Random thoughts on a rainy day

T

The Devil's Advocate

The Teller of Truths
The St Louis area could really use a Sunday night track. I never realized how much I'd miss "The Bowl" until it was gone.

I-55 is a great track, but is it really worth the cult status that it is given by the locals?

Highland also has a loyal following, but seems that racers who come from other tracks are merely tolerated, at best.

Mt Vernon- Is that track the only reason he's leading UMP points?

Ken Rumble- great season for the underdog of the St Louis late model scene. Is he still running a steel block?

And what's the big deal about steel blocks? They can cost almost as much as an aluminum motor, but if they run as a separate show from the UMP cars, they get paid much less.

Montgomery County is a racy little track. Wish they were drawing more Late Models now that it's had a few seasons under its belt?

Montgomery has a really laid back atmosphere. Reminds me alot of "The Bowl".

Bond County is a track that should have made it.

Was watching VH1 this morning and saw an old Huey Lewis & the News video. Huey and Jeff Gordon really look alot alike.

Godfrey really needs to get started on time. And find a way to stop making such bad judgement calls. Other than that, the racing has been incredible!

Belleville- no thanks.

Gateway was just poorly planned. Parking is horrible, and the track doesn't lend itself to much good racing. Reconfigure it into a 3/4 mile sweeper, like Richmond, and then maybe they could get a Cup date.

The St Louis area could also benefit from a weekly pavement track.

Tri-City was the place to be for the Xtreme late model race. Hope they come back next year and start to build up the race as a yearly tradition. That's the only track in the area that could do it justice.

As a side thought, since TCS is the only track capable of holding such high-profile events, why not try to also get the Challenge of Champions shootout next year. Pevely is ok, but for pure traditional racing, a big half-mile would be much better.

Speaking of tradition, other tracks used to shut down the weekend of the I-55 Nationals. That was the biggest shootout of the year for most teams within a 300 mile radius. Where's the respect? I can't think of one track that will afford them that courtesy this year. Then again, it may be their own fault for turning it into just another race by adding the street stock / sportsman class to the card about 10 years ago.

The Illinois Fall Nationals are coming up pretty soon. Will this event ever break through to "must race" status for the bigger teams? Maybe that would be a better site for the Challenge of Champions shootout.

What ever happened to trophy girls?
 
If Tri-City had UMP, they could get a CoC race, and maybe the Finalee, but they don't. I-55 is a great track, and the finally will be a great race. I think the reason the I-55 nationals are as well thought of is because of the purse. The purse that they have now is about a normal, not so big show. $10,000 to win is good pay, but what do they pay to start? In order to get a huge carcount you gotta have a nice payout through the field. If your gonna pay $10,000 to win make it about $600 or $800 to start. Maybe even more than that. They also need to treat the modifieds better than they do for the nationals. Remember this used to be called the Modified Nationals(yes I know the modifieds were basically a late model, and evolved into them), why not pay them decent too??? I think the modifieds should get $5000 to win for the nationals, and a few hundred to start. They do something like this and the carcount will be awesome just for these two divisions.
 
Strippers for Trophy Girls

D.A., I commiserate the lack of trophy girls along with you. I was
especially disappointed with the profound absence of STRIPPER
trophy girls at Godfrey's SCRA show. What a twisted, "Politically
Correct" world we poor males of the species now endure.
Must the "P C" militants deprive us of EVERY slight innocent sin
that make weekends worth living for?

Can I get an "AMEN" brothers?
 
lol

The Trophy girls got old and fat!:D

55 is kool!

Highland?....ill pass....not into demo derbies or survival of the fittest!

Belle Clair......pass...never ran there....no comment!


MCS.....wish it was closer!...Same for b-town!

Godfrey........getting better every week....look how it was when the season started!


TCS......drop the nascar crap......still one of the smoothest tracks around!


