Hampton Downs

[Oldfart]

Custaxie 50, as Amco has said, I agreed with you! So what did I say that was a problem for you?
In the "good old days" even the humble grass track meetings at Waharoa, Raglan etc attracted a very good crowd, and the entry fees were low enough for pretty much all of us to compete and more to the point have a hell of a lot of fun. There were winners, of course, but from my distant memory it was not too important. Now please accept that I am NOT an advocate of the school athletics where the kids get an award for participating, winning (or more to the point trying as hard as you can) is bloody important, real life is like that.
So why have recent events (well from the 80s on) got less and less crowds? If you have been to a "proper" Grand Prix, you know that you see a shedload more on the box than you can at the circuit, just bugger all atmosphere.
How do you turn that around and get huge crowds? For me, personal opinion, reverse grid is a sham. Then again speedway often has fastest off the back and they still drag in the crowds, without the bouncy castles etc.
I don't profess to know.
I suspect that promoters get more $$$ from TV than the gate, so perhaps they don't mind?
Bruce302 I reckon you are right, we ALL need to make sure that 5 of our mates get to the Denny meeting, isn't that what we used to do, get a crowd of our own, I don't know how many are on this site but multiply that alone by 5! Our personal enthusiasms are probably the greatest weapon. Lets all be positive.

[AMCO72]

Now there's a thing....speedway. I haven't been to a speedway meet for some time, but I hear that they still manage to draw in the crowds. Why? Rapid, quick fire races, no buggering around with safety cars, except in the event of a bad crash, and plenty of action on the track, and an occasional stoush in the pits, and they do actually RACE. All good fun, and as oldfart says it WAS all good fun. I wrote ages ago on Yards and Yarns, that it was a long time since I had seen a smile on the spectators faces, but just occasionally we can drag them away from the hot-dog stand and get them enthralled in the action on the track. Of course it is the same old story....participation is better than anticipation, and I can see that to a lot of people motoracing is about as boring as America's Cup sailing or bowls, but I'm sure that actually participating in those events is hugely exciting. All this to see if we can improve the image of Classic car racing, and I'm sure if we bandy it about long enough some ideas will come out of it.