Anne DeBold
Member
It seems to me that some people need to take a basic math course to understand about how a business works. In order for a business to survive you need to take in a little more money than you pay out. In our case it's just the opposite. We constantly pay out more than we take in.
Once again Mother Nature delt us a bad spring wiht much more rain than we needed or just at the wrong times. By my records, Friday June 27th was the only time we called the races due to the threat of bad weather, and it didn't rain at the track. It rained all around us, (the track was already bad from the Thursday night rain) it poured 2 miles from the track. With severe thunderstorm warnings in Madison and surrounding counties, until 8pm. It was a tough call to make. But it's all about the money. We couldn't take the chance for a rain out. For instance, on June 6th, it looked like rain, and once again there was rain all around us, but we decided to give it a try, and what happened???. We ended up with 30 cars to race, 88 paid in the pits and 188 paid in the grandstands. Where were the cars then? When aksed, most said it was raining where they were and assumed it would be called off. Due to low crowds, low car count, and low concessions, the track went in the hole $1600 that night. Not many small businesses can afford to loose $1600 in one week. So far this season the track has been in the red every race, due to low car count, low crowds and low concessions. Money can really run short when you're trying to improve the facility and put on a race program. Anne and I both work full time jobs and put all the money we can in the track to make it better. For financial reasons we have had to make some adjustments, and we don't like it either. But we have to do what we have to do. I don't know many people that would be willing to try to keep something going if they knew that every week they were going to have to take some of their pay and savings to make pay outs for a business, especially when all you do is get hammered for every little mistake that comes along. We bought the track to try to keep racing alive in our area. The only thing that hurts the track is low crowds, low car count and low concessions. We know fuel prices have burdened everyone, so we try not to have people drive and spend fuel money only to be rained out after they are here. Rain outs after a show has started is a loss for EVERYONE! If classes get cut, it's because the cars don't show. The track doesn't go anywhere. It is prepped every week for racing. The cars need to show up. Bad mouthing us or the track doesn't bring cars in. No cars, no track.
Hopefully this will make sense to most people that ready this, others may never understand. Bottom line is folks, we'd love to see 15+ cars in each class and a full crowd of fans to watch, so everyone can enjoy a night at the races. It's a shame that a few try to create problems for the track verbally, when in fact most of the response from the people we talk to face to face, enjoy the racing, and most of the committed drivers really like the track. So let's all get along and support the track, even if it's only verbally. This was not intended to bash anyone, only to enlighted people with questions. I appreciate your time in reading this message.
Curley
Once again Mother Nature delt us a bad spring wiht much more rain than we needed or just at the wrong times. By my records, Friday June 27th was the only time we called the races due to the threat of bad weather, and it didn't rain at the track. It rained all around us, (the track was already bad from the Thursday night rain) it poured 2 miles from the track. With severe thunderstorm warnings in Madison and surrounding counties, until 8pm. It was a tough call to make. But it's all about the money. We couldn't take the chance for a rain out. For instance, on June 6th, it looked like rain, and once again there was rain all around us, but we decided to give it a try, and what happened???. We ended up with 30 cars to race, 88 paid in the pits and 188 paid in the grandstands. Where were the cars then? When aksed, most said it was raining where they were and assumed it would be called off. Due to low crowds, low car count, and low concessions, the track went in the hole $1600 that night. Not many small businesses can afford to loose $1600 in one week. So far this season the track has been in the red every race, due to low car count, low crowds and low concessions. Money can really run short when you're trying to improve the facility and put on a race program. Anne and I both work full time jobs and put all the money we can in the track to make it better. For financial reasons we have had to make some adjustments, and we don't like it either. But we have to do what we have to do. I don't know many people that would be willing to try to keep something going if they knew that every week they were going to have to take some of their pay and savings to make pay outs for a business, especially when all you do is get hammered for every little mistake that comes along. We bought the track to try to keep racing alive in our area. The only thing that hurts the track is low crowds, low car count and low concessions. We know fuel prices have burdened everyone, so we try not to have people drive and spend fuel money only to be rained out after they are here. Rain outs after a show has started is a loss for EVERYONE! If classes get cut, it's because the cars don't show. The track doesn't go anywhere. It is prepped every week for racing. The cars need to show up. Bad mouthing us or the track doesn't bring cars in. No cars, no track.
Hopefully this will make sense to most people that ready this, others may never understand. Bottom line is folks, we'd love to see 15+ cars in each class and a full crowd of fans to watch, so everyone can enjoy a night at the races. It's a shame that a few try to create problems for the track verbally, when in fact most of the response from the people we talk to face to face, enjoy the racing, and most of the committed drivers really like the track. So let's all get along and support the track, even if it's only verbally. This was not intended to bash anyone, only to enlighted people with questions. I appreciate your time in reading this message.
Curley