Indeed.  Already this season, POINTS races have included a 1k at Reading and, at Fowlmead (yet to be posted, but coming soon) a short (about 4km) time trial.  Thanks again to Kevin for updating the race software to make this possible.

 

The longer races are likely to continue to be the core of most meetings: not many of us want to travel hundreds of miles just for a 13-second sprint.

 

Do you guys also track course records for the various events and classes too?

Up here, it's not so much baseball, but hockey.  Football seems to be going through an ebb phase but soccer is slowly gaining ground now that there are semi-pro and pro teams.

I think colonials are more interested in the age of things because everything over here is "new".  We don't have towns that are 800 years old, or buildings that have nicks in them from Roman short swords.  When you grow up surrounded by many things that are hundreds of years old, maybe they don't seem as impressive anymore.  The old "familiarity breeds contempt" kind of thing.  A lot of people are interested in the history too, but the age of the thing standing in front of us, or at least me, is always the first impressive thing you can relate to.

As others say, we do racing. How fast you go depends on who else turns up.

I was thinking about my opposition to prize money. We don't have a very big membership, but we get good race attendances. There are several people each season who say they  had no idea how much fun it is until they tried. It seems a good thing to me. Prize money would not encourage it. We would have to raise more money, which would mean charging more for membership, and hence reducing membership, or charging more for races, and reducing attendance. 

Any prize money we could offer is unlikely to defer the fuel costs for people who live further away. We had a good attendance at our Worlds without prize money. There are 193 registered for Tilburg, with no prize money. I think we are doing something right! 

We vary the race formats to some extent depending on attendance, so comparison between races at venues is not direct.

As a matter of fact, we are getting some lap records. I timed Slasher Slade at the last 2 events, with a lap counting stopwatch and recorded his fastest lap. I'm not sure if the figures have been published at all. 

 

While I mentioned the small cash prizes, not all events or even individual races always have cash prizes and i doubt it is the prime motivator for anyone's attendance.  It's not liek you could go pay off your mortgage with you winnings, unless you had a very, very small house.

 

In the HPRA series, it's generally about $20 per class, per day, with discounted pricing for multiple classes and participating in both days of racing.  Usually for me, particpating in three classes each day, it's about $70 for both and it's not hard to win some, most or all of that back.  The two days and multiple classes gets me about 6 different races per day.  Usually a 200m or 1km sprint for each class, plus lap races for each class.  I'm not sure what the venue rental fees are, but I thought I remembered someone saying that the insurance for the event was something like $55?  I could be wrong on that though.  Also, no one has to be a member of the HPRA to race, just sign a waiver.  I think maybe the highest turn out of actual racers at an event might be something like 3 dozen or so.

 

What are the average race fees for a BHPC event? 

 

Yes it was.

Sort of elongated rectangle with a superb corner at the bottom of the hill. Shut your eyes and throw it in flat out in a pedal car but I am guessing a big braking point for a 2 wheeler.

Brilliant circuit.

Give us a shout when you go back.

I think 25hz and Paul have made my point for me. With our regular racing turnout, money for winners would be a subsidy for Slash, Mike B, Howie, Claire and whoever in multi track and sport.  The equivalent of $70 would be a big disincentive for beginners and slower riders, who are always expressing how much fun it is coming along.  We enjoy our decent length races plus other extras.