**NEW 2008 RACEDAY SCHEDULE** READ THIS**

[The GECCO]

I may be way off base but it seemed to me a lot of people showed up Saturday night and Sunday morning.

Personally, I think the numbers are in the single digits, but I am just going by "feel" as well. However, even if 50 guys showed up only for Sunday, you would still have to demonstrate that they all did it out of necessity. How many of them COULD show up on Saturday but simply chose not to because there are no "real" races on Saturdays?

just swap the amU and amO with novU and novO.

That goes against the grain of everything these changes are meant to accomplish. If we were to do this, and expert on a 600 who wants to run Amateur classes would have multiple back-to-back races.

Let's say I am an expert with a SS legal 600. I want to run as many races as possible to get the most bang (and tire money) for my buck. Depending on my choice between either Amateur classes or RoRU I would:

Run all three Supersport classes
Run all three Superbike classes
Run MW Endurance
Run either RoRU or both Amateur classes

That's either 8 or 9 races in a single weekend, and NOT ONE back-to-back race. The ability for people to do this should increase rider participation and grid sizes. How many of you would enter more classes if you didn't "need a break" on Sunday? This was one of the goals - to make it possible for the racers to maximize their track time without killing themselves to do it.

Benny - your change has that same rider running five of the six classes on Saturday (if he goes the Amateur route - which YOU would have to as a first year expert), that's not a very rider friendly schedule.

As for hurting the club, I don't see it as having a major impact. If a first year rider truly can't show on Saturday, he still has the option of running on Sunday in both Amateur classes, as well as Sportsman (and LOR if applicable). He also has the incentive to move up to Expert as soon as he is able. No one says you HAVE to chase a Novice championship in your first year.

If it's Experts we're talking about, the rider in the example I gave above (with the SS legal 600) can still come on Sunday and run five races, none of them back-to-back (or four, if he does RoRU instead of Amateur). How many experts ran more than five races on Sundays last year? If the problem is that they have to miss the "money classes", then they have to decide if they can make more cash working or racing - the pool of people with that problem is rather small. If such a person isn't able to finish in the money anyway, then their inability to enter SS races isn't a factor since they aren't losing income and still have plenty of track time available on Sundays.

Regarding food and lodging expenses - how many Novices DON'T practice on Saturdays? My gut tells me very few, because they want all the track time they can get at first. With this schedule, a Novice can come out, get a lot of practice Saturday AM, run both Novice classes and an Endurance race (or two) then pack up and go home, spending one LESS night in a hotel. So, it actually could be CHEAPER for someone just trying to break into the sport, plus they can then spend Sunday on the "honey-do" list so his (or her) better half will be more likely to put up with this madness.

Lastly - I don't want this to come across as harsh, and I don't want people to think I don't care about the guys who work their asses off selling or servicing bikes on Saturdays, because that's not at all true. However, the fact is that the number of people working at dealerships represents a very small percentage of the riding public as a whole. The intent of these changes was NOT to to alienate the dealership workers. The idea behind these changes was to make the schedule more friendly for the riders as a whole. This will attract and keep riders. As I said before, I know we can't please everybody so the goal has to be to please the majority, and the majority of racers CAN show up on Saturdays.

[gpsigs]

a couple concerning thoughts

-running novice and supersport classes on saturday targets two groups that are typically trying their best to afford to race. novices who are just getting into the sport do not have a lot of sponsors or hooks ups yet and have the most about of up front costs of getting started. likewise those running supersport i would say are also in a class that they hope will stay affordable. by running these on saturdays, even if individuals aren't necessarily working in a dealership, many people still do work on saturdays these days, we hurt them double as they spend more than twice the money running two days over one, and they aren't making money.

they other thing to keep in mind is that its a bit unfair to say a RACER doesn't HAVE to go for a novice championship in their first year. i would tend to think that anyone who is actually racing will have quite a bit of drive to be competitive otherwise they would be content just running track days. therefore this doesn't seem to be the best way to excuse making novices run saturday too.

just my thoughts, hoping to help in discussion

[The GECCO]

running novice and supersport classes on saturday targets two groups that are typically trying their best to afford to race. novices who are just getting into the sport do not have a lot of sponsors or hooks ups yet and have the most about of up front costs of getting started. likewise those running supersport i would say are also in a class that they hope will stay affordable. by running these on saturdays, even if individuals aren't necessarily working in a dealership, many people still do work on saturdays these days, we hurt them double as they spend more than twice the money running two days over one, and they aren't making money.

