That's coming from from someone who deals the crates so I'm sure your happy. I had my open motor done for less than what you can buy a crate for. its not that easy for the open motor guys to get rid of all there stuff to start over. I race at Motordrome in the street stocks now I'm stuck unless I sell everything and start from scratch how is that saving money when I compete with the 602's now. mark my word the division will be dead within 3 years.it's not fair for the open motor guys.
What this post says is only part of what is wrong with the entire crate racing concept.
Allow crate motors in the class, that's fine. But why should this fella be forced to buy one when he has perfectly good equipment that is bought and paid for? Like my buddy always says; "I can show you shelves full of parts that were put there by rules that were supposed to save me money".
Why would anyone think that a paved crate class would be any different than the crate on dirt clusterf*ck we have around here now? Probably 3/4 of the so-called money races are won by the same four or five guys, and everyone is led to believe that all the teams are on their best behavior because the tech process is so thorough and the penalties for cheating are so severe. What a bunch of horse shit. You can't tech everything all the time, and even if you did, who is to say that all of the tech people possess the same diligence, knowledge and thoroughness as the others? And what about politics and favoritism?
The only thing crate racing has done is underscore two things that anyone with half a brain already knew about racing, and they are that money still can help buy wins and that any racer worth their salt finds knew and creative ways to cheat. The only way to keep cheating out of the game is for a sanction to own, set-up and maintain the entire 24 car field.
So what does this say about crate racing? To me it says there is money in it for promoters that push the use of these motors at their track, and I don't mean money via the front and back-gate. I mean guaranteed money like division sponsors or money from tire rules. Why the hell else would Lernerville push the crate thing in an incredibly diverse and entertaining Stock class that averages over 24 cars, most of whom run "open" motors? Why, indeed.
People will flame me for this post and I could give a rats ass. I've been going to the races since before some of them were even born. I've seen what works at racetracks and what doesn't, and to me all this crate racing thing has done has but a band-aid on a wound that requires sutures. It has done for many promoters what table salt or hot sauce has done for nasty chicken wings or fish; covered the taste. A temporary fix for bad programs and poor car counts. Window dressing for piss poor promoting, terrible programs, slow shows, bad track conditions and nearly everything else that ails racing in the New Rust Belt of short track racing.