HOW DOES THE WAGTIMES BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION SOUND?

With still more than a week until the members only USAC/CRA meeting, many car owners and fans ponder what to do about the 2004 season. Sprint car racing is expensive and even the top teams require significant sponsorship to continue to race week after week during the long season. So along with getting more sponsorship money for a race team, and sometimes asking them where they prefer you run, car owners in the Southern California have some soul searching to do before the first race of the season. Some will run where they want, doing some of both associations, and some will need to pick the cheaper way from a few races up to all of one or the other. The fans will have the best of both worlds by being able to go to a lot of tracks for variety, except they can’t have all their heroes at one track at one time, or can they?

Since there is no turning back on the events that have happened, let’s forget why they split and view what is positive for both sides. SCRA has less races scheduled than the last few years with only 14 races locally. Of those 14, 9 race days are at a track that is not ready for prime time sprints and 5 at one that has provided outstanding action for fans and racers. The NWWC tour this year is only in the Mid-West and adds 9 dates for hearty travelers in August. On the other side, USAC/CRA has 30 local dates, plus one two race trip to Skagit that should expand, and makes the same travel path of recent SCRA schedules, minus Tulare while adding Bakersfield and Hanford. There is nothing scheduled during the USAC sanctioned Indiana Sprintweek for those who want to travel there, but it’s not a points deal.

SCRA features the majority of their schedule at a small quarter mile track nestled in among some gentle hills dotted with major boulders and an adventuresome pit area that wanders around one side of the track. Parking snakes thru the property and the seating is not majoring capacity, with some able to sit on their own lawn or beach chairs high above the track on one side. Barona Raceway is very scenic and requires the final part of the trip over a winding road to reach the facility that is located on Indian land and is near a casino, for those who like to gamble. It is located south of Orange County between two major freeways down towards San Diego. A sprint car test was run there two years ago with about 14 cars and was entertaining as many skated around the slick track having fun. It was, however, deemed not good enough for the 410 monsters by the SCRA, with sturdier safety fences and some added clay part of what was needed before it could happen there. A typical show includes Lightning Sprints, modifieds and other smaller race cars with much less horsepower than the sprints. A practice is to be held as I go to press for those who are ready to do so, or at least look it over.

Tulare needs no introduction as they have a fine 3/8 mile clay track that provides great racing for fans who sit in a big covered grandstand to enjoy the show. The friendly atmosphere allows the haulers in the pits to set up before signing in if you get there early enough. They have run at least one race per season over the last few years, with no more than two. So a jump to five dates will be interesting. Attendance at the track was not good at first, but has improved somewhat the last two trips there. It would be nice if they opened the main grandstands to general admission, but I love the place!

The newly formed USAC/CRA association has a lot going for it with a nationally known name and logo, plus TV power and other advantages that include the only direct path for open wheel drivers to glory in IRL or NASCAR. Although a lot of work has to be done before the first race, they have the manpower and knowledge to make this venture happen. Having two local dirt tracks, Perris and Manzanita, getting USAC national points races in the fall should bring some of the USAC regulars out west that don’t normally come at that time of year. They will run five different tracks and must do some marketing to help grow sprint car racing in the West. The upcoming meeting should say a lot about how well they do.

There was a time when CRA was THE club in So Cal and because of “things” the SCRA took off and went another direction without president/owner Frank Lewis as their leader. Glenn Howard, with plenty of help, built up the new club to be a thriving non-profit club as CRA was before it’s last years. After the changeover, you saw the same racers, the same fans and the same tracks as before, but it was called SCRA. People moaned about the loss of the CRA history, but they went on. Because of concern about using the old name for fear of some kind of financial burden, the SCRA name was chosen, but had no region or area associated to it and some felt that loss. The key is everyone went on and bonded together and racing continued even better than before with heroes like Lealand McSpadden and Ron Shuman setting their marks in the new club. Life went on when they retired as new heroes arrived to take their place.

Today we have experienced a 15 year growth of non wing racing to it’s highest popularity since the days of no wings. We have made major strides in major races paying big money and upgraded fans knowledge that there is something other than the outlaws out there with real passing and competition in Indiana and California and running traditional sprint cars. The CRA tours in the 80’s started the pattern under Gary Sokola and Ron Shuman Production’s NWWC continued it as Indiana became a state with all non wing race tracks and more competition was spawned. Locally, SCRA experienced a growth in cars to the point that Perris averaged over 50 cars a week and the club well over 40 wherever they appeared. We need to take advantage of that surge!

I believe that the 911 disaster changed the racing economy to the point that today we still have the cars and the fans, but both don’t go as often as they sort out their financial futures. It will get better, but in the meantime the SCRA desire for more money than some tracks were willing to pay caused the present standoff that has us in a quandary until we all decide what of the two directions, do we want to take. If either of these clubs can figure out how to get the fans back in droves, it will benefit racing tremendously in our world.

No one can say positive what will happen next, but some are OK with the bringing back of the CRA name and at a small cost to do it. Will the battle tested car owners be willing to stay with where they are with SCRA and run less races than in the past, at the two tracks so far available to them, or will they decide that twice as many races at tracks they already know is the direction to take. It looks simple to me, but heck, what do I know? One thing for sure, I don’t think both clubs can exist together for very long, due to splitting fans and cars, so I don’t expect the battle to go an on. When it’s all said and done, it will be the same fans, and the same cars, on the road to the track, Jack! Be there!

What to do, what to do? Sit back and relax and let nature take it’s path. I am sure the owners will speak for us all and that will be it! And about that Griffin replacement, my lips are sealed until they finally make an announcement, but I will tell you it has changed once already, so we’ll wait for it, even though the LA Times published who the new driver is last week.

Hey, I hit 90 B ball games last night and man, what can I say! It’s always interesting sitting in the bleachers listening to the fathers and big fans of particular teams, they are brutal! Mrs Wags is in T-town visiting the “??”, I mean her mom, and is having fun in temps a lot like here. It’s been real cool at night, but surely it will warm up for the opening of racing season. And now I present a week of quiet……..