NDRA June 26th/27th Maryland.

16 in Pro 4Cyl
25 in Turbo 4
19 in Comp 4
11 in Pro Stock
8 in Power Street (new class)
8 in Pro Street tire

That was the last time one was bigger

 

Hey Jim, very well said. It is kind of like people comparing the NHRA and NDRA. I see it all the time on here, NHRA fans bash the NDRA and vice versa. The latest one was, the NHRA has faster cars. But, are'nt 90% of the Pro's running both series? Also, what does it matter who is racing? If we are truely trying to save the sport, get your asses out of the recliner and to the races. If you can't afford to race, please arrange to be there and spectate at the events. All of the Sport Compact series need asses in the seat. So instead of throwing around excuses about no money, re-building, to far to drive, I don't like this or that, get to the track and talk to people and the officials and let them hear from you on what you like or dis-like about the events.

My .02

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Today's sport compact rodder doesn't seem to be buying all-out performance adders like cranks, rods, pistons and cylinder heads as many aftermarket manufacturers had hoped for. Yes there are some performance buyers, but many manufacturers are reassessing the drag racing component of the sport compact industry. </TD></TR></TABLE>

What companies????????? Eagle, crower, wiseco, arius??????? He sites no examples.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Most car manufacturers will void new car warranties if major modifications are made; so many sport compact street drivers are interested in "bling-bling", a bottle of nitrous or a computer performance program. Tires and wheels, chrome valve covers, plug wires, halogen headlights, street glow, vinyl graphics and dress-up kits are the most popular and a ton of it is sold.
</TD></TR></TABLE>

I can careless about a ricer company. Im building a drag car and these companies do not stock parts that i can use.

bling bling

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Now is the time to update the strident rulebook for Comp Eliminator to allow for multi-valve heads, EFI and turbos, in short: Bring on the next generation of drag racing.

Take off the gloves and let's see the real racing innovation of sport compact technology with Marty Ladwig, Stephan Papadakis, Nelson Hoyos and Ara Arslanian against the big boys of Comp like David Rampy, Wayne Ramay, Dean Carter and Vinnie Deceglie. Now that would be a race.
</TD></TR></TABLE>

Just bring it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I think our top dogs can hold there own against the domestic big dawgs.

Import drag racing is here to stay. Just get out and support all the sanctions. Thats for sponsors, spectatators, and racers. If any sanction folds its a blow to our industry.

 

Scott hit the nail on the head when he said that we need to go to MORE Powerade events than just two measly Extreme Rush events. Let me tell you all something.....I went to the NHRA Powerade event at Englishtown for the Saturday portion. After Top Fuel, Funny Car, and Pro Stock were finished with their qualifying, the stands nearly emptied out!! Pro-Modified, Pro Stock Bike, Comp. Eliminator, Top Alcohol Funny Car and Top Alcohol Dragster was some of the best racing I've seen all year!!! I've figured out a way to bring Sport Compact racing into the Powerade Series. Some of the classes in the NHRA have 132 car fields! They could easily knock that down to 84 car fields, and allow Sport Compact to be able to compete as well. That leaves 48 spots for Sport Compact cars to compete in. (16 hot rod, 8 all motor, 8 modified, 8 pro rwd, 8 sport fwd) and they can find a space to include 8 sport rwd cars. This is just an idea of mine.
Super Comp (8.90 cars) and Super Gas (9.90 cars) is the most boring racing in the history of drag racing. Getting rid of some of those would not hurt anything in my opinion. The NHRA has plenty of divisional races (I'm in the Northeast Division) that Sport Compacts could be a part of. You would have to race a few divisional races in order to be allowed to attempt to qualify for a Powerade race. What would be the harm in doing that??

 

like i had stated in another post if the sanctioning bodies would spend more time helping us to get sponsers instead of taking them as sponsers for races and and payouts for all of us out there giving them there advertising base. ***** and show cars are great to bring the people but im telling you unless your talkin about the nopi nationals, nobody is traveling much more than 300 miles to a carshow, racers on the other hand have thounsand to millions invested into this sport compact series and drive upwards of 5 to 6 thousand miles to go to a single event and recieve no coverage in your catagory? i'm sorry but all motor and p/s draw more cometitors than any other pro class usually. to give us no love sucks, its all gm,saturn, mopar, and never any of the honda upincomers and dont get me wrong Scott is a stand up guy and competior but he has manufacturer backing and they feed money into events so they get alot more coverage, Lisa,nelson,marty,mike c, shaun c. ! Dont think that im taking any thing away from these peticular people because they are all great peeps and friends but they are in the corp. realm and until honda steps up and other manufacturers, were steped on like **** ants. also all the names above have won many event's and deserve the time they get, what im really trying to say is we need more time for the independants like us or any other team out there. **** we have easy 750 thousand or more into our program with the cars rig trailer and tooling. we won a national event last year at etown summer slam and the only one luckily to cover it was espn but when mags came out drag sport only ones who even mentioned our names. no modified, ss, turbo, or any of the other top covers.

