DITTO!!

Mike I cant pm over this site anymore need to renew...

email me at

velocitymike at hotmail.com

I see this a lot: Less classes. What is the magic number? 5? what do you do with boats that show that dont have 5 boats? move them up a class? Will you lose boats? If there was class 1-6 at races we could filter people into these classes until they could fill the 5 boat requirement. Some how we have to thin out the classes to put more boats in less classes. Mobilcam posted the classes that had the most activity in an earlyer thread. I say build on those first! This may not sit well with some but we are racers and we need competition if we want any respect. Maybe more exposure for the bigger classes.
Let me ask this too you all. Who do you respect more, the teams that beat 15 other teams in class 6 or the teams that beat 2 other teams in the top classes? Do you ever wonder how good you would be if you were in that big boat but know you will never have a chance to find out? Are they truly the best or just are in a position that most will never have a shot at. Maybe we should build classes that more people could attempt to afford. I dont have the answers just the questions.
MD

Randy,
I respect the guys in the class with the most boats, OPA I respect class 5 the most. When/if I get my lil class 6 boat dialed in, I would love to step up to 5.

Yeah, in order to get the sponsors in there (to hopefully one day pay for it all), you'd have to basically go door to door to businesses in the area, and get in the local media.

If you already knew the event sites 6 months in advance, you could have a small group go in and sell advertising to local businesses early. You would have already gotten a quote on the cost to rent the equipment, so then structure the advertising prices to pay for the equipment. The more advertising they sell, the more equipment. You could price it according to exposure like a tee shirt logo, a race program, banner, or their name on the TV in poker run village for 3 days. The money made on ticket sales, shirts, concessions, etc would go to the race organization. The more popular the events become, the more they could charge to advertise, and start keepng a cut off that.

If it caught on, each season would be bigger than the last.... which would all but guarantee virtual reality headsets by 2011. :cool-smiley-011:

RACE IN THE OCEAN.The whole appeal of our sport has always been the boats not only battling other race boats,but the race course itself.The varying water conditions of ocean racing also tends to level the playing field for the competitors.I really dont think offshore powerboat racing is a good live motorsport;at least to watch from the beach.The action needs to be caught on camera from helicopters catching the boats jumping out of the water with engines screaming.Racing in lakes and rivers with a heat race format is for the hydroplanes and flatbottoms;and those boats are way more exciting to watch go in circles in calm water than "offshore"catamarans and deep vees.

CLASSES:two national or Pro classes;one cat class and one vee class.The media and television coverage needs to be centered around these classes.I feel this a format that even the most casual fan can understand.The schedule for these classes should be national.

There are far too many big boat classes spreading the fleet way too thin.This was very confusing to the fans in Key West. There needs to be more boats racing each other to make it exciting.Multiple "Super"classes with only a few boats each cant continue.I am sure many long time fans remember when there was only one "big boat" class: Open.It used to draw twenty or more boats at the national races.

As far as the other classes;divisional or Sportsman,there can be many, as long as they remain the support show or feeder system to the Pro classes.The focus of these classes should be to maximize the number of boats competing by allowing a place for just about any performance boat to race,and keeping the cost to compete as reasonable as possible.The classes could be both bracket and spec and should be based on a minimum of 5 boats.The schedule for these classes should be divisional.Keeping with the idea of affordability,travel expenes and time off from work need to be major considerations.As the long time fans know;there used to great local and divisional circuts all over the country with five or more races annually within a couple of hours of each other.These races were conducted by local clubs which supported the national sanctioning body which at that time was APBA.OPA has done a great job of rebuilding offshore powerboat racing in the northeast and central regions;and POPRA is trying to do the same out west;and SBI is primarily southeast;so the foundation to expand on this is already there.

RACES:Run the divisional or Sportsman classes on Saturday...and the national or Pro classes on Sunday.There should also be stand alone divisional races held throughout the season.

UNIFICATION.Finally,there needs to be one sanctioning body with a national series supported by divisional series' in the northeast,southeast,central and west.A World Championship race with all of the boats competing would be the highlight of the season every November.

This format worked very well for many years until the sport began to fragment in the mid-eighties.

Just my opinion.

The racing was good in those days;but how can you come up with rules to accomadate the variety of boats that are running today?...ie new stepped light weight vee bottom vs. older heavier conventional vee bottom.With the same power, the newer boat is going to be much faster.No doubt GPS racing is what it is;but it has increased the boat count.Many of the boats racing now can only be competitive with bracket rules monitored by the GPS's.