DaveA3
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Clarenville Dragway Drivers Meeting - SOON
The plan is to have a drivers meeting around the end of November or early December so there can be a discussion on what track management can do to increase car counts at the track next season with a special focus on street cars and motorcycles. New suggestions and constructive criticism welcome.
To get the juices flowing feel free to post comments here but please identify yourself if you want your comments brought to the meeting. Also keep in mind that the track must cover all of its expenses so if you are suggesting something that has an expense component to it please try to suggest an option to create new revenue to pay for it or at least recognize it and perhaps someone else can offer a revenue generating option. Always open to new sponsors!!!!!
As an example is there interest in instituting a Jr. Dragster class to get some of the racers who left due to starting families back to the track with their kids and spouses in tow. This has been a major win for the track in PEI where they can have anywhere between 12-20 Jr.’s when they host their larger events & some racers who started in Jr. dragster have now moved on to Super Pro & Pro..
I know that a lot would like to see a track closer to the city but the reality is that it is probably not an option any time soon so until there a track closer to St John’s up and running why not try to make the only operating strip in Newfoundland & Labrador a continued success.
Bell Island may be a 1/8 mile option however if it starts to draw the car counts and spectators that we saw 25+ years ago there you can be certain that there will be negative reaction from the commuters who rely on the ferries to get to and from work unless there is a way to address this up front. This was a serious problem 25 years ago and resulted in the loss of the venue and could well become an issue again.
Argentia is simply not an option at all, the surface is shot and the weather for those who never experienced it is almost always an issue. If you like foggy, damp, windy weather Argentia is the place to be!
Important for everyone to keep in mind that Clarenville Dragway is owned by 30+ shareholders many of whom do not race but simply have an interest, it is managed by a board most of whom race at the track so it is very much a racers track. There is no one involved who is putting any money in his/her pocket quite the opposite in fact.
LET’S WORK TOGETHER TO MAKE LOCAL DRAG RACING THE BEST THAT IT CAN BE!!!!!
DaveA
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11/7/2009, 8:21 pm
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ragz28
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Re: Clarenville Dragway Drivers Meeting - SOON
Having time to race is the factor lately for me.
Some brain farting off the top of my head. Don't know if some of these have been brought up before or not though.
Maybe work a deal whereby you get a small discount from one of the hotels or cabin rental places (Maybe show your receipt from the track and get the equivalent or a portion discount off your accomodations bill?). Encourage them to advertise it at the track or on the Dragway poster or somewhere to spread the word.
Show the race cars at one of the summer car shows (and not just one or two of them). A lot of people do not realize what class of cars actually race here Clarenville and how many of them there are.
Enough people race to come up with some more ideas.
Don't know if I will be around for the meeting due to my work schedule.
Fred
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'95 Camaro Z28 Convertible
ET 13.998@98.03mph
60' 2.07
On street tires
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11/7/2009, 10:55 pm
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STAGE6BC
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Re: Clarenville Dragway Drivers Meeting - SOON
Have a spectator camping area for raceweekends with a rate for that. Alot of racers become campers maybe some campers will become racers. Maybe we could sale a year confrimed spots.I know this could come with some problems but I think there would be more good them bad.
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Dodge Challenger
No NOS 10.37@128mph
On NOS 9.45@142mph
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11/8/2009, 3:35 am
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Drvs55
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Re: Clarenville Dragway Drivers Meeting - SOON
Posted notice over on the Mustang and NFMS sites.
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2 Tons of Topless Fun...
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11/8/2009, 8:53 am
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zthis
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Re: Clarenville Dragway Drivers Meeting - SOON
I think the "street cars" and maybe the motorcycles need something different than the regular Pro\Super Pro racers. Two things
seem pretty clear based on past experience
1. These guys don't want to run with the Super Pro\Pro class racers and 2. They don't want to race every track weekend. (most seem to be satisified with their annual time slip).
That being said a Street Car Class seems to be the way to go. Instead of having a best of seven weekends as you do for the SP\PRO
maybe a best of 4 weekends series would work better either staging the class every race weekend if car counts were reasonable or having street car event weekends planned say once per month alternating between bikes and street cars. This would give these guys a more "competitive" group to race against. Lets face it, its more fun to run a 14 sec vs 15 sec street car than it is if you go up against a 6 sec dragster bracket racing or not. Cost to do this (without a sponsor) a couple of hundred bucks for year end plaques and nylon jackets.
Based on street cars from this year maybe it might be worth looking into an import shootout weekend again. Seemed like these guys out numbered the V8s on most weekends.
Maybe its worth spending more time on trying to get all these Super Pro\Pro race cars out
of the garages or where ever they are and back to the track. There's a lot of cars that haven't been to the track in years. It doesn't cost that much to make it to the track for at least 1 weekend a year.
