matrix101

iTrader: (43)

I personally think a class naming structure that follows some sort of logical format would help too. I've had parents of potential new juniors ask more than once what the names mean.
Right now we have 21.5 or sportsman or 13.5 or stock ( which name gets used for each seems to depend on which club is hosting the event) then modified. Many people seem unsure where they or their kids will fit in.
I'm reminded of an article penned by Scott Guyatt on this subject where he proposed a naming structure similar to F1. Mod becomes TC1, stock TC2, sportsman TC3, and junior or novice could be TC3 Lite, giving clear links to its origins.

The Fuhrer

iTrader: (12)

540 (21.5 is pseudo 540...) was always a National class, for years. Prey tell, what happened there?

Radio Active

iTrader: (2)

I don't know exactly how the class came to being desanctioned, I was only doing club races for a couple of years, I think it happened during that time.

What I did see was that 540 was disconnected from the brushless classes above it, and the numbers drastically fell away during that period.

If the question is why did the 3rd tier survive at onroad and not offroad, I think I have an explanation. Numbers were much healthier at onroad than offroad at that time. Additionally, the performance difference between 540 and 'Stock' was greater onroad than offroad. So, offroad numbers were concentrated, which I believe is the reason that we have 150+ at state series rounds now. Fewer motor classes builds numbers faster.

Novices can drive Stock, the problem isn't that there is no 540 offroad. As I said earlier 21.5 onroad is almost junior free now. The problem is that there is no class with a significant portion of juniors, and the rest of the environment isn't helping to grow their numbers.

frozenpod

iTrader: (1)

Yep I agree we have a serious problem and we are either at crisi point or will be soon if we don't do anything about it.

Two problems getting juniors to the track and keeping them.

I agree a class specific for juniors sounds like a good idea. I also agree on club days we need to do something to speed things up. Apart from running less classes perhaps clubs could run the junior class twice per round.

For a cheap power plant perhaps something like the sensorless hobbywing setup that was very succesful in mini.

thommo

iTrader: (1)

I would be keen to see a club day race meeting being completed in about 4-5 hours. It might mean 1 car/ 1 entry per person.

Clubs could think about a rotation idea of classes meeting to meeting, to get through a day quicker.

I would run more often as time is my biggest limitation. And the kids would be easier to keep interested and I would only be out for 1/2 a day.

A good discussion.

A

frozenpod

iTrader: (1)

It would also be worth discouraging the use of traction compounds for juniors.

Nasty stuff and many new racers in particular juniors don't realise the dangers and get it all over the hands ect.

semper

A new member is a plus regardless of age. The problem is attracting new people and retaining those we have. Are we doing either well? Based on observations I think not, but is there any data available? If not why not?
Much of the discussion will no doubt concentrate on classes. The argument that there are too many classes already, does have some validity. In anycase a class attractive to new members would need more than a separate age group or a different motor:-) Ever considered what it would be like to wire up an esc in a small high rise unit in Ryde? How about charging lipos? Perhaps an intro class should have tamiya connectors and nimh only as a restriction? As an example only.
Visibility is something we should work on. I saw a state title at the Easter Show. I saw rc cars race on a small oval inside Hornsby Westfield. When was the last time a race meeting was held somewhere public?
Who would go out on a limb and organise such a thing? How do we treat our volunteers?

Mr Weasel

iTrader: (3)

Hello folks,
I think it's fantastic that this thread has been started.
I've been racing onroad for 18 months in Victoria.
Was discussing this thread with a few RC buddies yesterday.
Some of the ideas that we were throwing about:
Shorter day for juniors (maybe afternoon only or morning only)
No quali for juniors - just 3 races
Two junior races per round so they can get more races in shorter time.
Fixed motor/esc/chassis? (Or a specified range of)

I have brought my girlfriends kids and friends kids to race days. While they enjoy it, after 2 six minute runs in 2 hours they usually have had enough and go home. We need to hold their interest.
Also, bad behavior from grown ups turns people away: kids and other grown ups.
In my experience there are wonderful and welcoming folks at all clubs. There are also a fair share of angry weirdos.
People are taking their racing way way to seriously and this reduces the fun for everyone.
Most clubs have a code of conduct which would set a standard of behaviour if adhered to.
I recently changed clubs after an incident of violence between two competitors at my old club that went unpunished.
I encourage all clubs to tighten up their tolerance of abuse, violence and bad behaviour and to actively encourage junior participation.

Neddysmith

iTrader: (2)

One of the biggest reasons I haven't got into racing for myself and boy is the time commitment, with todays crazy world I am time poor enough as it is without spending a whole day at the race track as much fun as it is. Think of all other sports, cricket, football, tennis, netball etc, they are all over in a few hours and either morning or afternoon, so there is plenty of time left to do other things with your time.

Perhaps one solution is to split a race day into 2 parts, run certain novice, beginner, junior or whatever classes in the morning with finals finishing up around lunch time and the run the mod classes etc in the afternoons or something similar.

