that would be a shame:(went to regional few season's back:thumbsup:batley seem's to be in similar postion,was there yesterday.nice weather,only 16 racing:(everything seem's to clash these day's.i get the feeling club racing is loosing out to big event's,national's,regional's,other race serie's,etc....york alway's seem's well supported:confused:and let's be honest it's alway's down to the same few to run,organise,set track up:(it get's frustrating:mad:

exactly.and if clubs dnt get together and arrange sumat so places arnt running at the same time .more clubs will fold especially as theres only 2 nw clubs left it seems daft how one another cant help each other out.the wont be any nw regional series anymore :(

8 members doesnt mean 8 turn up. I have been twice when no one else turned up and once where one other person turned up.

I put this in another post earlier, just repeating myself to highlight the problem. Things are realy bad.

Does anyone know how many racers turned up this weekend, weather looked great but I was working ?

I don't think Southport closing on alternate weeks is really going to help you out much. Southport club closes for NW regionals at Bury and actively encourages its members to go and support the series.

There are a lot of Southport members though that are only interested in club level racing for fun and aren't interested in travelling. One of the reasons they come to Southport is beacuse its a family venue where kids can enjoy the park and wives and girlfriends can walk in to town for shopping. If Southport closed a few would make the trip to Bury, but a lot of people would just stay home.

I think the result of runnning alternate weeks would be detrimental to the future of the Southport club and give little gain to Bury.

If Bury does close (I sincerly hope it doesn't as its a great track) the NW region will survive... with all 6 rounds at Southport if needs be!

Not to sound funny but where was Bury's support for the North West series a few years ago (2004 or 5 I think) when they dropped North West to run North East? Southport kept the series alive and ran all 6 rounds.

In my opinion there are plenty of racers in and around the Manchester area, but they just don't seem interested in club racing and choose to travel far and wide to follow bigger events.

I also think its a big ask with regards to running Bury alternately with Batley... I've looked at the Batley calander and there seems to be plenty of weeks already when they are closed for NE regions, if they started closing extra dates they would end up with no club days!

When did you run mid week? i didnt know it was on ive only been back racing about 3 years was it during that time? purely from a selfish point of veiw i finish work on fridays at about 2pm so love to race friday nights. i wouldnt mind coming down early to help with stuff on the track either. Same goes if you found somewhere indoors for winter

ok theres nothing on this week, so lets get as many people as we can there, i can turn up who els is willing

I agree completely with Dan on this.

A club is no more than the sum of it's members - if you can't get members, then your club doesn't succeed, and sometimes it doen't matter how much work is put into a club to keep the success of that club alive, things just don't work out.

But why is it that Southport are seemingly being blamed for not helping Bury out? We can't do anything more to help Bury out other than close our own club.

Southport appear to get dragged into everybody's "discussions".

It wasn't that long ago that when somebody decided the North East regions and the North West regions should merge, Southport were accused of trying to "steal" other clubs and members. Now it would appear to be suggested that we should "give-up" members to keep another club going! None of these "discussions" have been started by Southport Members, yet as a club we still somehow get dragged into them. It's bonkers.

Southport is a members club run for and by it's members - we have plenty to do doing that without trying to please everybody else, so please chaps, leave us out of it.

With Southport holding a national, then given any weekend where both are running, anyone interested in doing well at the national will choose Southport - me included.

The unfortunate thing, is that we don't have many new starters who don't do nationals. These should be the core racers of the club who support it week after week. Southport is a good example of this, they even have club meetings when nationals are on elsewhere as they have enough members to do it.

So I wonder, what could help Bury? I am not going to suggest a national for 2009, although it'd be nice, a national will only attract a temporary number of racers for the pupose of pre-national practice, and the club needs a longterm fix, not short-term.

The sportshall fire although unfortunate, I think makes the track better, that space cleared makes the place seem cleaner, so no blame on that. But the whole area is not as "inviting" as it could be for family - not the track, this is a tough one as to solve it involves relocation but there is nowhere else in Bury, and the track itself at Bury IS great and requires no change.

The other thing is the lack of a local model shop, Bury Model shop used to run the club many years ago, and they could generate interest over the counter to customers in the immediate area. Just how much is Ryan doing? (I don't know) but could he be drawn in to be more involved - even to the point of matching the level of commitment Steve Glover put in during its peak? It'd be in Ryans interest to.

Weather has also been bad over this and last summer, perhaps this has put off many new comers we might have had if the weather had been nice?

Chris

Yours points are spot on Chris.

Bury needs more club level racers. They can hold big one off meetings, (i.e. a national) that bring in revenue but no new members so it doesn't really help things out.

Certainly Bury needs to get some newbies in. Again Southport is at a geographic advantage because the track is in a public park so we get plenty of passers by and spectators. So I would agree that local model shops are your best bet for advertising.... When somebody goes into a shop to buy an RC car you need a shop thats going to actively try and sell a car that has the potential to be raced. Unfortunately most shops seem to concentrate on flogging nitro bashers these days.

