Interesting Discussions Regarding the MRA Race Series

[spideyrdr]

Bearing in mind a $15 increase for the first endurance race is a 25% increase over the early entry fee right now, I don't FEEL that's unreasonable. It's $90 over the course of the season for those guys who are only doing one endurance race since the 4 hour has its own pricing. That would probably raise another $1k+ per weekend.

I'm probably reiterating what's already been said here but... When paying, it would be awesome to have the endurance races count as the last sprint. So given the proposed fees Tony laid out on page 4 it it would be:
1 Sprint + 1 endurance = $140 + $60 = $200 (vs. $215)
2 Sprints + 1 endurance = $140 + $60 + $30 = $230 (vs. $275)
1 Sprint + 2 endrances races = $140 + $60 + $30 = $230 (vs. $245)
etc.

The endurance product still represents a 'value' either on its own OR added to a sprint race menu.

[random hero]

Just a few things I'm curious about.....

What's a legit reason Endurance should be discounted entry fee? You get WAY more track time than sprints, yet you pay 70% less.... How does this make sense from a business standpoint. Track time is track time, somehow the formula is 7 laps should cost %250 more than 15-30 laps....... I do both, and would gladly pay $100-150 for endurance, it makes sense, and it's fair... especially for all the people who are paying $300-400 weekend in sprint entries to get the same amount of track time. It's not fair to "tax the rich" who in this case are the people who are paying for sprints, and cater to the people who are paying in the least amount of money into the club.

I don't think raising entry fee's on sprints will solve anything, if anything it will drive more people away. It's expensive as it is now. Think of it this way, your paying $130 for 7 laps.... Imagine stopping @ start/finish and putting $20 each lap in a hat. I personally think raised sprint fee's will mean less bikes on the grid for 2012... Endurance has the biggest grids, and again is on clearance for 1/3 of the cost....

Last.... we have 23 classes, a lot of these classes never saw 10 bikes on the same grid this year. I appreciate the fact some people love to race "odd-ball" machines, or want to win that plaque @ the end of the year, but the entertainment factor is weak, and the fact that we fill up 2 days of races with the majority being lowly attended classes doesn't make a lot of sense. I'm a twins guy, sure it's cool we have 4 twins races.... but it that really necessary? Is it necessary to have classes where we regular entries you can count on 1 hand...... I know everyone wants to be competitive and succeed, but we need to be realistic, are we really pulling new racers in w/these classses that are designed for niche machinery, or are we enticing them to come in and race a class w/4 bikes on the grid? Why not trim some of the fat, and try to grow/combine some of these classes... I would much rather enter a race where I can dice it up w/20 guys, rather than be on the grid w/a handful of people and probably circulate alone for the following 20 minutes...

I truly appreciate our board, and our clubs members... It's a great atmosphere, the people are great... and more than anything I want to see the MRA succeed.

[Scored51]

Just a few things I'm curious about..... we have 23 classes, a lot of these classes never saw 10 bikes on the same grid this year. I appreciate the fact some people love to race "odd-ball" machines, or want to win that plaque...

Luke,

I was curious too, as every time I hear this statement it is made from perspective (of a 600 rider). So I collected the data from our timing computer of every race run in 2011 and threw it into a spreadsheet. After averaging the attendance and ranking all 26 classes, I highlight all those races that didn't see 10 riders. I also created a cutoff line to illustrate those classes that failed to achieve an average of 10 riders for the season. Here are the stats:



I don't know exactly which "oddball classes" you were suggesting should be cut from the lineup, but here are a few obervations.

- Either way you slice it, cutting out the "less than 10" would cost the club more 400 running entries per year.
- Even Amateur GTO had a race with only 9 bikes circulating.
- Lightweight GP was the 4th most run class in the club. ROR was 7th.
- Colorado Class had a larger field than Middleweight did all year.
- Looking at these numbers, the best odds to be cherry picking would be with a 2002 Ducati 998 or a GSX-R750; not a small niche bike. Being female wouldn't hurt either. :lol:

[Bartman]

One of the things you need to keep in mind for the ODDBALL classes is alot of racers do these classes for one of two reasons,1 they want something different to ride than the norm 2 they don''t want to be in the meatgrinder classes and if we nix these classes I don't believe the majority will buy a 600 and comeback.
In years past they have also been known as Gentlemens classes cause we did not have the uber competitive racers in them and that keeps the recreational racer coming back and having fun.

