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?Originally Posted by clowe
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.
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