[otgracing17]

Pavement midget racing is dead, is going to stay dead, and there isn’t much going to change that without the National series support. We can talk about changing the motors, cars, or whatever but at the end of the day the horse has been left out to pasture. The problem is if you start changing stuff to fit your idea then the ten guys with pavement cars sitting in the corner get mad. It’s a lose lose deal either way and needs to stay that way for the current racing world. No promoters going to put their balls on the line to promote a pavement midget race that pays enough to get cars out of barns. The little 500 can be attributed to saving pavement sprint cars because when times got rough it didn’t go away now slowly we are seeing more pavement sprint car races. What big race is left for pavement midgets? Until someone gets off there wallet and decides to pay some money to have pavement midgets and preferably a few races they won’t come back.

Ps. Pavement midgets were what I grew up around and consider to be some of my favorite racing but it is what it is.

[Ray3]

Originally Posted by Jonr If you are going to race them at a high level, you are going to have purpose built pavement cars. If you have purpose built pavement cars, every conversion car will be battling for best in class. We can't unlearn technology. If you have to "dummy" down the rules so much that conversion cars are competitive what are you really accomplishing?

I disagree. There is no dummying down happening with what I proposed. What I have done is more clearly define what a Midget is. In fact, competitors by purchasing dirt cars and abandoning pavement have defined what a Midget is. The problem is, I don't think people chose to abandon pavement racing because they disliked pavement racing. They abandoned it because of cost. Having to have two separate cars, allowing testing, tire costs, engine costs and carbon fiber and titanium made it less viable to the team owners.

Therefore it is the rule book which caused pavement racing to become less attractive over time. An example is the wheelbase rules. There is no reason a rule book should have a 10" difference from min to max on wheelbase. That is absolutely nuts and is one of the biggest contributors to the need for both a pavement and dirt car. Actually, you could argue with that wide a gap on wheelbase you need a short track car, long track car and indoor car for pavement!! I wouldn't necessarily call wheelbase some extreme technology gain either. Also, weight is another factor. Increase the weight and you make ti and carbon fiber less of an advantage. So much less that some teams will abandon it because the ROI becomes too low and they can then win without it.

Also, the Z-link type suspension is already used on the Beast pavement cars most people were running. So thats not a major change. The only other major change is the engine set back and no offset engines to the right. Not big technological advancements but changes that are necessary to get this thing back under control and make dirt cars relevant on pavement.

You asked what is being accomplished. I think it is clear, you open up pavement racing to virtually every dirt Midget in the country. That is a huge deal. Access to ACTIVE cars is the way you bring pavement Midget racing back. Nothing else is going to revive it.

[Jonr]

Originally Posted by Ray3 ......….You asked what is being accomplished. I think it is clear, you open up pavement racing to virtually every dirt Midget in the country. That is a huge deal. Access to ACTIVE cars is the way you bring pavement Midget racing back. Nothing else is going to revive it.

But you are not bringing back pavement midget racing. Pavement midget race cars were incredibly fast and incredibly specialized built cars, not the conversion cars that you are campaigning for.

The fact that there is not a healthy pavement midget series shows that car owners could not afford them and track promoters would not accept the risk/reward to run them.

[racer5c]

Midget racers are their own worst enemies, as this thread shows

[racer5c]

I tried to help the new promoter at Mount Lawn with getting the guys from Montpelliar to run at Mount Lawn, everyone I talked to about it was negative and wanted nothing to do with it with the exception of one guy