what scott said made a ton of sense and I support the poweraid thing and believe we would blow up if they would just take the time to invite us for a trial season soon! the good old boys didnt like us at first and after extreme rush ive heard we open many eye's to our series but still not enough paying attendee's coming down from power-aid cusatomers!!!! stop using the extreme rush to pull people into our sport from another add us in and we can all playtogether and I bet attendance will all most double! just my2 cents

 

this guy pretty much tried to compare a sport which has 50 years under it's belt to a sport which,in my eyes, doesn't even have a decade. for god's sake the pro classes haven't even been around that long. all i can say is to look at the advancements the sport compact scene has made and to actually look at the big show and actually tell me who has actually progressed in bigger leaps. even if the nhra drops the compacts we will still do what we have always done, race.

 

i just read the article


he a loser and knows nothing about sport compact
if he only knew there is probably 50 more cars in the process of being built
and its jest been a rough year for fabing and all the stuff for our cars are some times one offs or wating for new parts to come he sucks just for writing the article!

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by A train &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">i just read the article


he a loser and knows nothing about sport compact
if he only knew there is probably 50 more cars in the process of being built
and its jest been a rough year for fabing and all the stuff for our cars are some times one offs or wating for new parts to come he sucks just for writing the article!</TD></TR></TABLE>


You just hit on something there. They have had 50 years of industry built around their cars and you can buy a lot of off the shelf stuff for those cars (domestic drag). I see a lot of pro cars doing things for the first time (NORAD), lets see that type of innovation in drag cars but I guess thats where this guy would agree with us. Its time for the domestics to reach the 21st century.

The one thing I don't have a problem with is NHRA being in businesss to make money. More power to them but I hope they still see the sport compact crowd as a money maker. If they won't then someone will take their market share.

 

im sorry to say this but the author is has some good points....

the problem with this sport is that we are still very young.....as a sport and and people who are willing to spend money.....

i disagree with him when he says that we are more into looks then power...
if the average18-24 year old male was able to afford the stroker kits and turbos then you would be seeing that ....(its a rich ...or a smart mans sport)

sometimes i think that the sport was pushed too far and too fast and we havent had time to breath.

lets say that mainstream and major series like nhra and nopi have been around for about 5-6....they expect in 5-6 years for the stands to consistently have 20-30k spectators is kinda out of hand.....we havent had time to build the loyal fan base that nhra did over the last 50 years.....and for most of us we are still first generation import racers.....

maybe what i said mainly applies in CA. if im wrong we can all just blame it on
DRIFTING EVENTS

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SUPERNATURAL &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">im sorry to say this but the author is has some good points....
</TD></TR></TABLE>

I agree some there are some good points there and some not so good ones. There is a problem with attendance it seems to me. Whether it is because there is alot of breakage of the race cars or people are into other things, attendance is kinda low. Once more cars are out and breakage is less, maybe more will showup hopefully. It is very exciting to watch racing that is very close.

For example last weekend at the ndra race, in P4C there was 5 cars in the 8.8x range in qualifying, now that is just awesome. Right now it seems there are more people interested in watching the bikini contest than racing, but whatever. Maybe I am weird and would rather watch the racing instead. But anyways people need get out there and support the industry whether it be racing or in the stands.

 

As we've all seen, it's usually not SATURDAYS at an NDRA/NHRA race that's the problem. Hell, we had a shitload of people at Bristol on Saturday. Sunday the place looked fairly empty. What the sanctioning bodies need to do is space the special events out. Instead of doing all of the bikini/jello wrestling/foam party type stuff on Saturday, why don't they space it out a little? Also, I agree with whoever said that they should have more giveaways/door prizes, etc. Just a thought. Here's an even better idea..........why don't they reach out and ASK fans why they don't show up on Sunday? By the way, here's a bone that's been thrown out......something they need to consider is something like Nostalgia Compact. What that is, is a bracket class (7.99-12.99 for example) which has old cars in it such as Toyota Starlets and Corollas, Mazda RX-3's and RX-7's. I'm telling you, you'd be surprised at how many of these cars are out there, and how many people show up to see them. They usually have a minimum of 7-8 people per car. It's amazing to see a whole bunch of people cheering for a 14 second Starlet with a rotary in it. There are plenty of Modified type cars in the Latin community ready to go, but they will not show up when they know they'll get killed by the Efantis/Ten/Rau combo. The rules need to be changed for that class. I'll be at the Pan American Nationals this weekend, which is ALL bracket racing with a 10k purse to the winner. I can PROMISE you there will be at least 20,000 people there on Saturday alone. Last year attendance topped 37,000, with people standing on top of the bathrooms at Atco because there was no room in the stands!

