2012 LRRS Suggestions

[ThunderCycle]

Gate admission is a problem. I'd be curious how much the track actually generates from gate receipts. Would an increase in attendance at a lower price off set a lower admission ticket?
We definitely need a Saturday only pass. If my family comes up to watch Saturday only racing and shells out another $125 at the gate, that's two less races for me, less money for track souvenirs and less dinning at the track restaurant. What about discount tickets for groups and organizations that might be interested in racing? Possible discount ticket coupons for racers to hand out to friends? Racing is not an inexpensive sport and if your friends and family can't watch/support you, interest will wain quickly on the home front.

Just my thought.

[timmyho414]

What about discount tickets for groups and organizations that might be interested in racing? Possible discount ticket coupons for racers to hand out to friends?

There were 5 dollar off coupon you could grab from the schedule displays. I've seen them on the table in the media center and on the counter of bike shops. I grabbed a few and gave them to my family.

[Pigman]

There were 5 dollar off coupon you could grab from the schedule displays. I've seen them on the table in the media center and on the counter of bike shops. I grabbed a few and gave them to my family.

Still @ 20$ thats a lot for 12-5 for watching......I just don't see how charging so much is helping our sport at all. Let it be free and fill the stands and get people there they will spend there $$$$ some where else inside and there is your profit.

EASY........

[CEO]

Still @ 20$ thats a lot for 12-5 for watching......I just don't see how charging so much is helping our sport at all. Let it be free and fill the stands and get people there they will spend there $$$$ some where else inside and there is your profit.

EASY........

Well, maybe make it 5 or 10 bucks.

If you make it completely free, I'd be more worried about thieves.

Maybe just TRY lowering it and let us all know ahead of time, we'll try to promote, and see if the attendance goes up. If not, fine, leave it be.

[butcher bergs]

Theives will pay to get in if they think the score is worth it. The travelling sales guy that was recently busted comes to mind.

[GingahNinjah]

or drop ULSB (ie motard 2) and give production 250s a class of their own to be competetive in

[Jim]

all this arguing over a class that gets 7-10 bikes in its grid anyways. no one watches those races, and most dont care.

[Jim]

Eric, has there ever been any talk about an auto bump to EX during the season? Something similar to bumping up Novice riders (lap times), so some of the season long top AM riders aren't collecting all the trophies & contingency when they should be riding in the EX races.

[Woodcraft]

Eric, has there ever been any talk about an auto bump to EX during the season? Something similar to bumping up Novice riders (lap times), so some of the season long top AM riders aren't collecting all the trophies & contingency when they should be riding in the EX races.

There is nothing official here, but Amateurs who have not earned the points to bump by the classic but are deemed ready to bump are generally given a pass until the end of the season so that they can compete in the Race of Champions if they so desire. The following season, they'll be moved up - so you get, at most, half a season of trophy collecting.

[Scottg22]

My biggest suggestion is proper Novice trophies. With the turn over in this sport these are the riders that LRRS need to focus on. Getting a ribbon/medal for 3rd place in your first few events is very cool and meaningful- but when u flip it over and the date is wrong and they hand you a "Novice" tag to put over the original class for the back of it ... It's just plain cheesy.

As for the trophies, you are correct we should all make an effort to be there- a lot of us don't keep them and donate our trophies to be redistributed. I went down to see my son get his saturday and it was cool to see everyone there. But you couldn't even hear because of the legends cars practicing.

[CBR929RE]

My biggest suggestion is proper Novice trophies. With the turn over in this sport these are the riders that LRRS need to focus on. Getting a ribbon/medal for 3rd place in your first few events is very cool and meaningful- but when u flip it over and the date is wrong and they hand you a "Novice" tag to put over the original class for the back of it ... It's just plain cheesy.

As for the trophies, you are correct we should all make an effort to be there- a lot of us don't keep them and donate our trophies to be redistributed. I went down to see my son get his saturday and it was cool to see everyone there. But you couldn't even hear because of the legends cars practicing.

I'll summarize for you "GET ON THE BOX!!!"
half the time you'll be right where you should be

[snwbrdr435]

.... But you couldn't even hear because of the legends cars practicing.

+1

[nt650hawk]

I've been out trying to raise money before....

Woodcraft dash for cash????

As for ULSB....so, if you take Motards out (a growing population at LRRS) - how many bikes fill that gap? More...less....and are the motard guys happy about losing a class? Just putting it out there.