Gateway...dont care dont care dont care.....no left turns on dirt!
 
xtreme dirtlatemodels

i would like to see them race at i55 raceway that would be better than tricity speedway.i saw the summer nat at mont county and it was awsome watch them race there.godfrey needs to race on sunday and there would be alot of late modles there ,i was there in april on a sunday they had 45 late models.you would have thought the track owner would see that and just start racing on sunday.and another thing godfrey speedway runs out of food by the features becauce they dont know how to start on time ,i was there on sat night about 3weeks ago the first heat started at 8:50 pm
 
I'm sure I-55 would have a good race for the Xtreme Dirt cars, but to say it would be better than the Tri-City show is really grasping at straws. Were you there for the show? Rather than give you my own biased opinion on the matter, I will refer you to a post which includes the opinions of those who have no affiliation with either track. Please click here:

http://www.stlracing.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=25218

Except for the disrespecting of our local racers, I feel that sums things up pretty well.

P.S. I am also craving the return of Sunday night racing.
 
Hey Doug, One race makes(or breaks) a season for a track? I hope not, but with this board it does.:rolleyes: Just wondering, were you at the Tri-State Challenge race at I-55? I doubt it.

TCS with a big UMP race - Like Crash9 pretty much said, it probably wouldn't occur unless they get a UMP sanction, so here is the million dollar question - would that(UMP sanction) ever happen???
 
NOT IF THE MEN INCHARGE HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITHIT AND DOUGIE IF YOU WANT TO SEE AND REALLY EXTREME RACE TAKE TRIP EAST ON70 TO OHIO 127TO OHIO47 I DO BELEIVE TO 118 THIS WEEKND BIG BOY 200 PLUS U M P LATE MODELS I,M LEAVING 9 AM FRIDAY MORNING
 
WHICH TRACK WOULD HAVE A BETTER XTREME RACE, TCS OR I55??

THOSE GUYS ARE GONNA PUT ON A GOOD SHOW ANYWHERE MOST LIKELY. THE DECIDING FACTOR WOULD PROBABLY BE, WHICH TYPE OF TRACK YOU LIKE. HIGH BANKED? FLAT? 1/2 MILE, OR SHORTER? ECT ECT!
 
ANYBODY THINK RED HILL RACEWAY IS
GEARING UP FOR BIG MONEY SHOWS?
IF YOU HAVEN'T BEEN THERE YET, GO CHECK
THIS PLACE OUT. IT IS DEFINATELY FIRST CLASS.
RED CLAY SURFACE AND VERY FAST. LOOK FOR SOME BIG RACES HERE SOON. JMO
 
Tri-City has asked for a UMP Summer Nationals show every year for the past several years. UMP keeps telling them NO and most likely will keep telling them no.
 
Okay, I couldn't stand it anymore, this thread is like a broken record. No offense to the person that started it either, but we're all (or must of us anyway) in agreement that there needs to be a Sunday Late Model track, it can work with the right promoting! Many of us have posted stuff just like this but we are preaching to the choir, how many promoters do you think actually read this stuff, although if they were wise they would, afterall we are the fans that fill the grandstands. I agree that Mont. Cty is a great track, one problem, location. It is right in the middle of the state and IS the sanctioning body dividing point. All around the track are different sanctions, MLRA, MARS, IMCA, NASCAR, etc. It will take time to build but I'm sure will be successful in years to come and maybe someday will lead to some tracks out my way jumping on board with UMP. Something that would work at Mont. Cty is a challenge race, and I don't mean UMP Challenge of Champions race either, I mean something between MARS/WDRL/UMP/MLRA, etc., they would just need to come up with an agreeing tire ruling. Now wouldn't it be cool to see the MARS/MLRA/UMP guys run against each other right in the middle of the damn state!