[T Baggins]

an entry is an entry. If a small displacement twin runs in 4 classes, that's $240 in revenue. If you cut/combine some of those classes then they run only two. That's $190 in revenue. How is that beneficial.. We don't have a lack of daylight, we have a lack of entries per rider and in some cases a lack of entries per class.

By providing riders with more classes they legal/competitive in... they're more likely to enter them.

[JWinter]

I only raced sundays this year due to work (thank god I had that problem) but I noticed something that I thought was weird at HPR until I figured it out...On sunday morning when I arrived at 7:15 the pits would seem fairly full and I would see a fair number of novice bikes in the pits and would see these bikes do morning practice on sunday. But a good few of these bikes would not line up on the grid for sunday, but pack up after morning practice and leave. At first I thought that these riders had a mechanical problem or something came up and they had to leave. But it seemed to happen every weekend out at HPR. Then I put it together...These riders are running saturday practice, an endurance race, then staying and doing sunday morning practice, and leaving. So for $60 these riders are getting five 15 minute practice sessions and a 30 minute race for $60. I come in on sunday and race two sprints and get two 15 minute practice sessions for $180. Hmmm....

So how much money are we potentially losing here? Or better yet how can we gain money. Here is my suggestion:

Leave sprint prices alone...No increases
Leave endurance fees as is with no increases.
Charge a $10 per practice session fee.
Give each rider who pays for saturday practice a blue sticker with the # 1 for round 1 and ect...
Then sunday give each rider that payed for sunday practice a red sticker with the number of the round on it.
So this means saturdays would increase per rider by $30.
This means sundays per rider the increase is $20.
And for people who want to do one endurance race and five practice sessions it would cost $110.

So we make an increase in revenue without any structure changes, no increases in license fees, and the few who found a loop hole can't continue to exploit it.

[Clarkie]

To me, the best value bike with the entry pricing system in the MRA as an expert is to race a 600, sure they arent as cool to ride as some of the bikes out there, isnt as fun to ride as a twin (I miss riding twins!!!) and doesnt spin up like a 1000, but you can race AND BE COMPETITIVE in a LOT of classes. The Dimmick boys and Josh Galster showed the 1000's didnt have a lot on them on their 600's at some tracks 8)

Work out $ per lap to be competitive AND have great racing anywhere on track and you cant go past a 600cc bike. Sure other bikes can enter the same number of classes, but to race with other guys and not watch bigger/faster bike disappear into the distance while you "just do laps" I cant see why people pass up a 600 Supersport bike. No one can race a 600 Supersport bike to it's full potential at the club level, if they could they would be at the big show :wink:

[T Baggins]

Jeff,

We stopped charging for practice some time back for the following reasons:

1) We cut Saturday practice considerably when we moved sprint races over to Saturday (previously Saturday was only Practice and Endurance) so it was difficult to justify a fee for it after that.

2) It was a nightmare keeping track of who paid for practice and who didn't - people had multiple bikes, went out on someone else's bike, or just cheated the system altogether one way or another

3) It just seems cheap and petty to me to charge for practice, as I believe it is a necessary part of the raceday to get people and their equipment up to temperature and up to speed.

Just wanted to let you know the logic behind where we're at right now.

[Bartman]

Way back in the day there was a rule that if you did not make one practice round in the morning you were not allowed to race, idea was not to put someone on the grid who is not mentally or mechanically ready to race.
I agree with this on most levels but not on all I think we just need to charge enduro riders practice if enduro is all they are doing.

[rforsythe]

It may also be hard to tell where the benefits are if you change everything at once. My suggestion, add a bit to endurance fees if that's desired (I think most of us have said we'd understand a cost-of-business increase that wasn't silly huge). Then make the cost to add a sprint race to that a reasonable increase; $140 to essentially add 7 laps to my day is not reasonable, it's retarded. Then see if (a) your endurance grids change at all, and (b) if you get an increase in "crossover" riders adding sprints onto their endurance.

I agree with not charging for practice, and maybe just charging the endurance riders more for the whole package. (Tony, not THAT package.) Make this change too cumbersome/annoying/involved and I think the defection will just get worse, not better.

