Come into the light my brothers & sisters!

[BlueFirePony]

Anyone willing to help me pull together a strawman for the following let me know - if we can meet somewhere central or we can do it at MSR-H if it has to wait until then to get more involvement - I am a patient person ;)

1) Local outreach. Not planning to do something crazy here, just your basic grassroots (yep, I can use that word too :) local bird-of-a-feather type of thing. Main goal is to increase car count so that we have more fun people to race with (and yeah, maybe freeze or even bring down operating costs, attract more series sponsors, blah blah, but more car count first)
This can be a general NASA thing or a specific AI/CMC thing or just a "American V8 racing fanatics" thing. Whatever gets traction towards building car count. I don't really care that NASA should be doing this...nothing is stopping me from promoting my hobby. If I was running remote controlled airplanes I'd still be doing this if no one else stepped up.

2) Charity event - could be a Pro-AM W2W race, a "pennies-per-lap" endurance thing, some sort of time trial inversed donation thing or something else. Main goal is to raise $ and awareness for one or more charities.
I have three charities close to my heart (Cancer, Epilepsy/Neurilogical, Diabetes) but I am not planning to exact my personal whims on this. I firmly believe that giving is its own reward but such an event also has great PR potential.
This one may well be best with NASA involvement (logistics, contacts, etc.) and I honestly would prefer that but not ruling out a seperate deal either. Using my investment in the race car to promote and attract charitable contributions for others was a major reason I dumped x thousand into this purty mosheen in the first place and I've been damn lazy about doing anything.

...who's with me on this?

[GlennCMC70]

I love the charity thing. We should target this for the already planned April Enduro.

[donovan]

2) Charity event - could be a Pro-AM W2W race, a "pennies-per-lap" endurance thing, some sort of time trial inversed donation thing or something else. Main goal is to raise $ and awareness for one or more charities.
I have three charities close to my heart (Cancer, Epilepsy/Neurilogical, Diabetes) but I am not planning to exact my personal whims on this. I firmly believe that giving is its own reward but such an event also has great PR potential.

don't forget about Crohn's Disease... One of my favorites!

[Todd Covini]

Clifton's the enduro man...with his NASA involvement this could really be cool and we could use it as a vehicle for marketing.

I'm in...

-=- Todd

[Jeremy Gunter]

2) Charity event - could be a Pro-AM W2W race, a "pennies-per-lap" endurance thing, some sort of time trial inversed donation thing or something else. Main goal is to raise $ and awareness for one or more charities.
I have three charities close to my heart (Cancer, Epilepsy/Neurilogical, Diabetes) but I am not planning to exact my personal whims on this. I firmly believe that giving is its own reward but such an event also has great PR potential.

don't forget about Crohn's Disease... One of my favorites!

That makes two of us David!

[jeremiahkellam]

Since this seems to be a more productive thread, I'll post my thoughts here.

Hit up the local speed shops. In the Houston area = Fastlane, LMP, striclky performance... The clients that these guys do work work for have the means to race, now. It is hard to find people to get into something like this in this economy. The people sitting around browsing forums these days probably are not in a position to spend a lot of money right now. These shops build cars, and then tell the owners where to go play (the strip, TX mile...) Last year, Nick from Fastlane had about 5 cars at a Drivers edge event (all first timers). We need to get them and their customers out to the NASA DE's or at least do a once a year NASA TX event like the rookie day

On the same note, I bet Shannon and Jay might comp a few fees to the TX mile if we wanted to rep TX AI/CMC

Another idea I had... A kart race. A friend of mine that races karts does this once a year. He invites everyone he can, racers or not, to a King of the Karts race. This past year they had it at MSRH at their new kart track. They use the rental karts. He invites everyone he can, guys, girls, coworkers, everyone.... His goal is to get more people to race karts. The prizes = winner gets a 10min session in a 125 shifter, 2nd place in a Rotax sprint kart and I forget what 3rd gets. The catch, the current racers are not eligible for these prizes, only the trophies that are award. So the good prizes are going to someone who has never raced before. We could do the same thing at MSRH or Track 21, bring out our cars for a "car show". If we did it at MSRH, we could arrange a ride along in one of our cars, or I might be able to arrange a ride in a Panoz or something like that. If we did it at Track 21, it would have to be an IOU kind of thing, but we would gain a lot more "passer by" traffic stopping in to see what's going on.

[BlueFirePony]

Putting the actual charity aside for now, I'll be reaching out to Clifton on the enduro/charity thing to see if that has legs. I thought about it more last night and think its a great idea but I am clueless on all the logistics but willing to learn and work on it.

Local speed shop, Texas mile, kart race...got it...like the ideas.

At this point I think its all about divergent thinking - we'll have plenty of time to converge on what is doable/effective sure enough so keep the input coming.

What about charity rides? I seem to recall that this was attempted before when I first found this group but it fizzled for some reason? Insurance...not enough cars with passenger seats? Is it still doable or not? I gave passenger rides in TT before the rules changed and running 7-8/10ths was enough to give the passenger a heck of a 10-15 minute roller coaster ride while still staying well inside of saftey IMO. I gotta believe with a waiver this is doable.

