Long time reader, first time poster......except for an ad about selling a motor. I've always hesitated to reply to a post here because honestly, some of you guys scare me more then Winchester or Salem ever did! But this issue is dear to my heart. I am a long time HOSS driver/car owner. And I am a very low buck guy. But with all due respect to Duke, the answer is not having guys drive the same car on dirt and pavement. The problem is not a shortage of cars. There are 20-25 cars running with HOSS and another 20-25 running with AVSS. The cars are there. And I personally would love to run some USAC races to get more non-winged pavement expierence. But the shear cost of running USAC is out of control. Not the price of the cars, but the race to race expense. HOSS and AVSS both run very similar tire rules. But USAC (and yes, I know they came first) uses different compound of tires on all four corners. And add to that, the big dogs bolt on new tires every time they hit the track. To me, the MSA (supermodified group out of Ohio) has the best tire rule. They specify a compound and you can only buy two tires a night. They don't care what two you buy, but you can only buy two. In fact this is a rule I wish HOSS and AVSS would adopt also.

Also, and I don't want to start a safety debate here, but with USAC, you have to run a HANS device. I'm not debating their effectiveness, but I doubt if there is five guys total between HOSS and AVSS that have one. Again, MSA mandates them, but they give you a three or five race (I'm not sure which) grace period to buy one. That allows you to decide if you want to run with them all the time before investing in a HANS.

I would jump at a chance to run more non-winged, I'm just not going to mortgage my house to do it. Maybe someone would like to have some non-sanctioned non-winged races..........are you listening Tony Barhorst?

Tom Paterson
Sprint car #11