[polar x]

It may also be hard to tell where the benefits are if you change everything at once. My suggestion, add a bit to endurance fees if that's desired (I think most of us have said we'd understand a cost-of-business increase that wasn't silly huge). Then make the cost to add a sprint race to that a reasonable increase; $140 to essentially add 7 laps to my day is not reasonable, it's retarded. Then see if (a) your endurance grids change at all, and (b) if you get an increase in "crossover" riders adding sprints onto their endurance.

I agree with not charging for practice, and maybe just charging the endurance riders more for the whole package.

BINGO BINGO BINGO

[Fastt Racing]

I though Nabber was South African? hehehe :wink:

[T Baggins]

I think we will definitely look at a more effective "crossover pricing structure" for guys who do both endurance and sprints. No point getting beaten up on the first race twice...

Not sure what that looks like from a programming code perspective - it's easy to "say" what the exception will be -but maybe harder to code it into the system.

[graphite675]

Then make the cost to add a sprint race to that a reasonable increase; $140 to essentially add 7 laps to my day is not reasonable, it's retarded. .

How would you work that though? I run Sprint only and I have to pay $140 for 7 laps? If you drop the price to say $50 to add a Sprint to endurance then I would just sign up for an endurance and then do my Sprints. Would be a lot cheaper then just doing the Sprint. $60+$50 vs. $140+$50 etc. I could get in a endurance and 2 Sprints cheaper then I could sign up for just 2 sprints on ther own.

To make this work you would have to raise the price of the endurance to be more inline with the sprint price then discount additional races?

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[vort3xr6]

1st endurance $90
2nd endurance $30

Add a sprint race to endurance, +$90

[Bartman]

The way I see it right now enduro does not pay for practice and sprints do, what I think most people are saying is there should be your first race fee that covers your practice and first race no matter whether that is sprint or enduro and then add races as before for a reduced fee per race.

[rforsythe]

Hmm, sort of. I'm saying keep endurance cheaper than your first sprint because it quite simply is the cheaper form of racing a lot of us are drawn to. But don't asspound us for wanting to add a sprint race on top of it too. Endurance can go up somewhat like we've all said, just make adding a sprint onto it at that point something that's reasonable as well.

Let's say the first endurance was $90, which seems to be a price point most of us are comfortable with. Adding a sprint was half the cost of the sprint-only fee of $140, so another $70 (reasonable since we're not getting another set of practice sessions on top of that). That means $160 for one endurance + one sprint. Follow the standard $60/30/20...n additional sprint model from there. I would go for that, and +$70 is more than the $0 extra I pay now because I can't/won't do $140 habitually.

[Bartman]

Why should enduro be any cheaper than a sprint, what rational can you have for this other than thats what you want. I get the fact that money is tight but how can we say you get practice and a 30min race for 90 and in the same breath say to someone else you get practice and 7 laps for 140.
So the question I want to ask is should the MRA subsidize racing or should everyone pay more or less the same for the same product? Should enduro just fall under the same pricing as all other racing, first race is a larger fee to pay for practice and all races added after that cost less the more you do.

[graphite675]

Let's say the first endurance was $90, which seems to be a price point most of us are comfortable with. Adding a sprint was half the cost of the sprint-only fee of $140, so another $70 (reasonable since we're not getting another set of practice sessions on top of that). That means $160 for one endurance + one sprint. Follow the standard $60/30/20...n additional sprint model from there. I would go for that, and +$70 is more than the $0 extra I pay now because I can't/won't do $140 habitually.

But this isn't really fair to the sprint only racers. You would get 2 races for $160 (one of which is a sprint) and the the guy that runs sprint only is going to be paying $40+ dollars more for his 2 races. Why should the sprint racer be penalized for Not doing a endurance race? If this was the case I would probably drop a sprint class next year in favor of the endurance + sprint.

I'm for either keeping endurance it's own "cheap" class and you pay the same as everyone else if you want a sprint, or make all classes equal cost. Flat fee for first race, second, third, etc.

Honestly I would like to see the entry fee lowered across the board next year but I know that won't happen. I think that is the only thing that will bring more people to the grid right now. Raising the cost even a little in this economy is only going to drive more folks away IMO.

