JamesHigdon

So backstory; sending my daily driver truck for paint work and I needed a beater to get around town in while it was gone. My requirements where 4 doors, RWD, V8 (or a really good V6), sporty, reliable, new/nice enough my wife would drive it and cheap. I had $3-4k to spend because again this was just a temp car. My list of possibilities? Q45, M45, M35, LS400, LS430, 550i, E430, Crown Vic, TownCar, Marquis, Caprice (LT1 Era), Charger, Chrysler 300, 1st gen CTS-V (they can be had in that range if you look), V6 CTS, STS and some cars I’m sure I’m forgetting. I ended up with an 80k mile, 05 STS V8 with zero real needs for less than my budget. I like it so much I bought another ‘08 with more options but a bad motor and I’m building a Northstar V8 with some performance parts for it. These cars are incredibly cheap to buy, ridiculously cheap to modify and can reliably make as much power as a healthy 350/351/360. So why are we limited to guys racing 35 year old cars no one under the age of 25 has ever seen on the street? With so many options why did we stop advancing with the evolution of what the public is driving? How hard would it really be to form a class where the requirements are must be fuel injected from the factory, must be 4 doors and can not be a “performance model” (no V series caddies, no AMGs, no Ms, etc). The average 35 year old Mechanic (my age) is much more comfortable with a laptop tuning injector rates than a screw driver dialing in a 500 Holley. I think it would be much easier to get younger people into circle track racing if they gave a damn about the cars on the track. What am I missing here?

That persons exists and so does the business model; it has to be someone willing to look past what the past offered. The fact that Texas is building club level kart tracks, building/expanding world class road courses (more road courses have been built and upgraded in TX in the last decade than any other kind of track and they are the most expensive to build/operate) and tracks like I37 are thriving is a sign that racing isn’t dead but rather that specific ways of doing it are. The days of a paved circle track running 3 classes every Saturday night and being a viable business are gone. The days of fans paying to see 13-14 G-Bodies chase each other around a half mile track are gone. I will tell you part of the reason SAS sits right now is that it was proven very difficult logistically to pave the infield (which would allow for much more varied kinds of racing). With the right mayor and city council, the right money and the right vision SAS would be viable; tracks much worse off and in much worse locations have been brought back...but a track that integrated road racing, AutoX, drifting, RallyX and events (think Christmas Lights, Concerts, scholastic competitions) into its initial design would be much easier to make viable.

Sounds like a lot of fun! I get the feeling my generation may have missed the golden age of that kind of racing; going to support our local dirt tracks and try some road racing coming up to see how that shakes out.

No offense taken at all; I’ve learned you’re typically pretty much spot on with your assessments. The foundation of these projects is difficult; investors say “see what kind of support is out there and we can make educated plans from there” but as soon as you reach out the person who is doing the reaching is on the hook so to speak. As you well know there’s a ton of time to invest in these projects and it’s easy to get drawn into spending a almost uncountable hours on them. My oldest is starting in a kart this year I picked up a TAG kart for myself so my days of having time to chase after asphalt circle track dreams is limited...I’m going to focus on using what we have an enjoying the packed dirt tracks.

Misunderstanding, Reb wasn't referring to me or the ACM project...Apparently Shelma from that Scam had a "James"... Whoops! Thanks.

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The previous owner of ACM had every intent, the will and the money to back up the projects he was working on before he passed.

The owner of the property passed, the track was sold and all the time and effort many people spent on multiple projects out there went away.

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Wouldn’t it be great if the asphalt crowd could get their _ _ _ _ together and put on racing in Texas like the dirt guys do here or like the asphalt guys do in other parts of the country? Alaska can support a full time asphalt race track and TX can’t? This is pathetic.

🤣😂🤣😂 You didn’t just drink the cool aid you dunked your whole head in it and let it soak in, yea? Here, I have something for you. https://www.change.org/p/the-supreme-court-of-the-united-states-recount-or-revote-the-entire-2020-presidential-election?utm_content=cl_sharecopy_25665851_en-US%3A0&recruiter=1002340587&recruited_by_id=3b083b20-d05a-11e9-9559-8307566812cd&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=copylink&utm_campaign=psf_combo_share_abi&utm_term=psf_combo_share_initial

I suspect roughly this conversation is had more than once by more than one group of people every day.