 

The NDRA already does that. It is called Old School, and Old School Outlaw. It was run in Bradenton already this year, and should have a strong field in Moroso, Atco, and Reading. Trust me, the NDRA cares about getting the fans in the stands for the racing, I just wish everyone that says they are into the sport, cared more about the racing and less about the bikini contest. I guess I am in there with the others who would rather watch racing than the Bikini contest.
If you have any other suggestions about the old school classes, just let the guys at the NDRA know.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by sold9secteg &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> Trust me, the NDRA cares about getting the fans in the stands for the racing, I just wish everyone that says they are into the sport, cared more about the racing and less about the bikini contest. I guess I am in there with the others who would rather watch racing than the Bikini contest.
If you have any other suggestions about the old school classes, just let the guys at the NDRA know.</TD></TR></TABLE>

 

We get a miniature bikini contest while we sit in the staging lanes and while we sit in the pits...I always see the contestants walking around while we're not racing.....therefore, I don't need to see them while there's good racing going on!

 

I will have to pull some strings to get You and Luis in the hospitality suite. That is were they all hang out.

 

Careful, Glenn......you throw something like that out to a single guy like me, and you're asking for a PARTY!

 

basically it comes down to the normal response. The "Hot Rodd" era has been around for an est. 50yrs. this guy is trying to compare our sport to that. In my mind I really dont' like the fact that he is comparing SC to what he grew up with. I didn't read the whole article cuz im lazy nor did i read this entire post up here. But the bottom line her is that Hot Rodds have been around so long, and that for SC sactioned rafcing bodies (or Pro Classes) pretty much just came out, what about 3-6 years ago. Look at the time slips from 6yrs ago for a fwd and look at the ones now (7.72). thats cuz my $0.02 on this subject. feel free to tear me apart

 

Hey TyCooley, just think where we will all be in 50 years. Most of todays sport compact racers are not like the hot rodders of the 50's, most of these guys have college degrees or are working on one. Alot are shop owners and fabricators.
My Dad has raced and built cars all of his life and he still has to work everyday even though he is into his 60's. I would be willing to bet that 75% of the guys that are deep into the sport either racing or building have already given thoughts to early retirement. This is what the older generations don't understand, they have made the younger generations go to school, get diplomas, and do something other than kill ourselves making minimum wage like they did in the 50's and 60's.
Now you know why the good ole boys in all forms of racing are so reluctant to change, because alot of them do not, nor do they care to understand modern fuel injection and forced induction that we all live by now.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by old guy &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Has anyone ever heard of the guy who wrote the article? Ever seen him at a Sport Compact Event? </TD></TR></TABLE>

i've talked to him on the starting line at a couple of idrc races at palmdale.

darr is indeed a v-8 domestic guy, but he's been part of drag racing for a long time, and he has a long history in broadcast motorsports media... i believe that he is west coast-based, so he probably didn't mention the ndra because they don't run out here.

fwiw, i don't think that jello wrestling is going to improve his opinion of sport compact drag racing

cassandra, i'm not sure who you are, but, might i respectfully comment that you just brown-nosed the ndra so hard that you've got ring-around-the-collar... how about if you post some solid FACTS showing what racers get with the ndra that they don't get with the nhra? and please forgo that b.s. that the ndra is putting on these events for some higher purpose... nopi is in this to make money and promote their products, period!

ultimately, tho, the ndra isn't going to somehow save sport compact drag racing... they may have just pulled in 14(?) cars at the pro 4cyl class, but isn't the summer slam version of that class hot8? it just pulled in 11 cars... there are racers at every level that need a place to run.

in order to promote this sport, we all need to stick together... this drama-tech garbage of ***-kissing the ndra and bashing the nhra won't help the big picture.

putting sport compacts on the entire powerade tour would be good for the sport, but how many of those v-8 rednecks really care about fwd cars? and how many of you guys want a v-8 because of the powerade series, lol? most of the sport compacts will be run when there isn't anybody in the stands.

what is needed is for both the nhra and the ndra to starting putting the sport out there for more eyeball exposure... don't they know that hollywood now makes more money selling dvd's than they make at the boxoffice? nascar is the biggest motorsport in america, and of course they put out a year-end recap on dvd... hello?

the nhra will put up 'net video clips of the powerade stuff, but how much 'net video do they do for the sport compacts?

and while magazine coverage is very important, fwd cars at the track suck as a photo op... there is no launch shot, what are you gonna show, a little tire wrinkle? people need to see these cars reel it in on the big end, they need to hear the audio.

try thinking out of box for a change!