This way people who want to run multiple classes can be there the whole day, however, those who want to run a single class can be there foe a half day while still doing qualifying and finals, likewise the mod guys know they have the mornings to prep cars or whatever and they can turn up around lunch for qualifying and finals etc.

Ricardo40

I have been around rc TC for a few years, I would like to run at race meetings but couldn't be bothered spending 5-6 hours at a meeting as a begineer for 3 or 4 drives. So I run my car at Riverstone on the weekends about once every 2 months and dont get any better, just damage the car and order parts. But here are my observations, I've seen a few meetings at different levels;

Agressive drivers on the stand is a problem. (Use a yellow / red card system with a weeks ban). If they dont learn you dont need them.

TC 21.5; its not a feeder class its a trophy hunter class. The costs ramp right up with the "best blinky" speedie and motor. $400 - 700 CF kits, 6000+ mah lipos.
21.5 should be entry level class with low end kits and speedie motor combos like the speed passion one for $80. You shouldn't be allowed to spend too many seasons in this class and there should be progression.

Too many add-on class like F1, minis, VTA, 1/12 pan car etc all requiring multiple qualifing; cut the qualifing and cut the classes down, rotating the add-on classes is a great idea.

Maybe run two (2-3 hour) meetings on the day; 1st could be junior, feeder 21.5 TC and an add-on class. The second meeting would follow with "open" 21.5, 13.5 etc. Anyone making progress in the first and race the second.

Also the mentor thing has alot of merit, in rc flying clubs people need to get their "wings" to progress and there are multiple stages here. mentoring and constructive feedback are key here.

I have net some really nice and helpful people in this hobby and also some people that look down on you because you're a newb, it happens in all parts of life. You just need strong leadership to encrouage the former.

My 2 cents.

SEQ12thScale

The trouble with this is that you require 40mins between rounds to get batteries charged for the next race. So 4 hours would be the minimum you could get 5 rounds done in and that 40 mins per round only gives you time to run 4 heats.

Of course you could require people to come with 3 to 5 batteries pre-charged, but this then would increase costs exponentially. which defeated the purpose of trying to keep costs down in a junior class.

Like wise you could expect them to come with 20A chargers and lipos capable of being charged at 2 or 3C but, again, the costs of this are very high.

And when you consider the number of people who actually do the work around clubs, and how few there are, who is going to run the extra race meeting.

If the clubs could work together and do something they all seem to be afraid to do, and that is share and work together, I think a junior race meeting run weekly on a Sat morning is a very viable thing to do, have 4 clubs working together and they would only need to run it once a month each, thus keeping the work involved by any one individual manageable.

It is also much better to have 30 kids at their own race meeting, than 8 at one club, it is also beneficial to have kids driving on a variety of tracks and surfaces.

But to have this happen, you need a proper framework outlining the goals to be achieved, and you need investment into marketing to recruit these juniors to the sport and you need the clubs to work together within a common framework so you can gauge the effectiveness of all the hard work.

And this is where we need someone like AARCMCC to have a grand vision to modernize how RC functions and to to design the tools clubs need to compete with soccer, netball, afl, nrl and cricket and bring juniors to RC.

Canada 95

State cans 540 classes, nek minnet, no juniors, go figger?

nexxus

iTrader: (315)

I don't know about needing 40 mins between races, I seldom bring a charger at all, I use two stick pack lipos on for both qualifiers one for both finals and even in 13.5 it's more than enough, this isn't Nimh days!

Maybe a designated novice class, Sakura S (or Turnigy rebadge) chassis, Speed Passion Reventon / Citrix motor / esc combo and open servo/radio. That puts the cost of the car around $200 which isn't unreasonable, most of us spend more on an ESC alone (Orion RS Pro or LRP Flow?)

Maybe keep the kids races on a separate day, parents can marshall, I'd feel more comfortable taking my son down to race in that sort of environment.

frozenpod

iTrader: (1)

Re battery charging that could be a problem.

Perhaps clubs could purchase a high power multi battery charger I see a few racers have them so the price mustn't be too bad.

The race director or other experienced person could be in charge of charging and monitoring all the packs at once.

The next round could then also be run as soon as the batteries are ready.

With low power motors the batteries are likely to only require 1000-13000mAh which at 1C would probably be around 15-20 minutes.

SEQ12thScale

2 things here, RPM = Voltage over time, while you might be happy to start a race with 3.7v per cell, anyone who is wanting to be competitive is going to want to have batteries charged to 4.22v per cell and gain a 500-1000+ rpm advantage over you.

Also, as this is related to juniors, you want to teach them all aspects of rc and this includes things like battery charging, race craft, health and safety, sportsmanship, the care and maintenance of their equipment. And you might as well teach them the proper way to do things, and that means fully charged batteries when you start a race, 1 or 2 sighting laps then grid up.