GTL.....personally, I wouldn't want to put a Motard through that....it would certainly shorten the life span of the engine. Keep putting ideas out...it's all good

what did the middle weight production guys of last year say?

Doesn't CCS allow the SV650 into ULSB? Do we think that LRRS may adopt that? That would certainly increase the number of "sportbikes" on that grid.

CCS does LRRS does not. LRRS wants/wanted to preserve the lighter weight class seing that the SV had been producing Great results in the LW classes. Again this is falling to the same realm the motards are fulling. They are competitive in many other classes why not try and preserve the ULSB status for the small sport bikes.

I'm not sure if Motards would enjoy running LWSB... Sure they might have similar lap times, but 50hp vs 80-100hp? All their hard work would be wasted the second they get to a straightaway.

I was saying that with Ducati 800's with 85-95 hp..

But isn't a 17.2 a 17.2 or a 16 a 16 or a 15 a 15 when you cross the finish line.

Can someone explain to me what exactly is the problem with motards in ULSB?

They fit the bill perfectly weight and power wise. I rode mine in ULSB this weekend.

People complain about weird lines but honestly the fastest way to ride a tard is on the line. If there are erratic racers out there, that has to do with the racer, not the machine. There are erratic racers in other classes including big bikes... we don't try to ban their bike from a class.

I have no issue with the motard lines as a mater of fact I really don see to much of a difference than mine. In the past Motords were kicked out of competing I think in a different wave with 125's because it had been argued that their lines were different.

Just saying Motards have reduced the number of Sportbike entries in a Sport bike class. Just trying to revive the sport bike aspect of the class. Motards are/can be competive in a number of other classes.

But motards do not have a technical competitive advantage in the class... they just happen to dominate because more people ride them. Eh?

are they not technicaly 100# or more less than a standard bike?

And the hawk has 33% more horsepower out of the box, too. Not to mention the tard is certainly not optimized or designed to do what we are doing with it. The hawk has a great chassis, bigger vtwin motor, etc. What's with the poor me attitude?

Bitch bitch, whine whine. They ARE similar machines, as listed in the rules, and as told easily by the laptimes both bikes run. So why 'bail'? Hawks are competitive in the class, end of story. If you want to kick all the tards out, you'll have a grid of two guys. Then they'll probably dump the class entirely. Is that what you want?

Bottom line, if you're mad they beat you, you need to ride faster. I got beat by two hawks in ULSB... maybe they should ban hawks?

This whole argument is pretty dumb now that I think about it a bit more. Why would you ever want to have LESS people to race against unless you don't like competition? And if you don't want that, you shouldn't race motorcycles.

no tude.

Just would like to have a sportbike aspect to a class the is a sportbike status. I've explisitly have heard from a number of people that they do not want to ride in a motard race in ULSB. That is why there are not a lot of other sport bikes participating in ULSB any more.

if you think a stock hawk has 33% more powere you are grosely missled...try 45-50hp at the wheel. good luck trying to compare a 23-24 year old motor to modern motard motor. I've run a stock motor and really pushed it and produced a 19.4. Power to weight advantage is definately to the motard. A sickly 700cc hawk with maybe 70 hp gets closer to the power to weight ratio for the motard but is still less.

all this arguing over a class that gets 7-10 bikes in its grid anyways. no one watches those races, and most dont care.

Ask a lot of people what is the best race to watch?

I guess the same argument can and have been fought for the EX production twin class. Averaging 4.8 entries per race for the year. Let’s get rid of that one because it does not have a lot going on in that series, right???? OR the EX125cc class that is averaging 1.8 entries for the year. FYI Motard class is averaging 8.1 per race for the year.


LW sportsman of the 14 that have raced this series I think 1 maybe 2 are not a motard.


Personally I have nothing against the Motards. I think that they are an absolute blast to ride. I like to call it Stupid Fun. I'm just looking to try and preserve a class from become another motard race regardless of what I am doing. It has not been since 2008 that a Sportbike has been on top of this class.

[CEO]

Josh deleted all his posts for some reason so I deleted mine

[BrianC]

On the topic of getting/retaining more spectators, I would say that more important than lowering gate fees, is beefing up the areas to spectate from the infield. I've had over 15 friends and family come up over the past 2 seasons, and they all say they wish they could see more of the action... of all of them, only my wife has come back up a 2nd or 3rd time. Maybe some taller bleachers, and put them in a few more spots. Something on the back part of the track by t9 would be cool too.
Just a suggestion...

overall, I'm thankful for all the efforts the officials make to keep us safe and happy. It is cool to have someone like Eric who sees both sides taking the time to hear our suggestions so thanks to him for that. In my 2 seasons alone, I've seen alot of improvement so I can tell we are headed in the right direction.