Second, Tri-city, with the execption of this year's xTreme race is a flat, boring half mile, like Sedalia, you normally know who's going to win after the first lap is over. I've seen the UMP LMs on the Tri-city Speedway, only they were on the 1/4 mile, it was right after the 9/11 tragedy and it was great race. Don't get me wrong, I thought the xTreme cars were great but how many 1/2 miles are there in the stl area??? Answer, not too darn many, and for a reason, they are normally boring! Tracks such as Mont. Cty, Pevely, Highland, B'town, Godfrey, Mt. Melvin and Macon are much more enjoyable to watch races on, usually lots of passing and side-by-side action and races are usually fought for all the way thru, not boring 1/2 mile track blow-outs. I will go back next year if xTreme races Tri-city but that's about all I'd want to see on the 1/2 mile. If any of you have ever been to the Black Hills, there was once a 1/2 mile there too, now there is a 1/4 mile inside of it and a smaller track inside the 1/4 mile, these people got it going on now. Their car counts are up, fans are filling the stands again and oh yeah, xTreme just raced their first race there this year, the farthest west xTreme (Hav-a-Tampa, UDTRA) LM show ever! Smaller tracks can work and are the way to go now. Check out Black Hills Speedway website, now this is a great configuration. http://www.blackhillsspeedway.com./trackinfo.htm

Third, UMP tracks and promoters seem to enjoy walking all over each other nowadays, you're right, everything used to be off the weekend of the good 'ole two-day nats at Pevely, man those were the days. Now the mod nationals are in Boone, IA and the LMs have too many choices to go to and "points" to worry about, which keeps the counts down at most stl-area events. The UMP article in DLM was a good one, but I disagree that some things go untouched, especially the points issue, it HAS TO CHANGE for UMP to continue to thrive as well as the Summer Nats, they must change also in order to stay elite. No points should be awarded at local tracks when there is a "big" race within 100 or so miles of the event, this may prevent some of the "avoiders" from not deciding to race against other competitors. In the end, it's each driver's decision though where to race and we should all respect that, I wouldn't drive 2 hours away to race either if there was a track close to home, hmmm, just common sense is what I think that is called. Everyone needs to just realize that the fans, no matter how hard we try or want, DO NOT control where racers race!

That's enough soap box for now, anyone got an ark!!! 10 inches of rain and counting!

...hope to see (most of) you at the meeting of the minds at Nat's!!!
Sam
 
Here is another rainy day thought/idea....TCS with a UMP sanction, running on Sundays. It would fill that Sunday need and be somewhat centrally located for this area, also they would probably then be able to get some big UMP shows(as mentioned in above post). They could run the UMP LMs and Mods plus a couple of other classes on whichever track, quarter or half. Just a thought, but maybe a radical one though.


UMP points issue, yep I agree with Sam67 that something needs to be changed with the points system setup, be it weekly or SN, either way they need to alter it a little. I don't claim to have the perfect idea on how to change it, but I know there are many ideas out there.
 
SamIam,

I have been to Black Hills Speedway. I was on vacation up in South Dakota a few years back and we went over to that track for a 100 lap Late Model show. Great facility....and a very very very fast track!!!
 
Chewin'

I spent many Friday nights there from when I was stationed at Ellsworth AFB nearby from 95 to 2001. The track went thru a lot of growing pains for a while but now they got it going on. It's a WISOTA-sanctioned track and according to my friends still there, they are very proud of having an xTreme race and hope to have them back again next year.

Sam
 
Yea..I think I went to the Bud 100 or something like that...but it was a WISSOTA Late Model race...I remember them running quite a few of other classes, too. I think that was the first time I saw trucks on dirt....then I came back here and saw Utley with his "Modified" Truck.
 
I mention 10 tracks, yet Tri City is the one that everyone comments on? I was really hoping on some insight as to the cult status I-55 has.

BTW, interesting idea on Sundays @ TCS. Hadn't even considered that one yet.

Yes, Black Hills Speedway looks like an awesome place. Hope to get there someday. Is it on the way to Sturgis?
 
Dev's Adv;

Yes, the BH Speedway is near the Rally, and there are usually special events there that week to include bike races, saw them one year and it wasn't too bad. Rapid City is 26 miles from Sturgis, all you do is jump on I-90 and head west to Sturgis from Rapid.

Sam
 
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