Won A Trophy Last Night....

FormulaNERD · 06-26-2004, 11:31 PM

so, as most of you know, my transmission is bunnyed.... but i'm #5 in points on the season (bracket racing) and i dont want to drop, so i decided to race my girlfriends avenger... (2.0l)

man is this thing slow... but it's fairly consistent, and that's all that matters. the most consistend 60' times i've seen in any "street" car.

last night was trophy night, top 5 getting trophies, there were 24 cars that entered, and buy backs in rounds 1 and 2.

needless to say i didnt have to buy back, and won a trophy, losing out in the semi finals. all in all i was happy and i gained a crapload of points to close in on the #4 spot for the season. not bad considering i started racing for the first time ever about half way into the season...

BLK03GXS · 06-27-2004, 12:59 AM

cool, post pics of the winning "race car"

and congrats :thumbsup:

BLK03GXS · 06-27-2004, 01:00 AM

Ohhh b4 if forget... what did it run..."man this thing is slow..." is kinda indiscriptive..lol

Redog · 06-27-2004, 01:06 AM

Congrats, even if you drove a Dodge to the finish line

Pic of car, time slips???

Daytona · 06-27-2004, 08:29 AM

Congrats! It doesn't say much about your competition if you're already in 4th after joining mid-season. One day you and I will have to have a run off, and maybe invite a few of the other drag racing regulars on here.

As for me, I'm off to my track in a half-an-hour to move back up towards the points lead (currently now #2 after 3 bad weeks).

FormulaNERD · 06-27-2004, 10:47 AM

actually i'm in 5th.... workin on closing in on 4th. and the competition really isnt all that great, actually it isnt even that, it's just the top 5 guys you see out there every single week.

i didnt take any pics of any of the winners at the track. and trophy night kinda sucked cause all the sportsman footbrakes that had DOT tires raced street instead, so it would be easier for them to walk home with a trophy... bastards. every car in the top 5 were older cars that were built to race, but apparently street legal.

i could get a pic of the dodge, if anyone even cares, it's just a plain ol' avenger, same color as my alero. factory wheels with plain hubcaps... lol, i was a little embarrassed racing it... 11.85 in the 1/8th. calculates to about 18.6 in the 1/4. lol, soooo slow.

Daytona · 06-28-2004, 08:28 AM

I mentioned your post to a bunch of others yesterday at the track and no one has ever heard of a Points series with 1st and 2nd round buy-backs.

As for my track, we've got many of the top racers in the Northeast competing. Most of our guys race 2-3 times per week, usually at several different tracks. I'm one of the few top points guys in any class that only races during RP's points races and rarely anywhere else during the regular season (due to my other commitments and work schedule). Gaining any ground in any class is a very hard feat.

Myself, I maintained sole possession of 2n dplace in the points but fell 1 more point behind the points leader Brian who is now an impressive 10 points ahead of me. Last year he and I both were swapping the lead and 5-10 points ahead of everyone until the final race when some others caught up but we still finished on top. Brian in 1st and me in 3rd (Joe Amodea caught us on the last day and passed me but tied Brian and lost to him on a tie breaker). The 3 of us all finished within 1 point of each other.

This year, Joe's #1 in the Saturday night Real Street class but not faring as well in our Street ET. Brian's back in 1st. And I am holding my own in 2nd but lately falling 1 round shy of Brian each week.

Yesterday it was a 3rd round break-out that did me in. Was racing Jason Teal who I've raced only twice before against. The final race of '02 I beat him (and everyone else, including Brian) to keep him from finishing in one fo the top 4 money spots in the points. Last year he returned the favor on the last day of points by beating me and keeping me 1 point behind Brian, effectively ending my run at the Points title. Yesterday we got paired up on the ladder and I had him by .01 RT off the line. His car has a high mph charge at the end and I got the handicapped start so when he charged up at me at the end I didn't decide that I should hit the brakes until it was too late. I tapped the brakes but not soon enough and broke out.

Luckily Brian's new car broke in the next round so he only gained 1 point on me and most of the guys immediately behind me all went out in my round or earlier.

FormulaNERD · 06-28-2004, 10:25 AM

i see, well you're more of a racer than i am... but like i said, i've only been racing for about 2 months now.

friday nights i race street, 1st and 2nd round buy backs, and wednesdays i race sport compact, 1st round buy back only.

40 points for entry, 10 points per round advance (not counting buy backs), 3 points for winner, 1 point for runner up.

www.gatewaymotordrags.com

Daytona · 06-28-2004, 02:25 PM

Hmm... I can't access their website through my computer here at work. Will have to try it again at home.

Thanks for posting up your track's points determinations. Odd system of point values. I don't recall any other tracks, at least none near me, that utilize this format. I could be wrong but I'm guessing that to increase participation in their different race series, the track is resorting to buy backs. How many cars has the track been averaging in your classes each night?

The standard at most of the tracks around here, including Raceway Park, is 1 point for staging 1st round and 1 point for every round win. RP also gives out a bonus point for everyone who signs up before the 1st race of the season. They used to also award 3 points for a Final Round win and 2 for runner-up but then scrapped that after 2 seasons. No buybacks for any round.

Tiebreakers in the points at RP are done 2 ways: first, whomever has the most Final Round victories. If there's still a tie, it goes to positional points. After the 5th race of the season, everyone is then award points based on their spot in the standings. Whomever is in 1st place gets 1 positional point, whomever is in 2nd gets 2, etc. Then each week your post-race standings position adds that many more positional points to your total. If the Final Rounds tiebreaker needs a tiebreaker, whomever has the lowest positional points total wins. Any tiebreakers needed after that (which there have never been yet) are determined by a 1 race run-off between the 2 racers.

Good luck with the rest of the season! Once the season ends you'll have to let us know how you finished in each class. Does your track compete in the NHRA Bracket Finals? That's where the top x-number of racers in each points class compete individually and collectively as a team against drivers from all of the other tracks in your Division. Team RP gets hurt every year in the Finals when half of our better drivers compete for neighboring Atco Raceway (most $$$ racers around here run points at at least 2 different tracks at once) because Atco refuses to give out end-of-year bonus money to any points racer that doesn't race for Atco's team at the Finals. Hopefully your track competes in that and you get to go. It's a great experience.

FormulaNERD · 06-28-2004, 06:25 PM

the nhra finals sounds cool, i'll have to look into it.

but on a normal night there are only 12-15 cars (street class, friday nights) and around 10 (sport compact, wednesday nights)

but it's not the same people every week, only like 60% come as often as possible, the rest just show up whenever. partly because i'd say half are military, and we dont always get the time off... wednesday isnt a ritual for me because i usually end up doing something military related, but my friday nights are usually free.

the buy backs i'm assuming are like you said, to increase participation, and also the money goes into the pot for the $$$ at the end of the season.

oh and the website has a schedule, explains points and rules, that's about it. i want to talk to them about me workin on it, or at least a link, so that people can check the standings, points, and maybe they can even export timeslips from the cpu's at the track.

Daytona · 06-28-2004, 06:39 PM

That would be cool if you can get to revamp their site for them. RP's got a pretty good site if you want to use that as a reference: http://www.etownraceway.com/.

On the left there's a whole bunch of different sections to link to and they reproduce their flyers on the site for reference. The Points standings have their own section, too, and the points are listed out by class (though I don't like how the points for a class scroll in a small section in the bottom half of the screen). I'm listed under Street ET points (Mitch Speert).