[OreoGaborio]

Yeah, the infield spectating areas are DEFINITELY lacking big time.

[Jim]

My favorite spot to watch used to be the old T3 bleachers

[jasnmar]

On the topic of getting/retaining more spectators, I would say that more important than lowering gate fees, is beefing up the areas to spectate from the infield. I've had over 15 friends and family come up over the past 2 seasons, and they all say they wish they could see more of the action... of all of them, only my wife has come back up a 2nd or 3rd time. Maybe some taller bleachers, and put them in a few more spots. Something on the back part of the track by t9 would be cool too.
Just a suggestion...

Yeah, the infield spectating areas are DEFINITELY lacking big time.

So, as not a racer or familiar I'd hesitated to recommend anything, so I'll blame my comments on Brian and Pete.

Background ... my first ever race was a ride to the races early this year (one of the seacoast rides). It was "fine". I was still new to this board and didn't know most of the people. I hung out in the T3 stands for a while... eventually found the T1 stands and hung out there for a while.

While I enjoyed the action enough I didn't really understand much of what was happening. Who's in what race? Why are these guys so much faster than the last guys? Race 4. Great! WTF is race 4? I don't remember if there is a description of the race on the board, but even if there is I still don't know what the hell you're talking about. ULSB race? (I know now that's Ultra Light Sport Bike, but what the hell is that?)

Fast forward ... I now "know" way more of the racers (I actually don't, i just know more names). I stumble across an offer for a free pass (thanks again ECK) and decide to take my son to the races last weekend. My wife decides she wants to go as well. OK (I don't have any expectation that she'll actually like this, but if I say that then I'm an ass). So we pay $30 to get the 3 of us into the infield (ECK savin' me money), spend another $40 on lunch (we can't go anywhere without having a meal, this is my families fault, not the tracks), races still aren't running and I'm not sure why (we didn't get there until after noon so I'm confused).

We wander around for a bit. I'm still exploring, I think there are stands in 1 and 3, but also think that 10/11/12 might support a stand and might be interesting. At this point I'm effectively leading an infield track tour for my family and I'm an idiot.

Once the action starts we are in the 3 stands for a bit. Since the stands don't make it easy to see, of course everyone is standing on them. My wife, being, well, my wife wants to sit down. She doesn't want to sit down on the dirty stands that everyone has walked on. She'd rather sit in the grass (no IDK the difference). Of course she can't see shit from the T3 grass. We end up moving to T1. Problem isn't any different. She ends up sitting on the tunnel wall.

After an hour of this, she's bored to death. We send her to the mall (almost forcibly). As we discuss things, it turns out that "mostly" she expected that she would be able to see the entire track from wherever she was. All she got to see what a small window of bikes "flying past her".

My son and I now make a pass through the pits and meet a few people, all the racers are extremely nice. We wander up near the hot pit. My son sees alot of pedestrians (i.e. non-raceres / support staff) entering the hot pit and wants to follow. I of course say no, as I don't know the rules (I tend to follow rules), but would really like to go out for the start.

I tell some stories about "umbrella girls" at Loudon as we see someone holding an umbrella. We talk about the fact that "someone" starts off grid as he missed the warm up lap and getting gridded "on time".

My son, at this point has figured out that he only wants to watch the "fast races" and is there a way to figure out when those are. I'm now on my phone trying to download a race schedule so that we can identify which races he would be most "interested" in. The other things that he's interested in are when are the people we met racing... Fortunately we asked Rada what races he was in, for others I'm digging through race reports to try to relate names to numbers (believe it or not, people in helmets aren't as recognizable as they were in the garage). As we're waiting for the "fast races" I notice Jake running around and explain to him that Jake is about his age, which also peaks his interests (unfortunately we missed Jake in the garage), so that's someone else he can identify with and show some interest in.

To relate riders to numbers I'm also searching through race reports to figure out who's who in some cases. There are a few I know, but I'm easily confused. I can see and ECK bike, and tell him that's one of the guys that paid for your ticket, and maybe I can tell you who it is...

