Not long after the much hyped announcement by Outlaw, Thunderbird announced that they will no longer be racing.
Now for the second track to give this idea a try. Veteran Modified driver Ryan Ruter will be the new promoter at the Hancock County Speedway in Britt, Iowa, for 2020 and this past week he released a schedule showing that his nine "weekly shows" will have a "Free Will Grandstand Admission". Okay, so not quite the same thing as Outlaw, but essentially you could drop a dollar in the bucket on the way in and enjoy a night of dirt track racing. Or, you could just watch it for free. Looks like that decision is completely up to you.
Ruter's five special events during the season will carry a fifteen dollar admission price.
So the question is how will this work at these tracks? No doubt that there will be a big bump in the crowd to begin with and you can bet that both promoters are using that in their sponsorship proposals in an effort to make up the lost revenue. The experiment here will be this, will the expected higher attendance hold steady or even grow as the season progresses?
Think about it this way. If you have been averaging 400 people at $10 each and you are now hoping to average 1,000 people for free that means that you are assuming that those extra 600 fans were staying home because of the ten dollar admission fee. Is that where we are at now in racing? I guess that we will find out at these two tracks this season.
Another question that I'm sure that the drivers have is "what will the purse be?" I haven't seen anything yet from Outlaw and Ruter posted today that he is waiting for sponsors to commit before he can release a purse structure and to give him a few weeks. Since pit passes are still $30 each at both tracks it will be interesting to see what the drivers will be racing for in front of these free grandstands.
Up in Wisconsin I am hearing that Steve Kasten is going a different route at SK Speedway, formerly known as Spring Lake Speedway. At the track in Unity only the drivers will be admitted free so add that one to your list of experiments to watch in 2020.
On an unrelated note (?) I went to the local high school boys basketball game last night and ended up sitting behind a gentleman who had his phone in a very nice tripod so that he could live stream the entire game on Facebook. The crowd was noticeably smaller than usual despite the fact that the Panthers were hosting a very talented team from Iowa City Regina and while the highly entertaining SOTU address may have kept some people home, I can't help but to wonder just how many five dollar tickets went unsold because some knew that they could just watch it from his feed. At one point I could see that 71 people were viewing.
Oh yes, and the Panthers won!
The Dubuque County Fair Board will take on the promotion of the races at the Dubuque Fairgrounds Speedway for 2020 with Kelly Welter serving as the Race Director. In the short video announcing this on Facebook yesterday the classes were not specified, but the track will be IMCA sanctioned with Sunday night action starting on May 5th. There will be fourteen weekly shows and two fair races, so that is good news for one of my favorite tracks in the region.
I am assuming that fans will have to pay to go to the races there though.......don't want any confusion given the title of this entry on the Back Stretch.
Just as he did last year Quincy's Michael Long was the feature winner on opening night for the UMP Modified Gator Nationals at the Volusia County Speedway in Florida. Last year Long's promising start to Speedweeks came to an abrupt end on the second night of racing when Kyle Strickler and David Stremme got stupid and collected Michael in their ongoing war, so hopefully Long can run the full schedule in 2020 and challenge for the championship.
Brandon Sheppard has become the most dominant driver in Dirt Late Model racing. After winning three out of six races in his own equipment at the Wild West Shootout in Arizona during January, "B-Shep" is back in the Rocket house car for Speedweeks and he was back in victory lane on Tuesday night with the Lucas Oil Dirt Late Model Series at East Bay Raceway. Sheppard was coming to the front on Monday night as well when contact with Kyle Bronson sent him for a spin. Completing a 360 degree spin Sheppard never stopped, but the caution had waved and he was sent to the rear none too happy with the local hero Bronson who went on to finish second to Devin Moran.
The Lucas series made a change this year with drivers who have perfect attendance during the Georgia/Florida swing getting to use their five best finishes during Speedweeks toward the series point standings. This has definitely boosted the car count for the first two nights at East Bay with 62 for Monday's opener and 61 last night.
The feature racing has been great the first two nights and with East Bay scheduled to be sold in 2024 I definitely need to get down there one more time before that happens.
For now my first racing for 2020 will either be the Stock Car Shootout at Kennedale on February 22nd or the USMTS show at Big O Speedway on March 7th. Weather dependent of course! After that a trip to Beatrice for at least one night of the Spring Nationals is in the plans.
Where will you be going racing this year? Make sure to check out the Calendar at Positively Racing if you need a little help setting your schedule. We will continue to update it on a weekly basis as more schedules are released.
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| Random Pic of the Day: Hall of Famer Bobby Greiner likely leading a pack of IMCA Stock Cars at the Southern Iowa Speedway in Oskaloosa. I believe that I snapped this photo in 1992. Bobby, does that sound right? |
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