Board Attendees:

  • President - Chris Nami
  • Vice President - Bob Hasenhundl
  • Secretary - Terri Thompson (ABSENT)
  • Treasurer - Tiffany Maestas
  • VP Rules & Tech - Jared Dear
  • New Rider Director - Jeff Brown
  • Race Director - John McKown
  • Rider Rep - Press & Contingency - Nate Bell
  • Rider Rep - Rulebook - Dennis Stowers
  • Rider Rep - Trophies & Class Sponsorship - Blair Harness
  • Rider Rep - PR & Events - Erik Maxwell


Estimated Voting Members in Attendance: Taken via Zoom
Location: Nite Owl Sports Bar and Grill
Start Time: 7:30 pm
End Time: 9:30 pm

Important Announcements:

  • Jason Archuleta passed away not long ago due to injuries sustained from a SuperMoto race the previous week to our Round 2

    • Chris Joffrion posted a link on our Facebook page to a GoFundMe to help raise funds for the family. He has kids and any love we can send his family’s way

  • Pit with the President next round - the sentiment is the same throughout the entire Board. We have room, come talk with us and ask for tips and tricks .

    • Chris will most likely not be racing next round, come hang out and chat


Status Updates:
Chris:

  • Round 2 -

    • Pros - racing was great and was super clean. The weekend ran smooth and both days ended relatively on time

      • Track conditions at PPIR were the best we have seen in a long time
      • Lots of sportsmanship, even in all the tight racing that was had

        • Crash Mike was in, Mike helped fix the person’s bike he had crashed into

      • Fire extinguishers - saw lots of fire extinguishers in front of pits, those who were reminded went and got theirs and placed in front of their pits

    • Cons - people knowing their grid positions and being in the correct grid positions. Was rough on Saturday but better on Sunday

  • Brainstorming on working on serious changes with the Corner Crew (Safety Crew) - one of the very first changes is going to be what they are called

    • Keep running into the same issues we have faced the past few years, so we are looking at changing how things are done
    • Been working on a solid package - this will lead to a more qualified and experienced Safety Crew

      • Increased safety for the Crew and the riders, and overall better race weekend

    • There is a huge separation between the racers and the Safety Crew; every year we do the Corner Worker Appreciation and that is about it

      • Still going to have that, but it is going to be different this year

  • Our plan is to be by the book, everything that we do is by the book and there are no judgment calls. We appreciate and are welcoming when we get called out if we are not doing things by the book


Bob:

  • Round 2 -

    • Pros - Echoing everything Chris said. Was a great weekend and things ran smoothly. Finished on time. No major registration issues
    • Cons - Learned about some contingency issues. Some data being transmitted between SpeedHive and Orbits is getting corrupted. If you are having issues where you are not getting payouts but are expecting them let Bob know

  • Working on COntingency for Round 2
  • Round 3 registration opens up tomorrow at 6 o'clock. Includes SuperStreet
  • Working on Streamlining race round registration

    • If two races are ran together, you will only be able to chose one instead of being able to register for both

  • Working on registration for the 4 hour endurance
  • Beginning of this season we added a donation for the safety fund, we should have an option to take donations toward the Corner Worker Appreciation fund as well.

    • Can donate up to $500 in $5 increments. Unsure on how to implement this, but may give the Corner Workers bonuses on Sundays after race weekends instead of waiting for the end of the year

  • If you are attending this meeting as a Novice and want a half hour for Novice Hours, tell one of the Board Members (Tiffany) and have them take it down

    • Remember that YOU are responsible for making sure your hours get logged accurately
    • We are working on putting Novice Hours into MSR so you can go into your account and check to see how many Novice Hours you have done


Tiffany:

  • Refunds and Credits - read the rulebook and know when you can get a credit and under what circumstances you can get credits/refunds.

    • At the end of the day, fees are not automatically refunded so you need to come into the race day office and cancel
    • For those who did cancel, there were 5 who came in and canceled and was a lower amount than usual. Those refunds/credits have been done.