 

Here's my spin,

I think that you can argue or compare NHRA and NDRA till the cows come home and you'll be no further ahead. The best thing you can do is compare each series in terms of growth since their conception. I think NHRA had the racers but not the lifestyle and NDRA had the lifestyle but not all the racers. Today I think that NDRA is better balanced than it was 2 years ago while NHRA is still trying to find the pulse of the lifestyle side of things. It takes more than bikini contests. You also can't count E-town races because I could throw a block party there and have a huge turn out and the same goes for a race at Bradenton or Moroso. NHRA will find out what works for them eventually.

My biggest gripe with NHRA is that there is not enough emphasis on the up and coming racers that will replace the Gardellas, Kubos, Carlsons, Rados, and Papadakis's of the series when they eventually stop racing. There is a new generation of racer and enthusiast coming up through the ranks and they will be drawing in fans and sponsors in the future. Everyone wants to feel like they are a star but it's hard to shine if they don't get the opportunity. I throughly enjoy attending the NHRA races and it's obvious that NHRA employees are reading this forum, listen to your fans and racers! Having fast cars with huge sponsorship is no good if there isn't anyone watching. I'm not sure that having more sport compact racers at the Powerade events is the entire answer.

There needs to be more focus on the target demographic that actually buy the sponsors products, that is unless you want more traditional domestic involvment in the sport compact series. I think the real threat is the drift phenomenon which is gobbling up some sponsorship money that could be in the pockets of racers and sanctioning bodies. Why is it that D1 fills the stands in one event and both sanctioning bodies are fighting for a small percentage of spectators? Not to mention the fact that the event was held in SoCal. Correct me if I'm wrong but attendence at California race events are not that great in comparison to other events.

danimal made a comment about NDRA Jello wrestling- I don't think that will draw more spectators but it does keep people occupied and at the event longer. I think that both series have their strong and weak points but over the last year I think NDRA has done a good job.

Comparing hot rodders of the old days to the new generation of hot rodders is a waste of time they have a common thread- performance and just leave it at that. The old dudes are more likely to watch NASCAR while the new Generation would rather watch drifting, F1, touring or rally racing. They are a generation or two apart. It will really suck if our Pros end up getting a ride with the domestic IHRA, NHRA or NMCA team because there would be a huge hole to fill, then watch numbers plummet. Crossover is already happening.

 

So, other than having your nose up NHRA's butt, what is your problem with the NDRA?
What does the NDRA do for the racers? Racer's are treated with respect, thier concerns and idea's are listened to, and the street class or sportsman racers are treated just as well as the pros.
The NDRA has more classes for the racers and the street guys to choose from, larger pay-outs, and alot larger fan base come race day.
In fact, you are right on one point. It is about the bottom line at the end of the day for the NDRA and the NHRA. It does not matter what anyone tells you, everyone wants to make money in this buisness. Do you think the sponsor banners and title sponsors are free? No, not in any series. Some may give them away cheaper, but they all charge.
Now I already know you are pro NHRA, I have no problem with that. I like to think of Jim S. as a friend of mine, and I always hope he does well in whatever. But why do you think there has been such an influx of racers in the NDRA? Jello Wrestling? Swinsuit Competition? Spectator Count? Please feel free to form your own opionion, but state all of the facts and not the media release version of it.
It sounds like you and this writer are buddies to me.

 

Everyone is going to have their own opinion and there is no reason to bash them for it. (not trying to be mean )
Everyone who has replied on this article have all had very valid points and i agree with most of what is said...it all comes down to marketing and advertising. If someone doesn't know about it, they are not just going to magically show up! Word of mouth is powerful, but not powerful enough and that is the advertising that they are relying on!

 

Who are you replying to exactly?

 

glenn is attempting to reply to what i said, but he should try reading the post before he puts his foot in his mouth like that.

maybe he'd feel better if i bashed the nhra? there was a rumor going around awhile ago that mazda wanted drag racing footage of the bergenholtz car for some giant show in japan... they had somebody who's very well known in sport compact drag racing try to get the footage from an nhra sport compact race, but the nhra wouldn't allow anyone to come in and shoot their races.

as i pointed out earlier, you haven't been able buy a dvd of any nhra drag racing for years now, and apparently the nhra applied that no-home-video thing to a car show in japan as well(!).

so while i'd like to say that the ndra treats their sponsors better than that, there aren't any ndra dvd's for sale, either... it's another marketing opportunity that sponsors can't get with either of these short-sighted sanctioning bodies.

but of course, you can buy dvd's of the biggest drift events in the world.

 

There might be some red tape with the networks that air coverage of the NHRA/NDRA events that's preventing the release of a DVD. By the time the network gets a cut and the costs of production and editing etc. there probably isn't enough $ left over to justify selling a DVD. You want to sell something like that to make a profit not lose money.