7 replies to this topic

[Fan of 820]

I lived in Indy for a while and went to tracks such as Bloomington, Haubstadt, Putnamville, and Kokomo religiously. Can I ask why it would be such a sin to try wheel packing at Mercer or even Lernerville one weekend instead of packing the track as tight as you can with 50,000 lbs water trucks and the sheepsfoot. I know that the sprint guys around here are pretty spoiled and most would cry if they has to clean a little bit of mud off the car. I know I know call me a bleacher creecher or whatever you may like but there is a reason that the Midwest has the absolute best track conditions in the nation. They don't over pack the tracks with extremely heavy equipmet and let the cars with the widest tires smooth the place out. This makes for a heavy and very racey track. And please at Lernerville example, if there is a little bit of heavy choppy clay above the racing line let it go. No need to drag all the tacky clay clear down to bedrock after every race. Let the track go, let it move up with the racing. This is just my opinion on everything I've included. Please feel free to throw in your two cents. I'm not trying to be a know it all or anything like that. I just miss the days of cars railing the top at Mercer and a big ol' curb around Lernerville... Just want to help.

[LM RACING]

The people who spend hundreds of thousands per year like the tracks slick because it takes the guys that only spend tens of thousands out of the game. They say that its easier on motors and less broken equipment when its slick. But if you go back to heavy tracks you could run equipment that costs 1/4 of what they are spending now cause you didn't need all the fancy stuff.. Thats not what they want though because it gives the less funded and out of practice weekend racer a shot to beat the guys who do it for a living. Just my opinion but the lap times 20 years ago vs lap times now are not much different and the cars were way less expensive then.

[old man d]

LM RACING You are right on some things. I had to go back and check my books, the cost was around 2500.00 for a good car. Doesn"t sound like much but that was in the early 70"s. Lernerville was a heavy surface and cars for that time where fast motors held up fairly well. I understand the reason for the slick surface because of to-days equipment. 

[LM RACING]

We use to run mid pack at lernerville in 03-04 on a regular basis in super lates and I had less than 10,000 in my entire racing program including truck and trailer. That was fun! We had a blast just a few 20 yr old kids with nothing better to do. Spending ridiculous amounts of money and struggling to get any decent results is what has killed the super late car counts.

[showtime39]

I've been to kokomo and saw track prep very similar to what mercer does. Running in the track with heavy equipment and sheep's foot and not push trucks with skinny tires. Then finish running it in with race cars. The big difference is kokomo is actual good clay and not the sandy silty crap that mercer has. I'd love to see mercer with some clay on it.

[Express Man]

Several Factors!  Even back in the seventies....when all track prep was done with wheel packing...the dust would fly when the sprint cars were racing!Why???  Light weight/High Horsepower!  all cars today are Lightweight/High Horsepower!  Couple that that with the price of fuel and no one wanting to work anynore!  Guys like Don Martin and Piney Lasky dug thier tracks up after every race!  They would go out with the scarfers on the grader and dig it up 8-10 inches!  And they had enough clay on the tracks to do that!  They would leave the track open all week!  Water a few nights and wheel pack it the day of the race!  No one wants to spend that time and money now!  Tracks today never get dug up!  Just graded and watered!  Then all the sand in the Clay comes to the top!  Thats why these tracks are all sandy!  Its more lack of effort on the track crews and Light weight/ High Horesepower race cars makeing the tracks the way they are!  

[jo73]

It was also the days of cushions that would swallow up a right rear. I agree, in today's racing with the horsepower being made it is a tall task to keep a tracks racing surface good all night long. Some of those mid-west tracks are the same ones that started watering at intermission to bring the surface back for feature time. There are no track owners like Martin and Lasky anymore. Both, loved there speedway's and BOTH did things there way..

[longtimeracefan101]

The wingless do it out west all the time

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