If Bury can get the numbers up I think they need to offer club level competions. Nothing keeps youngsters more interested than points, prizes and trophies.

On a regional level I used to really enjoy the end of season interclub competion, where each club would pitch a team of F2,3, and 4. Many moons ago when I was a young F4 driver it was a real boost to be asked to represent my club. Maybe we have a chance to still do something like this.

I like trophies!
I to enjoyed the interclub competions many moons ago when Leigh was a club too, running a Bosscat.
I remember the clubs in the NW region Chorley, Leigh, south lakes Southport and Bury. all getting a good turn out every week and for regionals having to pre-book.

In the end it all boils down to money and how much you wish to spend or don`t spend

Plenty of people every week turn up every week with a B4 rtr and have a greats days racing with out spending a fortune. Other spend a fortune only to spit thier dummy out. RC racing is cheaper now than it ever was in my opinion.

I think more people have to work weekends than ever before which is a problem. Come on Mr Brown, lets shut all the shops on sundays again!

Also difficult to get the Playstation generation out of their bedrooms and interested in proper hobbies now.

Some excellent points made here - sensible stuff.

I like Bury a lot and try to come whenever my home club aren't running. I'd come for club racing while the nationals were on at SRCC, if there was any point. I'd rather race and have a laugh than watch it.

Apart from the location factor (passing trade / family area), which are arguably more important concerns, Bury is lacking catering and toilet facilities.

These things are important - most people like a butty, a hot drink and access to a toilet without needing a lock and key.

Southport are doing track maintenance in readiness for the nationals on 20th, so I intend to head up to Bury.

Anyone else up for it?

Today there were between 15 and 20 people wanting to race, all of whom turned up to Bury and most of whom are Southport regulars (go figure!!).

As this was advertised as a CLUB DAY on the website calendar it should have been running, but no one turned up to run the thing, so we all ended up bashing around the track for a few hours. What gives? :thumbdown:

Enjoyable as this was, it is pretty much a disgrace that no one came to run it, especially when Bury moan that no one ever turns up and especially as the organisers live very close by. I don't know if I will make the trip next time - would you? :mad:

There seems to be a collective effort brewing (albeit seemingly not from your own club members) to support Bury because folk like to race there and it keeps the North West scene alive, but with this sort of attitude I expect the future of Bury is bleak - this is a terrible shame.

The mind boggles. :confused:

Let's not forget Woody Snr and Jnr invest a lot of time and effort into keeping the club going and it's difficult to stay motivated when turnouts are consistently poor, however I'm sure many people were as disappointed as I was to load up the car and drive to Bury only to find a lot of willing racers unable to do anything more than practice.

As one poster pointed out above, the other 'local' club was closed and the weather was good so it was a great opportunity for Bury to put on a decent club day as advertised on the website.

Whilst I'm sure there are valid reasons for a Bury 'no-show', today openly demonstrated the racers' support and was certainly a chance missed for the club. It's easy to sit and complain, so let's try and keep any feedback constructive...

Bloody hell fire:o

totally agree with russ :(:(

dan

My personal opinion is this no matter how good your weather your the best at the track or whatever they should still attend club racers. To show they support the club some people dont go to them now. But since the fule prices went up we cant attend to all of the tracks

are you b-mag in disguise?

To make matters worse, there was a big cycle race being held and alot of the riders and their families came over to see what was going on. A properly organised race meeting would have been a much better advert for the club.
I made the trip to support Bury today despite the fact that I 'should' have been helping Southport prepare for the National. With hindsight perhaps the shovel/paintbrush would have been a better choice (sorry to all at Southport who did help out :()
Whilst everyone who stayed had a laugh and got some testing done, an equal amount simply left disheartened without running their cars at all. Not sure if they will be returning too soon:(.
Definitely an opportunity missed.

Has anyone got a translator?

Gobshite to english will do?:confused:

The usual suspects plus a couple more, who know who they are, where in attendance painting and preparing the track this weekend. there is still more to do during the week if you contact burgers to see what nights we are going.

But as for Bury, a day missed is surly not great for moral of all partys.

Got some bitchin crawling done though! :)

It was sick!

I went down And heard from someone who had phoned Roger the night before and he had said he was not coming down. So i left dissapointed. :thumbdown:

I was at Bury today and a good day was had by all:thumbsup:

Only the ordinary members can be blamed if this club has to close.

Other than the 'Southport lot' only 5 others turned up!

Roger and Co can only do so much.

here ya go lee.

Gobshite Translator!

Fantastic, it works too :thumbsup:

On a serious note though, did anyone actually know what vinny meant?:confused:

I said 'constructive', not 'codswallop'. I'd try to help you, but I don't know where to begin!

