Originally Posted by
digitalsmithy
like cypress said, i'd kill if there was 3 near me
i live in chicago and i think there's like 1 track an hr way with limited races...
Similar situation for me here in maryland. I feel the lack of SHOP OWNER interest kills it as well. There arent many tracks around me, the closest one is a half hour away, next closest uses to be an hour but has since became an indoor offroad track (tides of the hobby) and now a newer track has opened in Middle river maryland, just outside of baltimore. This track is carpet and a great track, the owner has a family of racers and they are all very interested in it. This seems to draw more customers because its not like the newer guys have to wait until a saturday race day to talk to the experienced racers, they can come in any time and get started in the hobby. Without an interested, experienced shop/track owner it doesnt bring in much business compared to one that has an owner like that. The economy, as others have stated, doesnt help at all either. It seems to cause track to have a harder time stocking parts in the shop connected to it and this pushes people away, it hurts the upkeep of the running surface which also pushes people away when their car doesnt perform very well on say old carpet as apposed to newer carpet that you'll see at all the larger events. It seems on-road is beginning a small come back, but with short course and all these other off-road classes, it has really died off heavily in the 7 years that I have been racing. When i started it was 60 guys, easy, every saturday. Now we're lucky to get 20 or 30. The off-road track, about 80, every single weekend.
My $.02 for what its worth.
