Personally, I do pay an entry fee to send cars to the Chili Bowl, to the Knoxville Nationals, Short Track Nationals, and even to race POWRi. I don't like doing it at any of those, but all have entry fees that are long established.

I suppose you can call a $2,000 to win show a 'special', and as long as it's something you can hang the 'special' tag on, I guess to some it's justification for an entry fee.

Next Friday at Jacksonville we have a 3,000 to win/300 to start sprint car race and in September we will have a 4,000 to win sprint car race... both without entry fees. That doesn't make us right and FC wrong, but it's pretty obvious that since these are "specials" that I'm leaving $1,500 on the table as the promoter by not charging a fee.... and that $1,500 would come in handy to make the shows work.

I guess that's my point. Personally, I don't want to have any sprint car race in Illinois have an entry fee. It hasn't been the norm before now, and I'd like to keep it that way. I was just stating why MHess isn't going to be at an entry fee sprint car race in Illinois. I don't think at this point it's necessary to make a $2,000 to win 'special' work. But I've been wrong before.

And please don't take this as a bash against FC or Jeff for doing it. I'm just stating my personal position on the matter, and in the long run, I think I'm on the wrong side of the fence on this one.