Stock Outboard classes:

[14J]

Wat's the big yank on how long the day takes to get "over" I for one am there to race and help out and watch racing

Ok you have to be out in the judge boat longer or any other reason,- we need entries to pay for insurance cost's etc...

god i'm suprised that anyone will insure us at all, and that any community will have us period with all the attorney's out there chasing the big cha- ching!(sorry Ed, not you)
anyway RUN E'M ALL WHAT THE HAY!

I never brought up the long days, however, I could address that as an issue. What I questioned was the value proposition.

Expense vs. Racing Time

You have to look at this from the eyes of someone on the outside. Many of us can't. Most of us are looking at it from the perspective of people who grew up in the sport.

[14J]

My whole point was to bring to the table that region 10 is growing the 20SSH class DIRECTLY with the 302. We regularly have close to a full field. The way I read the future class proposal table was that the 302 was being left out of 20/B after 2008. This would hurt growth .... in 20 and CSH. The growth of 20SSH (via the 302) is helping with full fields of CSH....

If I understood John's reply .... the 302 will be kept in 20SS/B for the next several years .... which seems logical.

I've taken the general topic of growth a little further, thanks for the thread.

[14J]

also troy, some old guy's don't want to run with the 12 crazy's in say 20ssh,- call me what you want but I still enjoy a good ride, just with 6 boat's instead, if the classes were all booked up with elem's and 12 boat final's, I would be not out there, I have to be at work on monday ya know?

I don't have a problem with 6 boats. I have a problem with 3-4 classes which bring 3 boats to a race. I've seen it all season long.

[14J]

I see what you are saying, every boatracer is coming to races and spending money for different reason's and they all get something different out of the sport. going back to abcd only classes is going to far IMHO-

If I run J,AX,A,B,C,D that's 12 classes. How many classes is ideal?

[14J]

totaly agree with you on the 3-4 boats, but if they are 25SSH at least it's over fast- lol

I think we had 7 or 8 this weekend at Millville. No problem with that class on the East Coast. Where does that fit into the reorg plan?

[Steve Warnock]

Right on George!

Survival at the Club level is KEY here. Cutting classes in the SO venue will cause clubs to expand into other categories to survive,(IE MODS, Pro, OPC-SLT). Not that this is a bad thing.! Your race days will still be LONG to pay for the event.

I see it already at Big Rapids(OPC-SLT,Great Show), Grass Lake down on entries this year. BSOA expanded its Pro program at Pleasant Prairie with 125CCH. The Northeast group still hurts from membership participation. John Runne and the West Coast have to travel in a large part a million miles to go to a race.

SO Class structure will not dictate club survival or local participation. But the current SO class structure hasn't realy hurt either. I know Don Allen Jr doesn't like 4 boat racing, neither do I, but we at the club level have to cater to those that wish to participate and pay the freight. Hell, Don Allen Jr Jr got his first Pro 125CCH ride at Pleasant Prairie.

Local race programs with reasonable travel times (2-4hours) with current structures can build the membership/participation base locally. That is what we have tried to do in Region 7. Region 6 is now going to try the same formula, expanding local races. They may have to change their mostly pure stock format to get participation to pay for those expanded events. Our future 2008/2009 R6-R7 race dates may go up again each other. We understand Region 6ers hate going thru Chicago, but us Region 7'ner, tough cheesheads can get by it to race in in R6 if we want and DO! (I thinks this is a dig here)LOL

Its fine to have a plan to look at, and thanks to John R for his efforts. The plans needs to remain very flexible based on certain deliverables. If they are not met, then the plan needs to be changed or life continues as is until other opprotunities can be exposed.

Lets keep this in mind as we go to Detroit. We can't force plans! I have been there and seen that at the company I work for and they fail with out a doubt each time.

Warbs

[14J]

Steve-

At the end of the day what is to much? When does to much hurt the long term goals? I don't know the answers but I have to ask the questions.

I returned to a sport last year that was much different than 10 years ago. When we went to races growing up they were SO races. Now we spend the day watching 3 boat Mod classes, Pro classes, and in some cases Stock classes (no offense to the other catagories). In fact I often see SO guys make fields for Mod.

I believe SO can once again and should be able to survive on it's own (inclusive of J).

Troy

[14J]

Only (2) days into my offseason and I've said to much

Good Night!

[Steve Warnock]

Each Region is Different!

At our local R7 races we offer all Stock classes(except 45SS), all Mod classes and Pro OSY400, all J classes.

Typically it is a 14-16 class day. We start at 11-11:30 with about an hour of testing at vertually all races. 12:30 we start banging them out. Last boat in-next heat out. Extra bouys in the safety/patrol boats with anchor and all the trimmings so we minimized time to set a bouy if needed.