  • Payouts - there are a couple of people who have not gotten their payouts yet, I am working on getting this figured out so these people can get paid
  • Financials -

    • -$2767 loss for PPIR. Had 94 people attend and had 104 people attend last year
    • With MSR, we get paid every 2 weeks so there might be a payment in there that is processing and we do not know yet
    • Concession prices went up and the same things happened at PPIR, PPIR is sponsored by Pepsi now and they had to charge $5 minimum per drink
    • We are positive $5000 for Round 1

  • Round 2 -

    • Pros - Rick B was not able to attend this weekend, but Blair did an awesome job never really having done this before. He gave up all his racing to be able to do this

      • Thank you to Chris Vohl and Kellen Brewer who Corner Worked to get their Novice Hours done and for helping the rest of the day

    • Cons - Waivers and wristbands. We are not charging for spectators, so it slipped through the cracks as to letting everyone know that guests need to come in and sign the waiver for the weekend. Make sure they sign the MRA waiver! The waiver to get into the tracks (the Track specific waiver) is not the waiver that needs to be signed

  • Trying a new process - pre grids are not going to be done until the raceday office is closed and you will have a short time to check the grids before they go final

    • If you have any issues, please direct your questions to other Board Members so Terri can work on grids in the morning. We are trying different things and will take any feedback regarding anything to make sure that the process that we end up on is smooth and consistent
    • Than you with your patience with grids at this time


Jared:

  • Everyone’s bikes were better this Round than Round 1. The Novices are outshining the Experts in how clean and prepped their bikes are, so kudos to them. We were flying through tech this weekend because everyone is checking their bikes before the show up to tech
  • Round 2 -

    • Pros - the red flags were tended to very quickly and there were very little delays in getting everyone back out on the track. Kudos to the entire safety team
    • Cons - grid timeliness and some little hiccups with grids. Terri is working on getting all this figured out to have a process developed soon. Work with us on this

  • Working on a different design with tech stickers since they have been relatively the same the past 6 years


Jeff:

  • Round 2 -

    • SuperStreet we only had 9 entries, which isn’t great. We were however able to do 1 on 1s with the SuperStreeters
    • PPIR has turned the old classroom into offices, so we had to use the kitchen to make do. If we go back, we will have to work on where to hold the classroom
    • SuperStreet track time went great. We didn’t have anyone jump a red light and we did not have any crashes in the race. Had a person blow Turn 3 and they stopped before they re-entered the track
    • Cons - Turn 4 and pull up to a spectator stand and someone looked at my son on my lap and said “aw is that your grandson?”

  • Second new racer school coming up soon. Will be emailing instructors here soon to get instructors on board for the mid-season race school

    • Registration is open!


John:

  • Round 2 -

    • Had a very smooth weekend with everything that had happened. We have not had an MRA racer transported yet this season
    • From the Rider’s Meeting onwards, the riders are being set up with success for the race weekend
    • There are people coming up and giving suggestions to the BoD, which we appreciate
    • We have a new repeater due to the hardware at HPR changing. Blair helped get all this set up
    • Had Corner Workers at the PPIR drag event say that the track was in disrepair after their event, so after some messaging they repaired portions of the track and made the track very nice for us
    • PPIR let us store air fence in their garages as I had to make 3 trips back and forth to get all air fence to PPIR
    • Thank you to those who helped out with setting up and taking down the air fence

      • Did you know that you get paid $25 for taking down and setting up air fences?

