POSTED MAY 3, 2025

SPEEDWAY ECONOMICS

I promised several weeks ago to explain speedway economics and the bulletin board letter from the so called “Racing Fan” prompted me to finally get it done! So here goes!

Tuesday I talked to a veteran racer in our area whose family has been involved in racing ever since there was stock car racing in this area and he told me what I already knew-to run a late model show-even a very limited late model show paying $600 to win and $350 for 2^nd with $25 drops down to $100 to start-you need 1000-1200 fans!

Most race fans do not understand this or they look in the stands and see 3000 people when in reality there are maybe 600-800! In the 51 year history of the Mottville Speedway there may have been, at most, 3-4 nights of 1200 paid adults!

All across the country promoters are finding they cannot afford late models! In hindsight I should have dropped late models after 1991 but held out for several more very very unprofitable years because I was afraid to try racing without them!

It is actually worse than it sounds because if you get say 800-900 adults most nights, what happens when the weather is not good, typical in this area? You already have your advertising costs no matter what so if you do not run you have that but if you do you may well lose even more! The year before I purchased the track they had 8 rainouts!

Each speedway must find its “niche”! Mottville Speedway is not, never was and never will be Kalamazoo Speedway! But we can do some things that perhaps Kalamazoo can’t do like build strong economy classes of racing!

July 2,1994 I staged the biggest race in Mottville Speedway history when I brought in the SOD SPRINTS. We paid 22 cars $8130 in purse! Had the 2^nd largest crowd in my 11 years that night and for weeks afterwards I heard what a bundle I made that night! Problem was it was not true! I lost $2000! Know what? I was all ready to do it again in 1995 because of the “ego trip!” But in 1995 the purse went from $8000 to $10,000 and you had to have advanced para-medics to boot! So I was priced out and it was for my own good!

Later in 1994 I leased the track out to a veteran promoter for one Friday night late model race and this guy advertised like I never had or have! Big crowd,  it was even bigger than I had for the Sprints! Know what? He lost $3500!

I ran ARCA MIDGETS twice that season and lost $2000 or more each time despite way above average crowds! But the purse for midgets alone of $5200 did me in!

Over the years I have run Mini-Sprints, Dwarfs, Legends, Mini-Indys and lost money on each of them! They simply do not bring in (to Mottville at least) as much as they cost!

In 1990 I was the pr director and announcer for the Capital Speedway of Plymouth and it was a wonderful job! You know how easy it is to spend someone else’s money? Real easy! Wannabe promoters like “Racing Fan” have no idea what they are talking about! Kalamazoo is near a city of about 150,000! Berlin is near a city of over 250,000!

Mottville is near a town of 200! Throw in White Pigeon and you have about 2000!

What works at Kalamazoo Speedway will not necessarily work at Mottville Speedway and believe me I have about 8 years of red ink to prove it!

Since we have gone to “economy” classes of racing our bottom line results have improved dramatically! As for the number of nights we run, well I remember when I and many others would go to Mottville on Friday night, New Paris on Saturday night and Plymouth on Sunday night! This week one of our regular drivers told me he landed a sponsor and one of the reasons was the sponsor liked the idea of having his product advertised 74 nights per season! I mean if you like racing why not 74 nights? Personally, I LOVE RACING! In fact on Friday night, the week-end night we do not race, you will more often then not find me at another speedway!

In looking back over the last 10 seasons I can clearly see that my number one failure at Mottville has been the failure to build a “supporting class” of racing. That is our number one goal bar none for 2001! In fact we are making great progress in building not one supporting class but two! Thunder Cars and Mini-Thunder Cars! I am confident by mid-season both will be having a very solid 10-12 cars per night and this will enable us to devote more to the Mottville Stocks and Street Stocks and build them also!

We turned things around at Mottville in 1999 and each season since has been better than the one before it! Now why some people are bothered about us running economy classes of racing and not spending big bucks on advertising to go for the big crowds is way beyond me! If you want late model racing there are certainly plenty of speedways in the area offering it! If you want outside shows there are plenty of speedway in our area offering that also! Actually that is the American Way! Freedom of choice! I certainly am not critical of other speedways for what they run! More power to them! But while they probably do not have the time for two supporting classes like we have, time is no problem for us!

So let me close this sermon by looking at our present problem and something on which I received an email this week after my last column. Our Bomber class is not going well at present! After 11 nights we are averaging only 4.2 Bombers per night! Last season the count was up and down from 3-9 even during peak season! Only late in the year did the numbers go up. We need a steady 6 cars for the Bomber class to continue as a separate class. We do not have to have them this week-end but we need them over the next several weeks!

Now you could say the same thing about street stocks but here is the problem in a nutshell: A Bomber can be a ss but a ss can not be a Bomber! Plus we need a class at the top and that has to be ss! It is possible that with our Thunder Car class growing the Bomber class is not needed! I do not know if this is true or not but time will certainly tell! I do know that I am not going to continue to run a Bomber feature of 2-4 cars each night! We have paid the Bomber feature winner $75 for 10 nights even if  there was only 1 car! Our money would be better invested in SS and MS!

So will the Bomber class continue at Mottville? That is up to the Bomber drivers! Its actually Speedway economics at work! If there is a demand for the class we will keep it-it would be plain poor business not to! But if there is not a demand for the class, then there is no reason to keep it!

In the meantime if the Bombers have at least 6 cars they will run alone. But when they have less than 6 and SS have less than 4 they will run combined with one combined pay-off and separate points by class. I am inclined to keep the points separate the rest of the year even if they do not get the needed 6 cars. Even this 6 car requirement is most generous because our rules call for 8 cars  for the published pay-off and we will pay it with 6!

We are proud of our racing program at Mottville! I am also proud to have a track official like Rita Courtney who wrote such a fine response to “Racing Fan”!

So now you probably know more than you ever wanted to know about speedway economics!