and such low live medeocrity! The horrendous stain they made out of something good for everyone that year poisoned in the situation of racing anywhere as being "not in the pubic interest" because the public was being taken to the cleaners by elected officer of racers! Our racing community as a whole is being blamned wholey for the acts of the few and we in the racing community keep electing these turkeys because they got big mouths but few brains behind them those blathering lips!

I hear you John. Everyone in APBA really owe's Ed & Steve Hearn ALOT of thanks & gratitude for saving APBA from certain Doom and from these losers. I think most everyone here agree's with you and has some sort of Axe to grind with them as well! I know I do! Yes, they really caused some BIG problems. I think we ALL know who "they" are.

I personally do not believe we should mask these peoples names who have caused so much adversity, corruption, and huge wastes of APBA finances. Hey, they made their bed, now they gotta deal with laying in it (that is IF they still want to be involved with APBA)!

Many people (myself included) tried to warn ALOT of people in APBA (very early in the game) about Mike Allweiss, Steve Miklos and their blind gestapo-style friends/fanclub support network.
As you basically said, they used almost every low, cheap, dirty trick in the book to get what they wanted and/or to hurt anyone that thay think might be a threat to their cause (or ego's)! And Lord help ANYONE who WAS a threat, or incredibly even just had a unfavorable "opinion" about something regarding them!

The extreme measures they would then go to to deal with these poor people were incredible & abhorrent!
Many people here have seen (and/or have personally experienced) them do the following pathetic & tasteless maneuvers:
1. Improperly robbing drivers & owners of Wins, Titles and Records (ask Ben Robertson).

2. Make literal outright physical threats to people.

3. Use deceipt, stretching the truth or outright lies to attempt to destroy a person's credability, integrity, reliability and accomplishments.
I've been told that Miklos and Allweiss made it a point to do this to MANY people (myself included) at at least 2 APBA National Meetings, by subtly & deviously spreading lies and talking trash to these same peoples freinds & racing peers as well as to APBA Officers (all coincidentally done behind these peoples backs, when those people were either not attending or not currently present to defend themselves).

4. All the Offshore Officers overlooking many VERY obvious management "Conflictions of Interest" and "Internal Corruption". I.E. - other Officers also being competitors/drivers/owners. To which coincidentally later, they themselves basically inappropriately & undeservingly awarded some of themselves a Hall of Champions spot & National Titles.

5. Selfish Agenda's (it was quite obvious, regardless of what they said, that they NEVER had any cares of OR for APBA's other category's when they attempted their hostile takeover).

6. Insurmountable ego's & self-righteousness.

All of these things obviously & definetly adds up to a absolute recipe for failure.
What I STILL can not understand is, during (and still after) all of this corruption, chaos and deceipt, how some people STILL support and fight for these people and their flat wrong incorrigible ideals, values and ethics???!!!

[ferv888ipba]

Connie,
Hope that all is well. I am looking forward to my first USTS race this year. I appreciate what you and John did for the club this year. My health is good and the Lord has trully blessed me.

Guy,
I loved your note, now let's figure out a way for us to harness the anger and get us back on track with some racing. APBA has been around the block more than once with guys like that. My question is does APBA exist for us or do we exist for them?

I am not saying that they are good or bad, however is there a way for us to do for ourselves what they charge us for?

Do we continue to look at the litigation that is out there as a hinderence from moving out on our own or do we look for ways to accomplish what AOF has done. Not recommneding we go that way, just asking is there other opportunities to take control and begin to build our sport back again.

Ray

[Mike Fjeld]

Personally, I just want to race and I don’t care who puts on the race.

I have noticed that there is not one big association that covers all of auto racing. For instance NASCAR, ARCA, IRL, FASCAR, SCORE, USAC, and many others. Successful racing associations are usually run by a “ for profit “ Dictatorship ie NASCAR. I’m sure that if you ask a nascar driver if they have a problem with the France family making millions of dollars off them you would hear a ‘Hell NO” There is no voting in nascar and if you don’t like their rules you can take your ball home. This apparently works!!!

I will do my best to go to any race that a promoter invites me to regardless of the association or how much money they make, heck, it’s a lot of hard work to put on a good show and whoever does it should be rewarded for it.

[ferv888ipba]

Mike,
Right you are about NASCAR, what they have is a benevolent dictator that runs the show.

I think that is exactly what we need to do. Find someone who can sell some races, select the classes that are most prevelent in the area, whether they are Stock, Mod, Pro or whatever and pick 10 classes, get 12 boats or more in each class, run a four hour show with local promotion on it and go. Now if we could just find that guy.

Ray