[NCNCA] some food for thought

[Ron Castia]

I was thinking that this would be an excellent topic for the forum.

----- Original Message ----
From: Sandy Levensaler <finesaler at earthlink.net>
To: Hellyer Velodrome <ncva at googlegroups.com>
Cc: bike ncnca <ncnca at ncnca.org>
Sent: Tuesday, November 7, 2006 11:03:15 AM
Subject: [NCNCA] some food for thought

Recently I have been thinking about the debate over the best nights/ 
days to race at Hellyer.  While out riding last week I ran into Tait  
Sato and Dan Morgan. I asked them what they thought  would be the  
best time for them to race at the track. Tait, who is a top 10 placer  
in many of the NRC elite races, said that Thursday night would not  
work for her since it was too close to the weekend and that she would  
have a hard recovering. Dan's answer was different. He said that it  
was a "pain in the butt" to drive to Hellyer any night. Then I  
talked  to  Harvey Nitz and explained to him what was going on. He  
thought that if you wanted to attract "roadie/crit" riders then  
Wednesday was the best night to race. His other favorite nites for  
racing were  Friday and Thursday in that order. Harvey thought that   
hard Wednesday racing would give "roadies" ample time to recover from  
and for   weekend racing. These remarks got me to thinking about last  
year's racing. I decided to take a look at the attendance records for  
the 3 racing nights that were on the schedule. The results were  
interesting to say the least. The Wednesday night races averaged 41  
riders per week. Thursday night races averaged 31 riders week. Friday  
night numbers were not exact most of the time so I could not get a  
good count. Here are some points to think about. Were Thursday night  
numbers lower than Wednesday because "roadie/crit" types were voting  
with wheels or lack of? Would it be better to have Larry"s points  
race series on Wednesday and move Rick's Wednesday night series to  
Thursday? Would we get more "roadie/crit" types and sacrifice the  
Wednesday "trackies". Is this a case that what ever races are staged  
on Wednesday will bring riders to the track? Are Wednesday numbers  
higher because Rick has a separate women's fields? Do we want to  
change a good thing.? All of these questions are food thought? Some  
other thoughts. It seems to me that racing at the track is a South  
and Central Bay "thing". Most if not all of the BOD members live in  
these 2 areas and probably never experienced the commuting from  
Oakland/ Berkeley, Marin or Sacramento. A 15/30 minute drive in the  
car is much easier than 1:15 or 2 1/2 hours.  From personal  
experience I can tell you that driving to Hellyer alone is not a lot  
of fun. The point that I am trying to make here is that maybe there  
is no best night to draw roadies to the track and that there are  
other factors at work. Like work the next day, rush hour traffic, and  
the most precious commodity of all. TIME!!. This post is not meant to  
point fingers at any one. Its purpose is to stimulate further  
discussion. Thanks for reading. Joe Fineman
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