I'll give this thread a week or more and then I'll be in direct contact with people to see who wants to take an active hand (even if its just clapping).

[GlennCMC70]

i thought about asking Clifton if it would be possible to creat a CMC Class at the Texas Mile, if we could commit a set number of us. have class records for all NASA road racing class's at the TT. this could show the speeds a 230hp car can run and change a few minds of those who are HP junkies.

[kbrewmr2]

pledges per lap for the enduro is a fantastic idea - I've seen other regions do this and I think we can top them :wink: 8)

[GlennCMC70]

to expand on the idea of working w/ speed shops around Texas....
how about "wine and dine" those folks durring various NASA TX events? get them in a car durring HPDE (as a passenger or student).
set the hook...

[ShadowBolt]

to expand on the idea of working w/ speed shops around Texas....
how about "wine and dine" those folks durring various NASA TX events? get them in a car durring HPDE (as a passenger or student).
set the hook...

If you had these speed shop guys and you put them in the passenger seat and take them out on track and do W2W at seven tents like we did at TWS last weekend you would hook at least 10% of them to come race with us. You gotta start with car guys. I bet 20% of the red run group with TDE (if they got a ride in a real race car like this and knew how little it really cost to buy or build a car) would jump at the chance to race. Maybe I'm wrong but I don't think most DE'rs know about NASA. What about the guys that race dirt track. Maybe some of them are tired of the carnage and if offered a ride like this would change series? Drag racing is fun but not like road racing. How about passing out free ride passes to these other racers and DE'rs at their events and taking them for a ride on the Friday prior to an event. I'm just sayin.


JJ

[GlennCMC70]

you should just keep saying.

[rleng1]

Unless Al is driving sideways halfway down the back stretch. But then agan, the hook has already been set.

[ShadowBolt]

Unless Al is driving sideways halfway down the back stretch. But then agan, the hook has already been set.


"Track crack"


JJ

[BlueFirePony]

Here's a list of car shows in Texas I found for 2010. Obviously not a complete list - the Mustang Owner's Club of Austin show is not in there - I've been planning to go back to that one.

--==2010==--

Jan 8-10
Alamo Hot Rod Parts Autorama American Bank Center - 1901 N. Shoreline Blvd. Corpus Christi TX US

Feb 19-21
O'Reilly Autorama Dallas Market Center, 2100 Stemmons Fwy Dallas TX US

Mar 6
RDA Auto and Cycle Show Rockdale TX US

Mar 6-7
Spring Break Jam Convention Center, 7355 Padre Blvd South Padre Island TX US

Mar 13
Spring Classic Chevy Show for ’55-’57 Chevys Reliable Chevrolet, 800 N Central Expressway Richardson TX US

Mar 20
Operation Graduation Car Show Silsbee Middle School, 1140 Hwy 327 East Silsbee TX US

Mar 20-21
Corvette / Chevy Expo George Brown Convention Center, 1001 Avenida de las Americas Houston TX US

Apr 3
Space City Cruisers Spring Car Show Walter Hall Park, 807 Hwy 3 League City TX US

Apr 9-10
Bayshore Fine Rides Car Show 301 W Texas Ave Baytown TX US

Apr 10
Cruisin’ For Christ Kick Off Car Show 3701 Taft Blvd Wichita Falls TX US

Apr 17
All-Ford Car Show Gullo Ford Conroe TX US

Apr 24-25
San Antonio Heat Wave Nelson Wolff Stadium, Missions Baseball, 5757 Hwy 90 W. San Antonio TX US

Apr 30-May 2
Gator Drag Custom Car and Truck Show Montgomery County Fairgrounds Conroe TX US

May 1
GTACC Car Show Sun City Community Center, 2 Texas Dr Georgetown TX US

May 15
Boom Town Car and Bike Show 109 Kramer Rd Burkburnett TX US

Jun 5
Heartland Cruisers Rod Run Riverside Park, Commerce at Riverside Brownwood TX US

Jun 5
South Texas Stangs Benefit Car Show 1288 Loop 337 New Braunfels TX US

Jun 6
National Cancer Survivors Day Car Show TGI Friday's - Addison, 5100 Belt Line Rd Dallas TX US

Jun 12
Bringin' Back Memories Car Show Beaumont Civic Center, 701 Main St Beaumont TX US

Jun 12
NE Texas Classic Car Show LCC, 2025 Collegiate St Paris TX US

Jul 23-25
Texas Heat Wave Expo Center, 7311 Decker Ln Austin TX US

Aug 14
Longview Show & Shine 100 Grand Blvd Longview TX US

Aug 14
Triple C Car Show Central Christian Church, 4901 Lake Shore Dr Waco TX US

Sep 4
Cruis'n Orange Destroyer Dr Orange TX US

Oct 1-3
Mustangfest Island Moorings Marina, Mustang Island Port Aransas TX US

Oct 2-3
Corpus Christi Heat Wave American Bank Center, 1901 N. Shoreline Blvd Corpus Christi TX US