Anyway, as we're being constructive, in the absence of racing it was still good to see people on the rostrum practicing/testing away and making best use of the facilities. It would be a real shame to let Bury slip away....

had a good day at bury today, its a shame the there was no one there to run a race meeting :thumbdown:, i'm sure the organisers had good excuse's.
today showed that people are willing to support the club 'when' they can, and it would be a great loss to the n.w. region if bury was to close,
i for one won't let todays no show, put me off going to bury again, as i had a great day :thumbsup:

i didn't see the can 'crawling' today, i would've had a go with the t4:woot:

Out of the three sentences he wrote, I think I understood approximately none of them. And I think there’s only one other person on this forum who would understand at least one of them. His name begins with b and ends with g.

What happens for the regional in 2 weeks time? Is it still going ahead?

Bury has been unfortunate with weather for the last 2 years. But this year has proved that the club has no real member loyalty beyond people who turn up to practice for the NE regionals and Nationals. Its a shame. It needs influx of newbies. :(

There were LOADS of kids around on Sunday, and because of the Oval Cycling tournament they had on, there were quite a few adults. I was asked on a couple of occassions about the costs of racing. If only Roger et al had been there to coax them in as members.

If Bury are unable/unwilling to hold the Regional, then we will host it at Souhport. And maybe running the track anti-clockwise or something for a change!

Hi everyone.

I'm new to Oople today. I was among the few who turned up at Bury yesterday. It was my first race meeting in 15 years so from a personal point of view it was nice to have a bit of free practice against the small friendly group who showed up. Barring the odd broken wishbone, it was a fun day despite there being no racing. And I'll also say the 'Marshalls' did an excellent job.

However, looking at the Bury club situation, I understand from chatting to people and what I've read on here that it is struggling for support, to the point where the organisers are perhaps loosing enthusiasm. I remember way back when you could show up to Bury for a club meeting and there would be probably 60-80 people typically and a reasonable standard. There is I'm sure still the basis of a good club there and with a bit of maintenance and a lick of paint here and there (and perhaps round off a few of those wishbone breaking kerbs for the more careless such as myself!) the club could be restored to it's former glory. It's a shame that for a decent off road club that those from Manchester have to go as far as Batley or Southport, which is what will happen if Bury folds.

Lets hope for the good of the sport in the area that it keeps going somehow.

Chris

It was great to see people at the track yesterday. Such a pity there was no racing.

I guess we got a taste of how Roger feels when he sets up and there is no one there !

A lot of people were angry there was no racing. Personaly I was just dissapointed, I had taken time off work becasue I had read on here other people were going to turn up this week.

Has anyone spoken to Roger since, what are his feelings ?

I think that some poeple have very good ideas but when it comes down to it, what happens? You all leave it to MY Dad. Just to let you know he has had 6 weeks now when he has been to the track with all of the computer and printer stuff( with a bad back and after a heart attach) and hardly anyone has turned up. Insted of Bitching about no one turned up to run the meeting, already there has been a few post's on here that they have mine and my Dads telephone numbers but we DID NOT get any phone calls. I had a text off a friend of mine and I said I am not going and that my Dad was really upset and I dont know if he was going. If you all want the club to stay open then come forward and I will give you the keys to the place and you can have a go at running it for the 8 members.
Sorry for going on but nobody looks at the bigger picture! 1 day 20 people turn up and my Dad doesnt and you all have a go. He has been there every Sunday for the last God knows how many years and if it wasnt for him it would of gone in the mid 90's. Bit of respect is needed I think. What has he got out of all them years? 8 members.

I think Roger deserves a medal TBH for the way he has continued to open up each week and tries to keep things going. It must be so frustrating.

Woody, I think you'll find most people have tried to be constructive about Sunday. Indeed there was very little 'bitching' that I noticed, just a decent turnout having a laugh and getting some practice in the sunshine, making the most of things.

The day could possibly have been better with some organised racing, that's all.

Will PM about the other stuff...

I was there sunday and had a good laugh :thumbsup:

Racing or not... had a a good time.. plus gave me a chance to get some practice in and set up my cars.. oh and break them! lol!!

I didnt hear anyone moaning or bitching?! :confused:

This track has so much potential.. as Pugboy says a spruce up and a lick of paint would do it the world of good... and maybe make a few alterations to make it less of a " car breaking track! " lol!!

The trackside buildings and rostrum could be spruced up etc.. could the club get some sort of cash injection from the council to fund the tidy up etc?

Cheers

Nick
:thumbsup:

It isn't a car breaking track, I hate it when people say it is, its no more of a car breaker than Batley, Southport, EPR, Kidderminster.

If you are breaking your car then you are driving too fast for the track. The track at Bury is excellent just as it is. Go and enjoy it, and that practice will mean you'll break less :thumbsup: