What happened to John Hagins dream "united we race"! In reading some of the post here I see allot of peeling apart the rules to the ninth degress. I thought the goal was to get more race boats, not make it harder to join the sport! In my 'off the record' interviews with performance boat owners the biggest complaint I hear is "there are too many rules to join a class forcing the racer to spend more money. What happened to "run what you brung?" I know it's P class, but if a play on words can bring in new players, whats the harm?
The second complaint is "Its not fun anymore!" Picking the sport apart doesn't seem like much fun, so I say 'Bring back the fun & they will come!'
Anyways, thats my goal, but what do I know? I'm just a racers wife trying to support my husbands habit

I say ring back the A, B, C, D, Modified, and Open classes. Unless a class can bring 10 boats to a race.

So bringing back the A, B, C, D, Modified, and Open classes will Guarantee 10 boats plus per glass per race?

The first time i every had about the jeszy boys OPA was when I brought my boat to jason sarris at performance marine and he showed me his race boats and gave me a tour of his shop. Jason and crew is a great person. My boat is only 21ft with a single vortec smallblock i would love to race the circuit but its to small. Maybe if someday thier would be a class for small boats you would get more people.Bigger crowds.Didnt they race smaller boats back in the day

That didn't quite seem to work out. Again.

u·nit·ed
–adjective
1. made into or caused to act as a single entity
–verb
2. to join, combine, or incorporate so as to form a single whole or unit.

Nope.

u·nit·ed
adj.
1. Combined into a single entity.
2. Concerned with, produced by, or resulting from mutual action.
3. Being in harmony; agreed.

we
pron.
1. Used by the speaker or writer to indicate the speaker or writer along with another or others as the subject: We made it to the lecture hall on time. We are planning a trip to Arizona this winter.
2. Used to refer to people in general, including the speaker or writer: "How can we enter the professions and yet remain civilized human beings?" (Virginia Woolf).
3. Used instead of I, especially by a writer wishing to reduce or avoid a subjective tone.


race
n.
1. Sports
a. A competition of speed, as in running or riding.
b. races A series of such competitions held at a specified time on a regular course: a fan of the dog races.
2. An extended competition in which participants struggle like runners to be the winner: the presidential race.


So if your going to break down the meaning of united we race it's best we look into the meaning of all three words.

UNITED: Come race with us, everyone is welcome in our group.
WE : "We", our group, thus come race with our group, everyone is welcome.
RACE: Come "race" with us. Everyone is welcome to come come and compete at any of our OPA events.

Seems that's been a long standing invitation the OPA has left out for any and all teams.

OPA's definitely on the top of my list. They've got their sht together for sure. It'd be nice if they ended up being the only game in town.

In theory that would be great, but I don't think Smitty and the Boyz could handle that. Remember the OPA is a volunteer group of friends. What I believe would be best is if their were three groups that follow the OPA model, almost Francizes. North, South and West. Meet for a National Championship. Same rules, same fees, same managing partners.

We're on the same page.
Logistically, you're spot on and at the end of the day they would all fall under one, whole, singular governance. One set of rules, one set of fees, one set of points, one champion. We can dream, right?

When Haggin came up with the idea of United we Race was when I was first starting to get involved with the GEICO team. The thing that most people do not know is that it was not just Haggin involved with trying to promote what they were trying to do. It was a group of racers that had come together to do this. The racers who Haggin had gotten involved were all people who had a true passion for the sport and really wanted to see things go somewhere. This group really did start getting behind OPA and if anyone can remember back to Ocean City MD. in I want to say around 2006 that was a huge race. National Television, Big Boat Count and a group that all had a common goal.

During the 2005 Season is when OPA did the Dash for Cash in Camden NJ. Some of us may remember it as the "rainy race" It rained so hard that weekend but it was a great time. I am pretty sure everyone that went to this race from OSO ended up and still have the yellow AMF Jacket. Well at this race Smitty and Haggin along with some others came up with the idea of no entry fee racing. This is what started the kick off to OPA. During the winter between 05 and 06 Haggin rallied the troops and got everyone behind OPA.

It was a great season for OPA and all the teams that became involved. Many of those teams still call OPA home today. Now of course there were factors that came into the Success of United we Race, mainly the two other race groups SBI and OSS. Both of the groups had people that of course would stay loyal to that group and that is great. Haggin was one of the few people who went all over the country racing with every group at almost every race site. I remember when I started with the team one of the guys was telling that the year before that had something like 30+ Races. He said it was great but a very long year. Haggin conitued to do this until 2010 where AMF and Miss GEICO joined forces really trying to put OPA on the map with a televised race schedule consisting of 6 races broadcast on Sunday Afternoon at 4pm. The races would be run six weeks back to back and it was a great boost for the sport. In Orange Beach AL. Haggin retired saying that it was time to focus on other interests.

Now to answer your question. United We Race still exsists and ther are some people that live by those words. Haggin and that group of racers spent a lot of time and money trying to go to many different race sites during the season working on trying to get the leaders of all of these groups to play nice and work together. Well over the years things have changed a lot and for personal reasons those people retired from racing. Haggin countied to fight for this solution and did so until he retired living us with a great legacy.

The problem is very simple: As long as there are mulptiply organizations who have different ideals about the racing world then it will next to immposible to get everyone to race as one. I understand why people race where they do and that is fine but those loyalties hurt United We Race.

Racing will always be a hobby to everyone but maybe the elite few and so it gets treated as a hobby. Second P Class racing is here to stay because with out P Class in any group the boat count would be terrible leaving a race site with no more then 15 to 20 race boats. As a Race promoter boat count is huge because the bigger the show the better it looks. Trust me I get asked on a daily basis is GEICO coming back to Solomons Island. Yes they are and they put on a great show but the more boats out there and racing the better the show. One thing the racing organizations need to do is figure out a way to better explain the classes to the fans. P class is here to stay so its best to think of ways to make it work for the bennifit of the group.