Sportsman Racing, Making A Living!!!

[Bucky]

Well, you can try it on a smaller scale. Frankly, there were several years when I owned my own business and needed to reinvest the profits to grow it. That left me very little for racing. If I was going to race, it had to mostly pay for itself. It did for the most part. I had a couple of great seasons. I had a lot of motivation to do well. But I had no major breakage. I was constantly on top of maintenance, as letting something go could mean the end of my season. There was nothing new that wasn't consumable. It was very easy to loose your sense of fun with it with that kind of pressure to do well.
I had to be selective about the type of race I would compete at. When you are depending on it, you just can't afford an expensive weekend that ends up a bust. So the big buck weekends were out for me. Statistically I could average out in the 4th or 5th round. Not bad! But if you weren't making money by then, the race simply didn't make sense. I one a couple races per season. So the big gambles just didn't make sense to me. There had to be money early.

So, take this experience, and add the pressure of having to profit...not just break even....and it can be really not fun. What happens if you get sick? What if you have a rash of breakage? It starts to unravel. Tow rig pukes? Can't make it to a race and make money then.

If you can get good sponsorship, the equation can make a little more sense. Just my experience.