There are a TON of those cars out there; from old SAS charger style cars to THR/SAS style Latemodels and everything in-between. The only reference point needed would be the CTS Street Stocks; you had everything from limited latemodels to Chargers to Outlaw Superstocks running the same class and running up front due to the way the rules where staggered. I know the Outlaw Super Stock is popular in the South East and that allows Houston racers to run in Florida/Alabama but in South/Central TX the cars sitting in garages on jack stands are all stock stub, steel bodied cars with the occasional NASCAR Latemodel Stock. I did the research in '18 and at the time there where dozens of those cars in the Central, South and Coastal Bend areas of TX...something like the Brackets at HMP could draw some of those cars off the jackstands just like it has in WI/IL.

I think if it was based around the right kind of cars it would do spectacularly; see Reb’s comment about the Lonestar 600. Brad Dixon didn’t put that race together by accident; he’s know for years it would work, got the chance and he’s been proven 100% correct. Just because a guy can’t afford a cutting edge chassis doesn’t mean he wants to run a slower car; these kind of races make room for those guys. Old tech asphalt/dirt cars are abundant here as are stock chassis, steel body dirt cars. Hell...IF ONE ASPHALT TRACK WOULD TRY AND RUN THAT KIND OF CAR IT WOULD WORK...

I love watching short track racing from all over the country and the Hudson event along with Kalamazoo's call of the wild are great but Rockford's Bahama Brackets are the highlight of the season as far as I'm concerned. Think run what you brung bracket racing but on a circle track with dozens of cars and with classifications for EVERYTHING. 2020 Bahama Brackets Highlights

What Dibenendetto doesn't bring to the table is family money, without it rides in NASCAR are becoming harder to find. In less then a dozen years NASCAR will look just like F1; a bunch of rich kids.

So Hamlin was forced below the line, passed the car which forced him below the line PLUS another car. Doesn’t he have to give the spot back? Does anyone know the actual rule which gifted the race to Hamlin?

So...I’ve been waiting about 2.5 weeks since TX tracks started racing with fans in the stands to see what came of it. I haven’t heard of a single person getting sick from being in the pits or the stands? Has anyone else heard anything? In most of the country tracks still can’t have fans and may not be able to for months; surely with that kind of restriction in other places many-many people must be getting sick here from going to the track?

This has 1979 Daytona 500 written all over it; every other sport is canceled, everyone is stuck at home and NASCAR has a captive audience for a long race.

New plan; everyone order Hazmat suits. San Antonio is about to shut down (the colleges have, the school district are literally meeting right now) so this coming week will be quiet. I propose cleanup Tuesday, practice Wednesday and racing Thursday at SAS. The purse will be easy; 1st in every class gets a case of TP, 2nd gets a gallon of hand sanitizer, 3rd gets some Clorox wipes and the rest of the positions get N95 masks. 50/50 drawing will be done with bottled water. Who is in?

Couldn't agree more; I've had racing on in the background all week while I worked and watched it on my phone when I wasn't busy.

I know it’s super cute and hip to talk about everything that’s wrong with racing but for tracks that will put in the effort and put together good shows the crowds have literally never been bigger...even for NASCAR sanctioned races...even at short tracks...even in the winter...even during the week during the school year. https://speed51.com/new-smyrna-thrilled-to-death-with-huge-monday-crowd/

I was pretty hesitant to get on board with the new NBC Track Pass just for NASCAR stuff but they’re running A LOT of short track racing including all 9 nights of the World Series of Asphalt Racing live from New Smyrna Speedway starting tonight. You download the APP onto your phone, smart TV or fire stick/Roku, etc and get 4-5 short track races a night for the next week. The NASCAR Roots package is $2.99 a month and includes short tracks, ARCA and extra NASCAR coverage. The broadcast quality is far better than Speed51 or FanChoice and so far the streaming has been flawless. Between this and RaceonTexas I think it’s pretty well covered!

I don't disagree with that and I personally felt the same way for years but after seeing what CoTA does for the grass-roots racers it didn't make sense to me anymore. I don't like Jerry Jones but I'd support my kids football team if they played there.