RSRRacer

Just to clarify - zone 2 hosted many years of profitable club racing at VIR and then after one year of a loss they throw in the towel? Maybe I misinterpreted this post.

ExMB

I read it the same way. I don't know how much money they have, get from PCA but asking regions to now take the financial risk ......... It does speak volumes IMHO with the lower participation numbers that are being experienced, reported by others.

Pete Debusmann

They are not abandoning the race due to the financials. PCA National has said zones cannot host races, it must be a region due to some legal issues. Zone 2 is therefore trying to get a region to take it over so it remains on the schedule. Watkins Glen will/should be similarly affected.

Matt Romanowski

There is a legal issue with zones from my memory. Most are not incorporated like a region IIRC.

RSRRacer

Ok this makes sense.

RobT 394

Susan has every one of our email addresses, past and present drivers (along with medical forms). Surveys can be developed specifically for those that left to better understand why, and what it will take to bring them back. Some focus groups will also be needed. Surveys are only one step in the process. The volunteers and scruts need to be spoken to as well.

Understand this is reality until we fill the paddock with racers. For some classes more race groups are better. It is never fun to dice it out with the back marker of a faster race class. Some of the best events in the past were Sebring and The Glen where there were four race groups and plenty of people to fill them. This is what we should aspire to.

LuigiVampa

I've read the PCA bylaws and it appears the reason Zones are technically not allowed to host a race is that each Zone representative is appointed by Executive Counsel, and not elected, and only elected PCA officials can incur a debt or obligation on behalf of PCA. Accordingly, because Zone reps are not elected they have no power to enter into a contract on behalf of PCA.

The PCA bylaws, which have not been amended in ten years, could easily be changed to allow for this. It only takes 3% of the membership to propose an amendment and in order not to incur the costs of a separate vote the amendment could be done in conjunction with a general election. The Executive Council has the power to propose amendments as well without the need for 3% of the membership.

Bottom line - instead of pushing the liability to a region PCA could easily give Zones the authority to run races.

RobT 394

But this would require change.

GlenL

This thread has brought out what racers don't like about PCA Club Racing. Some comments are positive, too, but the overall theme is that drivers are leaving because the racing is better elsewhere.

We don't have solid data on what is declining. The latest PCA CR mag says that 92% of racers re-upped their licenses. That seems like a good number but how many new racers are coming in? More than that, how many races are being entered? I wonder if the larger decline is in racers just entering fewer events each year. Clearly, there are fewer events and lower attendance at most.

Maybe the single-marquee event approach is too limited to provide many races and that driving with another organization is necessary to fill a schedule without traveling 1000s of miles. Then PCA becomes secondary.

If PCA Club Racing is going to stop declining, and even grow, it needs to bring in more drivers and that means new racers from the DE ranks. Pulling in, or back, guys racing P-cars from other leagues works, too.

How many new PCA racers have you met in the last year?

LuigiVampa

92% renewal rate is not something to celebrate as anything below 100% indicates a problem.

Jas0nn

That's not my takeaway; it seems to me that the racing is better at PCA and the things that are driving racers away are largely outside the actual racing.

Ask anyone where they'd race instead, and they're ultimately left facing the reality that any other SPRINT racing option will mean significantly LESS racing each weekend! That's a fact.

I choose to read this through an optimistic lens that suggests that this very angle - the amount of racing we get each weekend - could be the strategy that gets people back ... and perhaps even new racers in!

RSRRacer

I renewed but have chosen not to race for a few reasons this year. Some due to PCA and some not. Not cost. More personal. So a license renewal data point isn't too meaningful because it's so cheap to renew you'll have a ton of "why not " folks.

Streak

Stubborn leadership has historically been an issue. I've been club racing since 2008 and often times it is made very clear that the concept of a membership driven club is not given much consideration.

For example, when the points championship was implemented I pointed out almost immediately the flaw in the system: only large regions could compete. Really only a handful of racers across the entire country had any shot of winning due to the 10 bonus points. In the very early days of SPB the only regions that had any shot were in Texas and CA.

As a fix I repeatedly emailed that the bonus points should be limited to 5 and points.

After a hard race at WG with DiStefano my trans gave up with 6 minutes to go. Matt earned those points but since I DNF'd he didn't get at least that one. I also suggested that DNF's be counted towards the points.

Fast forward to January of this year and all of a suddenly the bonus points limit is 5 and DNF's are counted. Should have happened years ago but for one bald headed dictator.

And don't get me started on the passing rule. A constant source of conflict that thru sheer obstinance will never ever be clarified. Every other racing organization has a clarified passing rule with established definitions of overlap etc. Every single one.

During a certain bald person's chairmanship you could ask around the paddock and every racer you spoke to would get red in the face and recall a negative experience with said chairman. He was way way out of hand and just belligerent. That was the culture. It's a bad one.

There is no room for that in a member driven club.

None

Veloce Raptor

I remember that guy

Streak

Kinda set the tone for a long time.

Best thing that ever happened to PCA Club racing was when he retired.