    • Incidents were responded to very quickly and the races were restarted very quickly after red flags
    • Bob Heaton came in in a pinch and trained 2 brand new start finish workers. He has an award named after him for a reason. Was great to see him come out and train
    • We will always take you if your bike breaks down and you don’t have anything going on
    • Made a new map for PPIR for the rider’s meeting since there was not a digital version of the map
    • Largest problem was staffing and this has been going on for a decade now. Calling people last minute to get people to come out and that ends now

      • We were short 4 workers on Saturday and Sunday

    • I was the one that ended up doing crash cart due to crash cart canceling later in the week

      • Went out and picked up a bike on a hot track, this will not be happening again and we will do better in the future

    • If we schedule someone to come out and work the weekend and they do not show up without telling anyone, they will not be welcome back
    • Corner Worker for 3 years and have seen a lot of things and hate the term “Corner Worker”. It’s as if you are not part of the “cool kid club”

      • From here on out, they will be a part of the rider’s meetings in the morning to help bring the Safety Team and the riders together

        • Helps with consistency in the information delivered as well

      • We are going to formalize and reward the team members that are committed to the MRA. Revisiting pay structure, inviting them into meetings, giving them associate memberships so they can vote

    • The BoD all underestimated the relationship between the track day on Friday and the race weekend

      • Moving forward I will be at any track day before our race weekend to ensure that the information contained in the rider’s meetings are consistent

    • Put Corner Worker in Turn 4 and she had her back to Turn 3 the entire weekend and she was not in a concrete bunker. We are never going to do this again

      • Set up an HPR-style portable light system to set up at the outside of Turn 4
      • Start / Finish is also set up with zero protection from the riders in case of an incident

  • We need to get more serious about fundraising so we can buy better safety equipment. The air fences are outdated and many sections need to be repaired
  • Angela Wilkerson volunteered to help market and get more people to come to the banquet. Getting vendors to come to the banquet to make it more of an event, etc


Nate:

  • Doing a video / team MRA thing and am loving everything that is going on with rebranding the Safety Club
  • Round 2 -

    • White plates are stepping up and are recognized the change and are leading the change themselves
    • The sportsmanship thing is huge and I am loving to hear all that. Blair was the hero this weekend as far as I am concerned with setting up the PR stuff and timing and scoring with Orbits.
    • Still a young BoD and are learning on the fly most days. We are working with the equipment we have and are learning how to use all of this
    • If you want stuff said over the radio, you need to come find me so I can say it over the PR

  • Working on developing team MRA tents, keep an eye out for those and am happy to be a part of this team building process
  • I cannot call out a live race if I do not have a live race to call out. I would rather say nothing than accidentally call out the wrong leader and cause embarrassment that way


Dennis:

  • Round 2 -

    • Everyone already covered the pros and the cons well
    • Bikes looked good, was stoked to see everyone with bikes that were ready to go and pre-tech checklists in hand
    • Have the timeline down, tech opens at 6pm after track days. Working on making this consistent for your guys
    • We were able to do what we can to manage the cons that came up and addressed them accordingly
    • The BoD is starting to come together and work as a team. We are new, but we are starting to figure out how to work as a team and things are improving by the minute and by the day

      • Addressing fires before they even happen

    • Ruen came out and we figured out that he had a crack in his block that he didn’t know about.

      • Everyone was already bugging him about parts and wanting to help him and sucking him even farther into the team and family mentality

    • Sportsmanship has been huge this year and it has been so awesome to see. Don’t just crawl into your camper for the night. Make friends and talk to people to see if they need anything

  • Rider Reps jobs are to represent the membership to the officer positions on the Board. The Rider Reps are the first mode of contact to have things addressed or express how you feel things are going.


Blair:

  • Round 2 -

    • We had some issues with Race Hero and Orbits, we are working on that so bear with us
    • The weekend went very smooth overall and there was no person who didn’t get a trophy they were after

  • Regular sponsorship stuff, working on finding more and getting trophies for next round squared away


Erik:

  • Round 2 -

    • Pros - talked to a bunch of people and got a really good vibe around the pits. A lot of people are mingling and there are good vibes going around through the entire club

      • Might have something to do at HPR next round
      • SuperStreet went really well. My student wanted to do it again and get more involved with the Club
      • Was fun seeing students go out and have fun
      • Were only minor incidents and everyone was safe
      • Would like to see more of the mentorship factor going around in the Club. There are huge Novice Classes and it is great to see experts come out and help them learn the ins and outs of racing
      • Had a student who wanted to race, so Brownie watched him on Friday and got him licensed up. Everyone in the pits came together to get his bike race ready so he could race

    • Watched Blair do Orbits stuff and it is very tedious. The software is great, but there is a lot of nit-pickiness that still needs to happen

  • Trying to figure out a way to bring people together and made the blacked-out tent toppers. If you like them, I can mock them up with your race numbers. Remember that these are not free.

