Incentives to qualify better.
 

When I was growing up racers always took pride in qualifying well. Racers liked to see that there hard work and hard earned money we’re paying off with a good qualifying effort. Lately is seems like racers don’t want to qualify real good because they have turned qualifying into a manipulation game for the bracket race (eliminations) coming up, and I understand that. I would like to hear from other racer some ideas on how we could put more emphasis on qualifying again. Lots of racers like chasing points.Could it be points awarded for each qualifying position? (could only have a max number of qualifying points per season) Could it be money? Could of be a discount on the entry to the next race? I would like to see what other racers think on how to accomplish this or if it’s a stupid idea. I know my car/combo would be a top tier qualifier but I would still like to see qualifying well mean a little more than it does. Im sure I’ll get some flack for this but I don’t mean it in a bad way to anybody. There are a lot of great minds out there who have been racing a lot longer than I have. Heck there are a lot of great minds out there who just started racing. I would like to hear from the young and the old. Thanks to everyone who took time to read this ridiculously long post. May you always race with a good tail wind. Who knows Lonnie Grimes might see this 🤪🤪🤪 #B00take00. Thanks

Re: Incentives to qualify better.
 

Last year,at the St Louis National event,I was pretty happy that I ran .75 under.I was rewarded with a heads up race in Round 1 by someone that had me covered by a mile.
Smart racers will try to qualify in a position to avoid this scenario. Be smart.

Re: Incentives to qualify better.
 

Back when we first started racing a class car we traveled with Dave Layer of Heads Up Cylinder Heads. The group of his buds consisted of quite a few very capable qualifiers. The trick was to qualify #1 so you got the 1100 dollar qualifying money to pay for your trip. If you could be #1 at least your travel money and entry was paid for. (But do as little harm to your combo as possible.) That amount dropped to 100 ?, then nothing. After the incentives stopped, so did all the effort to be #1. It used to be talked about quite a bit, but now the only advantage is if you get a bye. Most people won't risk stepping on your own peter to be #1 for just a possible bye.

Re: Incentives to qualify better.
 

Won't waste my energy or time on a long post.
Brought it up many times.
BYE runs in round one .
Several ways to do it....
#1 = run -1.00 under, earn a round one bye
OR
#2 = set up ladder like march madness (have a play in round for everyone to get in to the final 64 or 32... no bye runs after rd 1)

Re: Incentives to qualify better.
 

Let 140 enter for 128 qualified spots. But that would make it a seven round race with only 11 points difference in winning vs R/U, not the 21 point difference in a six round race 105 vs 84.

So racer A could win 48 rounds and score 840 points at eight six round races, racer B could win 48 rounds and only score 752 points at eight seven round races. How can that happen? Racer B lost in the finals eight times.

Is winning a six round race worth 11 more points for winning the sixty round at a seven round race?

Re: Incentives to qualify better.
 

Give out points for the top 10 Qualifiers. If it's a Div. Race it counts towards your Div. total. If a Natl. Race, counts towards Natl. and Div. total. 10 points to #1 on down to 1 point for #10. Qualify #1 at a Div. you get 10 Div. points. Qualify #1 at a Natl. and you get 10 Natl. AND 10 Div. points. 20 Div. points for a Natl. Record. Individual Racer can only set 2 Records per year.

IF Lonnie is listening, you want to make S/SS "Performance Based Eliminators" again then go for it!

Re: Incentives to qualify better.
 

All great ideas, BUT the NHRA REGIME wont spend one single DOLLAR or allocate the MANPOWER to implement any of this….not gonna happen ….

Re: Incentives to qualify better.
 

I am a Teamster who works for a large Public Corporation. We scratch our heads at some of the decisions, made without ANY input from us, regarding work they will be asking us to do. There are obvious solutions to save time and money, but they ALWAYS seems to fall on deaf hears. NHRA`s response to SO many good ideas, reminds me of the samething.

Re: Incentives to qualify better.
 

Re: Incentives to qualify better.
 

Mr Grossi you and I are on the same page. I like it.