Finally maybe the last resort may be to work with what you got and put on the best show
possible. One suggestion I'll make in this regard is to have a earlier lunch break. Alot of fans are arriving just before the break and ending up sitting through a half hour of no racing. Not what they want to see. I'm pretty much a Sunday Only Racer and I can leave St. John's at 8-8:30 and still be there before the track opens for trial runs. 10:30 to 12:30 should be more than enough test and tune Get things started at 1PM and have everything over by 5PM so everyone can get home earlier.
And then theres advertising...
I'd start with those to signs on the TCH maybe consider redesigning with big lettering
DRAG RACING TODAY 10KM> With a nice action
car shot and not the dragway logo That in itself should get some sunday drivers down for a look maybe a few in the clarenville area itself wouldn't hurt either.
We need to get results advertised better weather that be in the Buy and Sell, Telegram (did you see that cool picture of Jerry in the paper WOW!), or on radio every
bit of exposure helps.
If the rumours are true then apparently no
one in Clarenville knows theres a dragway at the airstrip down the road. If this is the case there is an untapped spectator market
that could help with revenue.
The car show idea seems to be a great one maybe one of the major sponsors could have a show and shine for the dragcars at their business lots before the season begins. Great exposure for both parties.
And finally finally...
the dragway needs an weekly updated website
with current points, pictures, videos, blogs, twitters etc. Whatever the new generation of racers is into to get the word out and for the sponsors to see some advertising for their money. I know the current site is being run for free on volunteer time but maybe a serious upgrade would be time and money well spend.
My 10 cents worth.
Curtis
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Curtis P.
1975 Datsun 280Z
9.88 at 135 mph
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11/9/2009, 4:19 pm
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rocketpony427w
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Re: Clarenville Dragway Drivers Meeting - SOON
i defintly agree with having another compact car shootout, theres a lot of quick compact cars around thats been to the track too.
i also think maybe trying a bike shootout, theres been a good amount of bikes at the track during the year, and everyone knows how much bikes have gotton popular lately. heads-up of course, could give a chance to the riders to see whos got the fastest bikes and best drivers on the island.
and better advertising defintly
-mike
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9.68@142.73 1.44 60ft. spinning, only 10psi of boost, full street trim, pump gas
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11/9/2009, 6:49 pm
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scampy452
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Re: Clarenville Dragway Drivers Meeting - SOON
I should race 4-5 weekends next year myself. Z had a few great ideas but 1 other idea is that is costs about $200-$400 dollars to race for a weekend(fuel,entry, place to sleep). I know that is a great deal compared to other tracks, but only winning a very small amount of that back if you win is kinda backwards. Somehow increasing the pots would be nice. A 1st, 2nd, 3rd prize both days would help I think. Only watching this year I did notice that just as you show up its lunch break , maybe and earlier break would help as well. Of couse its snowballs as well, the higher the car count the better the racing is to watch. Also somehow drawing out the "bell Island" racers would be a great idea. Maybe race one weekend and the second is free? Hope I can make the meeting.
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11.31 @ 118.01
1.56 Sixty foot
255/60/16 Drag radial
soon to be HEMI ...
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11/9/2009, 11:13 pm
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Workin Skinney
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Re: Clarenville Dragway Drivers Meeting - SOON
I am and always have been open to suggestions on how and what to expand the website to, something that will drag people in and keep them their interest, but as you can well imagine, not being a particularly creative person, it's often a challenge to come up with ideas to even keeping the look fresh and do the bi-weekly updates. I've often gone out in search of pics etc but get a response with about as much interest as is often shown in the local scene in general. If anyone would like to take on one of these tasks, like I know Z (and others) have a great collection of pictures, maybe someone contributing to a blog or whatever, sounds great to me, and after a recent hicup, the web hosting has been upgraded and offers us alot of new options, all of which I haven't explored yet. But we now have alot more storage there. If anyone out there has a greater skill set than me, which isn't much of a stretch, I certainly wouldn't be opposed to some help/suggestions/constructive critisms/contributions to make more effective use of the site.
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1990 Mustang LX
1980 Fairmont Stationwagon "Project Skin Wagon"
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11/10/2009, 11:58 am
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94Redbird
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Re: Clarenville Dragway Drivers Meeting - SOON
Now that the new Mustang Club is around, maybe the track should look at bringing back the F-Body/Mustang Shootout. I'm not sure if the Mustang crowd would be into this but I'm sure Bill could investigate the option to see if there is any interest. I know there will be a few more F-Bodies back on the scene next summer as well. I'll post a poll on our website just to see what kind of interest I can stir up in the mean time.
Link to Poll
Last edited by 94Redbird, 11/10/2009, 2:49 pm
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97 Trans Am
13.608@100.87MPH
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11/10/2009, 2:38 pm
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