New Modified Eliminator Class

[Mike Bradley]

I know a lot of you have been asking me about a proposed new Modified Eliminator class for Pageland Dragway in 07. I like the format on paper which would be a true "No Box" class that allowed trans-brakes, 2-steps, and shifters. This would be for door cars and left steer roadsters with the same E.T. cutoff as Top Eliminator 0-7.99. The real issues are where will the cars come from and what format will they have at the Bracket Finals. If half the Top Eliminator cars pull the "Box" out to run Modified Eliminator then where does this leave the car count for Top Eliminator? I'll tell you, short on cars. If half the foot brake/street racers move up then where does this leave the foot brake/street program? There again very soft on cars.

Is it time to break up the classes by ET for eliminations? Have all Top Eliminator cars 5.99 and quicker to lanes 1 and 2 with 6.0 and up lanes 3 and 4? Foot Brake cars 6.99 and quicker to lanes 1 and 2 with 7.0 and up lanes 3 and 4? I'm just thinking out loud. Wondering if this might help accomplish anything or just more work and possible confusion.

I would love to restructure the transitional classes where a true Street/Foot Brake class was on the order of 7.00 and slower and have a true Modified Eliminator class be 0-7.99 or maybe 0-6.99.

Until IHRA aligns the whole country with formats and rules we'll need to stick with what is currently in place. I really appreciate the willingness of many of you to try a new class/format but I just can't see it being a healthy addition to our program at this time. You never know what the future will hold so we'll keep an open mind and plan for the future.

Mike

[staginglt]

>> a true "No Box" class [...] where will the cars come from

A bunch of the Footbrakers at Quaker City Raceway in Ohio complained until the track split the No-Box class into No-Box and Footbrake. Understand, QCR had a very strong program to begin with (80-100 cars?). They ended up with a still strong Footbrake class, and a No-Box class about less than half the size, although many Footbrakers double-entered and ran both classes (which tells you that they really didn't mind racing the no-box cars in the first place!)... and this is in a region that has long had no-box cars! While I personally have no problem with transbrake cars, you probably make more people upset about them than you make happy by allowing them. It's all about perception, so you'd really have to poll all your racers.

>> Is it time to break up the classes by ET for eliminations?

Mmmmm... maybe, if only for 1st round. Until your car count gets up to about twice where you're at, if you kept them separate as long as possible, you end up running the same guys week in and week out.

>> Until IHRA aligns the whole country with formats and rules

I don't really see this ever happening, because there simply is not a 'one size fits all plan'. Every region of the country has its owns rules for a reason. The northeast part of the country has a significantly higher population density - more people with more money means they are able to support the large number of classes they have there. In Div. 4-5, travel becomes the biggest key, because tracks are so far apart. Div. 2 is kind of right in the middle, where it could go either way, but before they can expand, they need to re-build the foundation, with entry-level classes.

10-15 years ago, this region tried to jump from the bottom to the top, which worked for quite awhile, but I think we're at a turning point now. The Carolina Coalition lost two tracks this year and picked up two new ones, and the East Coast Series lost a track to pick up another one. The top-heavy tower is wobbling. It'll still go on for a bit, but everyone's finding out what's truly important. I've often said it, there's a place for big money races, but by trying to do them just about every week, it has saturated the market. Mooresville took a step in the other direction last year, and they were greatly rewarded. Pageland is likely going to leapfrog them... and while it's not going to change the face of racing overnight, I think Pageland is going to start a slow but steady gain for the next five years.