On a great day we can be done by 4:30 with beer in hand. More challenging days-6pm Max weather permitting. Social events (sat) after which the familys seem to like.

We work very hard at running a quick program. In some cases, we have even had to stretch the program so our sponsor can sell more food.

Race committes have to be prepared and patrol boat changes have to be quick. You set the expectations and the drivers will pull through for the team.


I hope this helps!

Come on out some time! Glad to have ya!!!

Warbs

[propnuts]

Here's the but...

My whole point was to bring to the table that region 10 is growing the 20SSH class DIRECTLY with the 302. We regularly have close to a full field. The way I read the future class proposal table was that the 302 was being left out of 20/B after 2008. This would hurt growth .... in 20 and CSH. The growth of 20SSH (via the 302) is helping with full fields of CSH....

If I understood John's reply .... the 302 will be kept in 20SS/B for the next several years .... which seems logical.

Keep in mind Dan, that in order to sell Sidewinder 20's that motor needs to be made the dominant motor in that class PDQ. You may be able to run a Y302 in 20 for years, but if we do it right it will pretty **** tough to win a race with one.

[drbyrne55]

Sidewinder support ...

Without getting political ..... I really don't understand who the "we" is.... in "if we do it right"?

The A and 15 classes are in need of a new power-plants.

The 302 is a readily available current production engine I believe. Yamato corp isn't going anywhere although I did not check their DunnBradstreet rating, in fact Yamato is investing millions in the 402 as a possible 4 stroke engine for 20 and CSH.
I would think that making Sidewinder "the engine of choice" in 2 classes (A and 15SS) is great support for the company. Furthermore, making it legal in 20SS to compete against the Yamatos supports Sidewinder20 to a degree ..... let it play out like the 102,302, 80 while watching the continued growth of 20SSH.

Racing becomes very dependent on one company if you allow one small private company to be the sole supplier of 3 classes ..A, 15ss, B (20ss)... something to keep in mind.

Yamato has served racing well and a little continued support in 20SS/B is probably is not so bad.


New teams like us are investing in new 400lb 20SS set ups and props to make things faster for 2008 hoping the investment has some shelf life.

Keep in mind Dan, that in order to sell Sidewinder 20's that motor needs to be made the dominant motor in that class PDQ. You may be able to run a Y302 in 20 for years, but if we do it right it will pretty **** tough to win a race with one.

[csh2z]

Dan, The primary reason for the plan is so that people know what's coming in the future in order to plan for it. For example: People buying or planning to buy a 302 should know that at some point within the next 3-4-5 years the 302 will be phased out of 20SSH. And probably be phased out of 25SSR after next season, again due to the different size boats. We're trying to do this as painlessly as possible and still open the market for the manufacturer to get results as quickly as possible. The use of the Yamato's in 25SSR has nearly killed the CSR. What we've done, has created two weaker classes. CSR divided by 2 = 1/2.

[No Smoke 820]

Hey John, I was at Millville this weekend and the the 25SSR boats with the Mercury 25XS on them looked the same size as the boats running the 302. I dont think boat size is a good excuse. The way the class is right now makes it a good runabout entry class for a larger driver or a driver that dosent feel confortable in a smaller A-B boat.

[Dave M]

Some Points

Someone is saying you have to run small class numbers to make money. Perhaps a focus should be to reduce costs to race ? That would reduce the desire to eliminate drivers who compete in the smaller classes.

And Warbs, you said R6 does not support R7 races very often. You are probably right. From the sounds of how you run a race you give testing at each race and still get done around 4:30 if all goes well. That is great. I think you are on the right track reducing the time in the day, it will help sell your race to sponsors. Kind of a hard sell to Milwaukies Best beer a program that will start at oh somewhere around 11:00 am and end somewhere between 5:00 and 9:00 pm. No structure to sell. If you can say we will start at X time and end at X time they have an idea of what is going on and can advertise times to the public.

At any rate, I guess this is slightly off the thread topic, sorry.

[csh2z]

Lou, The boats that will be used with the Sidewinder will be somewhat smaller roll-up boats. The larger drivers that have the Yamato's Should be running CSR. The new Sidewinder is only 60lbs., therefore big guys will fit well in the new BSR also. That gives the bigger guys another choice of classes to run competitively in. Currently a big driver can't race a smaller boat because we only have CSR & DSR. This applies to the hydro's also. A 200+lb. guy can hardly be competitive in 20SSH, but with a 60lb. motor overweight is not an issue. The average American adult is not 170lb.