This argument doesn't wash - there are wealthy Novices and there are Experts that have 10 years with the club who are scraping by. Either way, the majority of the public doesn't work on Saturdays and if we are going to try to appeal to a certain group, it needs to be the majority. What would happen to the membership and entry levels if we decided to skip Saturday and race on Sunday and Monday instead?? I can tell you one thing, you'd be looking for replacements for 9 of the 11 Board Members, myself included.

Being competitive in Supersport is NOT the way to race on a budget. The bike has to be new (to qualify for contingency) and the level of competition is such that you can't skimp on equipment, tires, fuel, etc. If you want to race on a budget, you need an SV or a Modern Vintage bike. Neither of these are likely to be competitive in the current Novice classes, so a move to Expert as soon as it is feasible is desired, which leads into my second point below....

they other thing to keep in mind is that its a bit unfair to say a RACER doesn't HAVE to go for a novice championship in their first year. i would tend to think that anyone who is actually racing will have quite a bit of drive to be competitive otherwise they would be content just running track days. therefore this doesn't seem to be the best way to excuse making novices run saturday too.

My point was that I feel there is too much emphasis on the Novice championships, and too many riders who stay a Novice longer than they should for this reason. We have had to implement the "top 10" rule in an effort to move the perpetual Novices up. Personally, I think there shouldn't even BE a Novice championship - Novice should be a place to run a few races while you decide which direction you want to go as an Expert racer - but that's a whole other discussion.

[motobum]

glenn - you make very good points. all the fast people have told me that they got out of novice as fast as they could.

thanks for taking the time to explain the reasoning behind it.

[JimWilson29]

My point was that I feel there is too much emphasis on the Novice championships, and too many riders who stay a Novice longer than they should for this reason. We have had to implement the "top 10" rule in an effort to move the perpetual Novices up. Personally, I think there shouldn't even BE a Novice championship - Novice should be a place to run a few races while you decide which direction you want to go as an Expert racer - but that's a whole other discussion.

glenn - you make very good points. all the fast people have told me that they got out of novice as fast as they could.

When I raced at Willow Springs as a novice the end of 2003/beginning of 2004, I was booted out of the Novice class after 3 race weekends. There was no Novice championship and as a novice you could only run one race on Sunday so there was more incentive to advance to expert as soon as possible than here.

This is directly from their rulebook-
-Novice riders may advance to Probational Expert status by completing 3 Novice races occurring on 3 seperate event dates with a minimum of 10 advancement points earned and completing one day of corner working.
-Riders reaching 30 advancement points will be automatically advanced to Probational Expert status. Riders exceeding 30 advancement points may not participate in Novice races.

A 1st place finish is 15 points in their system so if you win two Novice races you automatically are advanced. Someone that is a running at a slower pace would take much longer to accumulate the points to advance than someone who is winning races and therefore spend more time racing as a Novice.

Personally it doesnt matter to me one way or another but it would be great to see some of these fast novices on the expert grids sooner.

[Lel399]

My point was that I feel there is too much emphasis on the Novice championships, and too many riders who stay a Novice longer than they should for this reason. We have had to implement the "top 10" rule in an effort to move the perpetual Novices up. Personally, I think there shouldn't even BE a Novice championship - Novice should be a place to run a few races while you decide which direction you want to go as an Expert racer - but that's a whole other discussion.

When I raced at Willow Springs as a novice the end of 2003/beginning of 2004, I was booted out of the Novice class after 3 race weekends. There was no Novice championship and as a novice you could only run one race on Sunday so there was more incentive to advance to expert as soon as possible than here.

Problem is you are comparing apples to oranges. Clubs like WERA, CCS, AFM etc... our novices are called 'amateurs' and run yellow plates, our sportsman is their novice.

[cu260r6]

Many racers start not knowing how good they'll be or how long they're going to continue with the sport. Becoming a top expert take a few years at the least, and that is a large commitment to make before you've even tried racing. Most novices want to do as well as they can the first year and hopefully win a championship because they don't know if they'll get another opportunity to do so. Eliminating these championships or reducing them somehow may lead to less new racers.