1. apologies for the long post. Based on the fact that I started this on my wireless device I didn't intend it to be what it was.
2. I'm not sure you wanted feedback from non-participants, so feel free to ignore me.
3. I'm not in any way "vested" into the best interests of the track, so my goals could be completely different.

If I were in charge of this and didn't have a budget...

Everyone who's never been to a LRRS race get's a free 2 day infield pass (the days are not required to be used consecutively. 1 Sat and next Sat works. Sat and Sun works. Sun and next Sun works. I don't care, any 2 days).
Everyone who's using a free pass (as well as anyone else who wants to) is will get a guided tour of the infield, that included a description of the track (as best as it can be explained from the infield).
Everyone who's using a free pass has access to a race schedule with "basic" descriptions of what the race classes actually mean (I still don't understand this) (text it to them, print it for them, don't care).
Everyone who's new get's a tour of the garages and gets introduced to the "willing" racers (in my experience this is most of them, but people might not want to interrupt).
Market (actively, starting in the Concord / Loudon area) the fact that everyone is invited to attend 2 free races. In addition to the Concord / Loudon area market with other "MC enthusiast" locations, like dealerships, NESR, Born, TTD, Bomo etc.

Much of the above would likely take a semi "dedicated" racing ambassador. This person might be able to also do other sorts of racing ambassador things (for other types of races), but during events would need to be the "noob coordinator" at a minimum.

My wife will likely never be back to a race.
My son is a coin toss at this point.
Gaining customers (fans) requires work.

Again, apologies for the long post, and please feel free to ignore me as I might have hijacked the original intent.

[LRRS#324]

Similar to the post above but this past weekend my family wanted to know if there was a copy of the grid sheets that they could use to try and figure out names and numbers and learn more about each race. Basically if we could come up with something that could be given to spectators to try and give them a basic idea of what is going on.

[Kurlon]

Problem there is the grid sheets aren't typically ready until the last possible minute. The url for live timing on the other hand would provide up to date info on what's going on if you have a cell phone or tablet with a data plan.

[Woodcraft]

My thought.....a program that details all of the information that you were missing would be a good start....spectating areas, class descriptions, explanations of what "Race 4" is, some personal information on class champions, the URL to put into your smartphone for live race results, etc. I saw this done years ago. It's a lot of work and in the end you can usually just get enough advertisers to pay for it. However, I think that it would be a good step towards enhancing the experience for families. I will bring this up for sure.

[GingahNinjah]

i like the idea of simpified/dumbed down class descriptions it would probably also help alot of new racers who already have alot of info to take in

[tonupdamien]

I'm not a racer yet...hopefully next year but here's my thoughts.

The track should be giving away fist-fulls of free tickets at bike nights across New England. Just have a few people on this board be "ambassadors" and send them a ton of tickets to distribute. I'm not sure what actual spectator numbers are, but it always looks very, very empty.

Have an information booth (is there one now?) where people can pick up a nice, concise overview of how the classes work and what bikes normally run in them.

Have more demo events to get people to the track, even just to the parking lot. They can experience it and realize they want to come back.

Get the Transatlantic Challenge/Thruxton Cup up here!!! (That may be tough, as it's AHRMA, but it would be awesome.)

[BSR6]

On the topic of getting/retaining more spectators, I would say that more important than lowering gate fees, is beefing up the areas to spectate from the infield. I've had over 15 friends and family come up over the past 2 seasons, and they all say they wish they could see more of the action... of all of them, only my wife has come back up a 2nd or 3rd time. Maybe some taller bleachers, and put them in a few more spots. Something on the back part of the track by t9 would be cool too.
Just a suggestion...

overall, I'm thankful for all the efforts the officials make to keep us safe and happy. It is cool to have someone like Eric who sees both sides taking the time to hear our suggestions so thanks to him for that. In my 2 seasons alone, I've seen alot of improvement so I can tell we are headed in the right direction.

Being a spectator, this is the first thing I would ask for over anything else. Larger bleachers, and more of them. I'm convinced more attention here may result in increased attendance without having to lower gate fees.

My second request would be a Saturday only pass.

[nt650hawk]

Hi Jas,
i'm glad we could chip in for a pass.

I make up a handfull of flyers and post a couple up at the garage entrance with the team members and the races they will be eintering. I often have extras that we hand out for those that want to carry arround the schedule so they can keep up with things throught the day. It definately helps.