Track Closings, Do they make enough gate on Events?

Overhead is so much more for races.

3 times the flaggers, ambulance, awards, staff, plus insurance is more.

Such a crap shoot nowadays on covering all those expenses. Then you have to walk the tightrope between not giving racers enough time and the day running too long.

Set a 6 hour practice day and make as much or more with less hassle.

Not a tough choice to make.

As far as no track owners running their own races, I think you are making a,blanket statement about things in your area, and would find that things differ a lot in other areas.

Thanks for the response, I was hoping you would. So it seems in your area the tracks run their own races, for some reason in Central Texas that is almost never seen. If the track is running the whole show, my question is irrelevant.

For those in other areas, are you paying twice? Once at the gate (perhaps reduced $ amount for events) or one pay at sign up?

I have been riding since 1995 at local tracks in FLA/GA area and I hate to say that about 12 tracks have closed since then. I remember practice weekends being a party with Castrol 927 smell in the air

Same here, high overhead, low turnout equals closed tracks. Berthoud used to get 300 plus riders on a practice Sunday and well over 600 on race days. They were getting less than 50 on practice days and only a couple hundred on race days before they finally threw in the towel the first time, new owners had same problem.

$10 race day entry fee for everyone
$30 per class for first and second class, $20 for third or fourth class

One track is just doing practice on some Sundays, 12 - 5 for $25.

no flaggers
no trophies
no paramedic
no gate / entry fee

If you just want to watch, it is free.

Ten years ago, it was ten people flagging for $50 each.

EDIT ADD-ON: one guy flagging at the finish line. Around here, we usually do 20 minutes big bikes, 20 minutes little bikes after a young racer passed away during a mixed session accidental crash back in 2008.

lostboy819 wrote:

Same here, high overhead, low turnout equals closed tracks. Berthoud used to get 300 plus riders on a practice Sunday and well over 600 on race days. They were getting less than 50 on practice days and only a couple hundred on race days before they finally threw in the towel the first time, new owners had same problem.

is that why it never re-opened after the one year of new ownership? Also- what is going on with the orgs around here??? I know they merged, yet no other info yet and lame schedule, not too mention a good track not being in the mix.