    • Topper is about $400, the metal frame is about $800
    • Trying to work with Tait through 64*R to support a local business
    • There is a post out on Facebook that explains the Dark Mode creative processes if you are interested in knowing what everything means
    • We have done mock-ups for banners, flags, etc and can help create cheaper options instead of just the tent toppers since they are more expensive

  • Saturday night pit beach party? Cornhole and potluck?

    • Setting up a Cornhole tournament is something that is feasible, many people have Cornhole sets

  • Rulebooks - we did not have a lot of takers on sponsorships, Nami was able to sponsor the first run. If someone wants to sponsor the second run, email me and we can get this squared away

    • MotoStation might be interested in sponsoring a second run

  • Fay Myers did their block party while we were at PPIR and hopefully next year we can get them our schedule so their events do not conflict with MRA events


Member Questions:

  • Thank you to the BoD for putting someone in 4 and making changes for us. When AMA raced at PPIR, they used between 40-45 sections of Air Fence to keep PPIR safe.

    • Contacted the RRW Action Fund and talked to John Ulrich about air fence for about an hour
    • There are crews from RRW that fix air fence and we are going to see if we can get him out here to fix air fence. Do not forget that we will need to still buy new air fence

  • Will the Safety Team be a part of the rider’s meetings both days?

    • Yes, we estimate that it is only going to be about a 10 minutes delay so we are doing it

  • How many open sponsorships do we have?

    • 4 regular classes and 1 endurance class
    • Sponsorship benefits can be found on the website. Sprint are $850, endurance is $750, and 4-hour endurance sponsorship is $550

  • Have we thought about broadcasting out to Utah, CMRA, etc and say if you guys come race with us, we will discount your race fees, or something along those lines?

    • We have talked about this in a lot of different ways. The only thought is that I would rather find ways to make racing cheaper for the current membership and focusing on growing the membership in the club instead of bringing in people from an outside organization
    • Huge influx of Novice Racers this year. Older members are coming back to race. Goal is to get racers excited to come and race with us

  • Why do some positions change between pregrid to start finish?

    • This is under the assumption that everyone always lines up in their correct positions at pregrid, this is potentially why this can change if people do not grid up properly in pregrid. Pregrid has the grids, she can tell you if you are in the right spot or not if you are worried you may have the wrong spot.
    • Just know where you are gridded. We do know that there were some things that came up, but this is why you check pre grids and final grids and then grid up in the right spot. If there is an issue, check with the office, check with Terri or Tiff if Terri is not there. If you are complacent, it can cost you
    • Grids are posted online and you can check them on your phone. If you don’t know, we don’t know what to tell you.


Member Feedback, Pros, and Cons

  • Pro - rider’s meeting with the crash and visuals. Cons - grid spots were painted with a green dot. There was no announcement of this in the rider’s meeting

    • The previous grid mark spots were no longer there and the paint we received was from PPIR. We will be addressing this in the future to make it better
    • Can’t remember the last time we got an applause after a rider’s meeting. The presentation was great and really clean

  • Crashed in turn 1, have never seen so many people come out and walk the track afterward

    • Fixed the guy’s bike that was collided with, the pit came together to help

  • This might be our last year at PPIR, after checking through the track, there are some huge issues that would need to be addressed
  • We will attempt to do the same advertising with the 4 hour this year as last year since this is our specialty round
  • The NATC loved HPR, we can get other people to come out and experience this too to get them to continually come back. Get them sucked in and become members
  • We are looking at changing the endurance races to make them something better, points structure, overall structure, etc
  • Having two people in Turn 3 / 4 so they can watch each other’s back. Otherwise you did a good job