2007 EWC and Other Thoughts

[Steve B]

(1) After five years of growth, EWC car counts took a big step backwards in 2006. Chicago road construction and gas prices probably had something to do with the low number of people who towed around the lake. However, the total number of entrants was significantly down as well. It looks to me that the Runoffs have become the EWC's primary competitor. With the CENDIV split taking effect in 2007, the number of entries available to Formula Ford drivers in this part of the country doubles. This does not bode well for 2007 EWC car counts. I think its time to rewrite the EWC business plan.

(2) I need some help running the series. There are four major tasks that will require some energy from others...

- business plan
- scheduling
- contingency award program
- driver recruiting

)'ll be in touch with series regulars in the next week looking for those willing to "volunteer" or otherwise contribute some time to the series.

(3) It looks like the end game for SCCA's mismangement of its class structure is just over the horizon. I personally don't want anything to do with "Formula 1600" or some other SCCA solution to a problem of their own making. I want even less to do with the race groups being forced on open wheel classes. Formula Ford has rich history and global footprint unmatched by any other form of racing. Only the best organized racing communities will be able to control their futures...

(4) ...which leads into my fourth and last thought. The 40th birthday party for Formula Ford is the portal to our future. The cooperation and organization required to pull off a successful event of this magniture are the survival tools for the next 40 years. We may eventually retire the Kent, but it should be on our terms not someone else's. We've got a big test coming up and it needs to be taken seriously.

Steve Beeler, de facto EWC commissioner
Lola T-540 HU44
home: (734)416-8865 sbeeler@wowway.com
office: (313)390-1818 sbeeler@ford.com

[TimW]

(1) After five years of growth, EWC car counts took a big step backwards in 2006. Chicago road construction and gas prices probably had something to do with the low number of people who towed around the lake. However, the total number of entrants was significantly down as well. It looks to me that the Runoffs have become the EWC's primary competitor. With the CENDIV split taking effect in 2007, the number of entries available to Formula Ford drivers in this part of the country doubles. This does not bode well for 2007 EWC car counts. I think its time to rewrite the EWC business plan.

I know this was suggested last year, but was shot down by several CF drivers who didn't want to get National licenses, but why don't we take our show to Great Lakes & Central Division Nationals? Now that the format for the Runoffs is by national participation and a bulk of the former EWC FF drivers are running nationals anyway, why not use the benefits (contingencies) of the series to keep our numbers strong in Nationals? While FF participation is not on the brink of being the 25th class, we can still improve ourselves. Since the national season seems to end early (July for CenDiv and the same but for likely 1 national in GL) keep the 1 month cadence April through July for four national races and then attempt to plan an August restricted regional for formula cars (The August Gingerman regional was cancelled due to lack of interest last year...if we can prove we can bring the cars for the restricted regional, we should have a chance of the region being open to new ideas that would make for a successful/profitable event).

The benefit of this I see are:

There are 8 groups at a national versus normally 6 or 7 for regionals. Bring the numbers and there seems to be one more group to divide things such that if the entry count warrants a single run group.

We help our national numbers by getting a good group of CFFs to nationals, holding their own race within a race as they do now in regionals even if not formally recognized. With twice as many runoffs slots now available, most of the FF guys will skip the regionals and be at Nationals anyways.

The original basis of the business plan that was so greatly received stays in tact, specifically one month cadence, two races on each side of the lake (keeping within the out of division limitation for those going to Topeka)

Some downsides are:

CFF won't have trophies by the organizing region.

National licenses are more expensive and require additional races per year to sustain.

Only one race per weekend, not two.

To me, the plusses outweigh any downsides that we can find solutions for (e.g. drivers fund the CFF plaques by a $5 per entry surcharge for series events; if we have our own race grouping, afternoon 'qualifying' can be a heat race per GCR 3.1.1.C.3). The license issue should be supported by all drivers as an investment in their own class: regional drivers who support national numbers will benefit within their regional programs. If National FF racing dies, regional FF will be right behind.

[csrazzle]

What is going on with cf and ff? I thought there would be more comments. I still maintain two cf's and would like to return eventually to ff or cf but it sounds as if there may be problems coming? Thanks

[Steve B]

Tim: I get the point about moving the EWC "up" to Nationals increasing the driver recruiting pool. What's your solution to Chicagophobia? In order to have a viable series, people must race on both sides of the lake.

Chuck: If you have not already, read the thread on the fight over track time in the DC region. This storm will eventually find its way out to our part of the country. The problems facing the EWC are not unique to FF/CFF.

Steve Beeler, de facto EWC commissioner
Lola T-540 HU44
home: (734)416-8865 sbeeler@wowway.com
office: (313)390-1818 sbeeler@ford.com

[FC63F]

Steve,

I note that we both live in Plymouth MI - small world

I do wonder about the root cause of the problem of participation

1. Is it the natural cycle of class counts - I can recall 8-9 years ago we had maybe one or two FC cars at Waterford and then about three or four years ago we had 7+ and then about bout two years ago we had 3. Last year was up and it looks like next year will be up +2 etc. - you kind of wonder what happened to the cars - were they sold off - were they sitting in a garage collecting dust. Why did people sit on their hands

2. How much of the car count issue is the the local economy - as a Detroiter I don't have to tell you that the auto business is poor and that impacts 80% of households to some degree?

3. I also observe that Great Lakes Challenge series while sucessful on many levels did not do well obtaining participation in Chicago by either the locals or by east of the lake participants - I think that Corey Collins and his three cars were all that made the trip from east of the lake.

