[thebus79h]

I've not been around TQ's for a few years, we finally got out of them in 04 I believe, as I got my brother in law out of those cars and into 600cc micro sprints. Me and my dad in 1999 were looking into getting an open wheeled dirt car, and thought about TQ's before going to micros. What we found was a whole lot of ********, and clubs. Even with a name not saying club, we could tell by the actions of people that we talked to, which is the exact atmosphere we wanted to get out of. We ended up running the micro for a few years until I quit driving for my dad and going out on my own. When I met the girlfriend, her brother was just getting into TQ's with the UMRA, this was back in 04.. They looked cool, and I liked the idea, and we went to the track the first time, and I wanted to see how they would run. The first race I saw was at Rushville, and when we pulled in, it reminded me a whole lot of the tracks I'd run in the micro. When hotlaps started, it didn't resemble anything like I had thought. I was genuinely dissapointed with what I saw. It's not a knock on anybody, but I wasn't impressed, and the racing I found, well, boring. JMO

After two years, 8 motors, couple drivelines, and being left in the infield at Rushville by somebody on a quad that had a winch while the front end of the car is torn out, and rain was coming, we'd had enough. I convinced them that going to the micro sprints was a better solution, and we did. The first night out in the car, the driver said he had learned more about how to tune a chassis, and drive a dirt car than he had in the two years running TQ's. The reason I bring this stuff up, is the stuff that is being raced in TQ's seems to be so outdated, it's not even funny. It looks to me like the UMRA has tried so hard to keep the tradition of what they were doing so much, that it let the racing suffer. I could imagine back in the day, TQ's were really fun to watch. When you go to a micro track up north of Indy, you actually honest to god see guys running the cushion just like you would in a sprint car or a midget, slide jobs, and just fabulous racing. I feel a TQ could definately get to that point, but it would need major revamping. Not a total redesign, but open up the rules to get some more power underneath the hood. I have no clue what a TQ motor even dyno's out at, but I know an 07 Honda 600 RR puts out 130 horsepower, and 49 ft. pounds of torque, and not loosing much through the driveline. I know that a TQ motor can't do that through the driveline, it looses to much power. Why not open the motor rules up a bit to get the cars to actually start going faster. Racing isn't all about speed, but I'll tell you once you get enough power to bust the tires loose and actually have to work the throttle, that's when you'll see racing improve, which will bring more cars. It costs money to race, it's not going to be cheap.

Maybe I'm way off base here, but this is my experience in what I've seen lately, and that may have something to do with falling car counts, maybe people are just going into a different direction. There is many rules that I think need to be opened up to improve the racing, so more people would be interested in coming in. I've had a couple guys that we race micros with be interested in getting a TQ to run the pavement stuff, and when I told them some of the rear track width rules, engine rules, and all that jazz, they've started to look elsewhere. The one that sticks out to me more than anything, is in a micro, you have to be 50" center to center on the rear tires, and in a TQ (which is a bigger car), you can only be 45". Open some of these rules up to make the racing better, and that will attract you more people.

PS. I don't think adding another series will help, one will survive, and one will fail. You guys already have the history, and with the right people that will stand up for the rules, and stand up to make changes to attract more cars, and if those things can happen, the UMRA will be around for another 40 years. We're going through this right now with micro sprints, the NMMA has a very storied history, and is now in the crapper because the organization would not allow for growth, expansion, and development of new technology into the series. You guys aren't at that point yet, but could be given another year or two. Spend the time NOW to fix the problems, and get people on board.