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Duke, I respect you and all the other drivers that ran cars without the cages back in the day. And although I'd like to think I'd have what it would take to strap into a car without a cage, I guess we really don't know until we try it. But I do know that there have been a couple of wrecks that without the cage, I wouldn't be typing this right now.
But I'll bet if you were to travel back in time and talked to a few old racers back in the 60's, you'd find that they thought the racing in the 50's and 40's were better then what they were seeing in the 60's. It's just human nature.
And I share your frustration with 14, 15 and 16 year old kids having the best equipment their daddy's money can buy when I had to work two jobs for two years to buy my first sprint car and it was a 10 year old Shores car. I'm not denying that many of them can really push the pedal, but yes, I'll admit it, I'm jealous.
But we can't go back in time. And obsoleting a bunch of cars is definately not the answer. But let me clarify my tire response.
I have no problems with Hoosier tire. I think the tires now are better then the tires we were using 10 years ago. Back then, it was common for sombody to have a tire worn down to the cords after a 30 lap feature. Partly because we were sliding around a lot more. Now, I can't remember the last time I saw a pavement tire blistered or taken down to the cords. And we are running a harder tire then we were back then.
Yes, they are expensive. And I'd like us to use a cheaper tire. But it is the guys that are bolting on 6-8 new tires a night that are causing the problem. Nothing is more depressing then to be rolling out for the heat race and see a guy with new biscuits on. For a heat race that pays nothing.
New tires will always be faster then used tires (yes, yes, I know, way back in 1906, you could run tires for ten years and they never dropped off. And the only reason you had to replace them is because they dry -rotted....LOL) The only way to get out of this is by three simple rules.
1. You can only buy two tires a night. Don't care what two, but you can only buy two.
2. You have to run the same right rear all night. If you have to run a B-main you can run another USED tire.
3. All the major pavement organizations (USAC, HOSS, AVSS, etc.) have to run the same compound tires.
I really feel these three simple rules would raise the car counts in USAC and keep the car count up in the other organizations. You can change all the cars to dirt cars, but if you don't solve the tire problem, you're still going to have 14 cars running the feature.
Tom Paterson
P.S. I ran Spartan Speedway once this last year and I had a good run and had a lot of fun. But it is three hours from home and it is a friday night. It's hard to work for a living and still run there.
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