4. Most of our participants came from greater Detroit, Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleveland and similar with a few strays from kentucky and parts south

5. i assume you have a long list of participants - have you surveyed people who participated in the past but this year didn't or really scaled back - I would be interested in the results. There are lessons to be learned for both EWC and GLC.

Great Lakes Challenge followed your model and made better headway than I would have hoped - I still wonder how to bridge the gap to west of Chicago - Maybe there should be two series one east and one west that comes togther for a limited number of races. Heck i don't know. I am curious about the move to nationals - how does that fix participation? I am not smart enough to see what the impact would be



David Keep

Reynard 90SF

[TimW]

Tim: I get the point about moving the EWC "up" to Nationals increasing the driver recruiting pool. What's your solution to Chicagophobia? In order to have a viable series, people must race on both sides of the lake.

Yep, don't claim to think moving to nationals will cure the tow around Chicago problem. But I agree with David below, we should craft a well thought out set of survey questions and tabulate the results to make some forward thinking decisions.

I like the concept of having two on each side of the lake and then a final formula car only 'festival.'

I would argue that if the competition was compelling enough, people would do whatever it takes to be on the grid. But thats a catch 22 and the Bob Geldoff approach will probably not work. If we can set a first goal to get each driver to cross the lake for one of the events their on the other side from we'd be signficantly better in the competition issue. So how do we incent that? Don't have all the answers, but can we be creative? Or can we steal other's ideas? What about tow money to the top 4 from each side that attend at least 1 cross lake event to attend the final formula car restricted regional. I like the idea the EWC is a cashless endeavor to the driver, but perhaps we need to think outside that box; we just must not make that a dis-incentive by keeping the costs per driver low or turning some of the contingies from current product contingencies to cash contingencies from the supporters.

[John LaRue]

Give a free or big discount to the entry for people who tow. FWIW a good number of racing series have no entry fee or at least a very small fee. They of course do charge for the pit pass (insurance) which is a good source of revenue. If it is simply that people do not like to tow through Chicago then perhaps that will help.

There may not be a problem or a cause for low car counts, it may just be that people are racing the amount they want and there are simply too many events...too much to choose from and thus the decreased car counts. What do you think would happen to the car counts if we had 5 National and 5 Regional events per year in the old CenDiv? If we took a lesson from some good marketers we might find that if we made things less available (reduced the events significantly) the participation numbers would go up.

[Ralph Z.]

What is the real reason for low participation in the EWC? Do we know? Maybe its time for some real market analysis starting with a mapping of car owners and their locations followed by interviews of each to determine what drives their shedules. Some good solid market research may be in order.

Ralph Z

[Ian Lenhart]

What is the real reason for low participation in the EWC?
Ralph Z

I can name several reasons:
-Racecars out for the season due to crashes in '05.
-Family priorities
-Runnoffs moving to Heartland Park took away the Mid-Div. guys to run nationals.
-Several Cendiv racers concentrating on going to the Runoffs.
-Time and Money
-Lack of promotion

Ian

[Steve B]

Entry fee discounts, market research, and better promotion are all great ideas...if the EWC had a budget to do any of them. The EWC is not a business, its simply a network of FF/CFF racers. Al Gore's invention of the internet made the EWC possible but he did not have any money left over for Formula Ford.

I still think the root cause of the low car counts is Chicagophobia. The number of drivers towing through Chicago to run the entire series has always been low. In 2005, the average car count was 24. If everyone had done just one more weekend, the car counts would have been in the mid to upper thirties! This past year was no different except that the total number of drivers fell off.

These observations lead to two questions:

(1) Would you pay an EWC sanctioning fee to provide the series with a marketing and operating budget? (I think I already know the answer to this one!)

(2) Will you be racing on both sides of the lake in 2007 and, if so, at the National or Regional level?

It may be kind of tough to answer (2) before the Great Lakes Division schedule is firmed up. Does anyone know what's up with that?

Steve Beeler, de facto EWC commissioner
Lola T-540 HU44
home: (734)416-8865 sbeeler@wowway.com
office: (313)390-1818 sbeeler@ford.com

[Garey Guzman]

I was hesitant to reply to this because I just moved to this side of the Mississippi and I'm a bit south of the tracks you guys seem to run (I think - I'm still learning my way around with MapQuest and Google Earth!).

One of the biggest reasons I've become interested in FC is because of the F2000 series Mike Rand has going. With that series, there are 4 events I could tow to within about 8 hours. If we could do that with FF, I would love to do it. But like Steve said, this stuff doesn't get handed out freely.

To answer Steve's questions:
1) I would pay a sanctioning fee to grow this series, especially if there is a visit or two to tracks a little farther south. I think the MI tracks are a good 10 hours north of me (not sure but MO was 8 hours). I would like to have a goal of being a support race for a big time series (CCWS or F1, maybe ALMS or Grand-Am).

2) I think Road America is 12-13 hours away per MapQuest, which makes it very, very difficult to do. And I'm sure that time doesn't include Chicago traffic! I don't know what else is on that side of the lake.

I'm primarily interested in Nationals, mostly because the run groupings are better. With the current trends, a couple of Regions are combining all open wheel and sports racers in a single group while Nationals will typical have small bore groups (FF, F5 and FV) in a single group. In fact, I just heard that Cal Club has combined these groups for Nationals too!

Anyway, I hope to participate and help this series grow. I watched it with envy when I was on the West Coast and now I want to see it first hand!