Sportsman Racers Council?

[Kent Hanley]

As Jeff and Mike have indicated the SRAC learned of this change at the same time everyone else did.


From what I learned today the new format for class racing was not a NHRA idea but a plan developed by the Sponsor Association to help reduce their expenses and add some excitement to Class racing. There were a lot of reasons for the change and the Sponsor Association have been trying to figure this out for a couple years. As you may all ready know the money put up for Class is “voluntary” and not part of their National event sponsorship commitment with NHRA?

The reasons I heard for their change in format are:

1. They are not getting the benefit, sales and/or return on investment for all the money they are investing in class contingency
2. There are so many classes and a large portion of the money is going to single competitor classes ( I think Indy had around 50 single competitor classes between stock and super stock)
3. Racers are falsifying the contingency forms and claiming products they don’t have.
4. Some sponsors are frustrated that they are paying some racers that bought a part or product from them 10 years ago and they have not sold them anything else since then.
5. They were also trying to come up with a new exciting twist to class racing with the National Class Champions who could win a lot at $500 per product. They also hope to promote the winners for added press and hopefully sales.
6. and the obvious, Economic conditions


This is all I know. I think I speak for all of us we very much appreciate any and all sponsors that supports our racing addiction especially those that voluntarily support class racing. I have only won class once in about 10 years so I may not have as much to loose or gain as others on this site but I would hope the sponsors will be open for suggestions and feedback on how this could be adjusted so it would be a win win for everyone.

It’s pretty obvious we need to support the sponsors that support us.

Kent Hanley
SRAC D1