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[Bartman]

Lets look at a brief history here, when we started enduro it was a fund raiser to buy airfence and nobody just ran it by itself we all ran sprints and then enduro so no worries. Later it became a class unto itself but you were not allowed in the morning practice unless signed up for sprints and you had a 15 min endro only practice, not enough practiced the enduro only practice so we nixxed it and allowed those few to do the normal practice in the morning. Now we have a boat load of people running enduro only and why not you cannot get cheaper track time but it was never intended to be a only race kind of deal with free practice. It has morphed into something it was not suppose to be and we need to get more in line with what everyone else is paying.

[rforsythe]

Why should the sprint racer be penalized for Not doing a endurance race? If this was the case I would probably drop a sprint class next year in favor of the endurance + sprint.

What's been stopping you from doing it already? Shit, you can do 2 endurance races for less than the price of one sprint now.

People don't do that because there is different energy in a sprint race than endurance that some like more.

And yes endurance has turned into "something different", but is that so bad? It's a big grid draw with some entertaining racing, probably largely due to the fact that it's cheaper.

If you are actually suggesting making it the same price as sprints, then either you're going to make an endurance race $140 which will decrease the grid, or make the first sprint $90 and raise endurance to keep in check with that. Or just recognize that maybe having an interesting class with a different dynamic, that draws racers in for some good clean fun, is not such a bad thing after all.

Yes I want it to stay cheaper, Bart. :lol: That should have been relatively evident by now. But it's not entirely because I am just a cheap bastard. I see some intrinsic and unique value in having it that way.

[T Baggins]

Aside from the fact that I don't have the endurance to race for 30 minutes... I don't see endurance an a "superior product" or "better value".

You practice first thing in the AM, but don't race till the end of the day - and your races are oftentimes shortened because of the mayhem earlier in the day.

You race in a two-wave race where you're constantly interacting with riders who have nothing to gain by "racing" you but don't have the sense to let you by if you're not in their class.

The faster riders lap the slower guys 3+ times in the race, which is precarious at best (for both parties), imo.

If you want to do more than one, you get about 10 minutes to rest in between races.

This, in my mind, is a different sort of value - and appeals to a different sort of rider mindset.

In a perfect world, you would ONLY race against people who have a dog in the fight, and nobody would get lapped (as lappers can either split the leaders if the leaders are polite, or the lappers can get taken out if the leaders are less polite).

I know people wish racing was less expensive, but really, do you really think that really a $10 - $30 increase (using some of the examples given...) in entry fees per weekend will really be the deal breaker for most guys? Really?

That's a total of $70 to $210 for THE ENTIRE YEAR in entry fees, and we're scheduling one fewer round so it should be a net positive for the riders as far as total cash outlay.

Bottom line is we either need more racers at the same fees, or more money from the current racers.

The cost to put the events on are pretty "non-negotiable" and so we have only rider entry fees to rely on for paying the way. Spectators help some, but are the smallest portion of our event income consistently.

[Bartman]

You can do 2 enduros for cheaper than one sprint, this is the core problem for me. It was never intended to be this way and the amount of track time has continued to increase without the increase in fees that should have come along with the track time.
Endurance was intended to be a class added so the price structure reflected that, it assumed you were already running sprints and it cost just a bit more to add a endurance because it was a longer race and that is why it was not just the next class added.
It never should have morphed into a walmart discounted supersized meal off of the dollar menu.
It is different racing than sprints but that does not mean it should be half price, will we loose a few if we charge what the race is worth maybe but we cannot give racing away, the cost of a weekend is not going to go down for the MRA so we need to make sure everyone pulls their own weight.

[graphite675]

I know people wish racing was less expensive, but really, do you really think that really a $10 - $30 increase (using some of the examples given...) in entry fees per weekend will really be the deal breaker for most guys? Really?
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$10 not a big deal, $30+, I think that will be a deal breaker for some and may prevent new entries, absolutly. Obviously the hardcore racers will continue you will loose some people for sure.

I know it's only $10-$30 increase per weekend but it's not just the racing cost. Add that to daycare cost for my kids just went up by $40 a week. My taxes went up, grocery cost is going up, etc etc. it all adds up to a bigger picture of people having less and less "hobby" money.

I don't claim to be a business man but I would think it is better to lower the price and draw more people. Is it better to charge $200 and have 5 entries or charge $150 and have 10 entries?

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[Bartman]

Only problem is will more people come if we lower fees, we can't know that so we lower fees the same or fewer come and it still costs the same to put on a weekend we are out of buisness in one or two rounds, is there any buisness that is charging less out there?