Regionals for Micro's
 

With the Nationals being so far away for the South East micro racers i would just like to know if people would be interested in running regionals and then a regional final:thumbsup:.

I'm hoping this would bring back interest to all clubs over the country especially South Ockenden, Wycombe, Aylesbury, Leighton Buzzard etc :thumbsup:

Sounds a good idea matey, unfortunately the bubble seems to have burst on the micro's, certainly in our area. At Aylesbury they were getting around 10 on a Friday night, I doubt they get 2 now. The last time I took my micro to Leighton only 3 of us turned up so we were told we couldn't race so I didn't bother going there again. Not sure how many Wycombe get as I haven't been for ages. All the people that used to have them in our area have got rid of them now as they couldn't be bothered to get longer chassis.
In my opinion there's too many "sizes" of car allowed, all it does is spread the already thin numbers even thinner and so makes it a waste of time (as I said, only my opinion and not meant to offend) :)

....

I think the idea of regional meetings would be a good move and could generate some more interest in micros in the south east. Reading Darrens comments on another forum and the replies given by Cosie he obvouisly thinks we are all wimps and Essex girls, he seems to have forgotten that both 2wd and 4wd national champions last year came from the south east, and we have the furthest to travel the first national this year is 265 miles for me which means I probably wont be going. So lets see if we can get some interest in more south east clubs and have some fun and compteative racing.
Rules would be based loosely on BRCA appart from the track size and surface, hoping this would bring some of the clubs not able of holding nationals back to micros. Comments please. Ashley

Straight out of the wood work some faces we haven't seen for a while:thumbsup:

I think with the new BRCA track rules obviously some clubs have suffered in the south.

But if there was a series would you come back:eh?:

Rather than asking for a 'regional' series, why not set up your own? SEMC (South East Micro Cup)?

Another good idea :thumbsup:

i see nothing wrong with regional champs, unfortunatley they won't be brca affiliated, but thats not a biggie.

i understand your concerns given the venues for this year, (and ash as your on the commitee all you have to do is pick up the phone to speak mate) but i have personally called more clubs than i have fingers trying to set up closer events to the SE.

I'd arranged PDA, but that fell through, got no reply from maritime (but i'm hoping on next year, i guees my emails didn't get through).... The venues aren't chose to marginalise the SE, we just didn't get any applications from there.

If anyone in london or the SE wants to help find venues for next year, we would be more than happy of your help.

Alec, your points on the allowed classes have been dealt with in the new rules, we now have just two scales, 1/18th and 1/16th, with max wheelbases of 167mm and 190mm respcetivley, sorted.:D

with regards the track changes, the comments from microx, especially from tank, were that we are at the stage where these cars are so fast now that a long straight is needed. You all know that in a final when points are on the line we are all a bit more aggressive than at a club night, if anything the 23m long straight may have been a bit small for anyone running an 8.5 without a delicate trigger finger!

Really? Thats quite a controversial statement to make dont you think Ash?

The point I was making to Darren was that it is all well and good going onto the forum and complaining that the Nationals arent on your doorstep but what do you want us to do?

FYI Hereford, Swansea, Caldicot and Dudley applied for Nationals before the deadline for applications...They were the only applicants so obviously they were going to get Nationals.

PDA were approached before the cut off date but didnt get back to us till after the cut off date and eventually had to pull out anyways.

Taplow applied for a Micro National thanks to being pointed in our direction by Carl Venter and Ardent Raceway applied after Mat North put in a tonne of hard work to get John adn his gang excited about us.

I remember speaking to yourself Ash, Danny and PMing Mike Spindley numerous times asking if Ockenden were going to apply for a National cos all 3 of you had mentioned to me that Ockenden were going to apply but that application never appeared.

I had a phone call from Danny last week (I think) talking about a new venue that they had found in Essex and how they were interested in a National but I told him then on the phone that Taplow and Ardent had been secured as the remaining venues.

It is well known that the Wycombe club does not meet our size requirements as has been discussed at length...

I use the term "Essex girls" in jest, as a joke...in the same way that I refer to Northerners as gravy drinkers and Southerners as shandy drinkers (and my local South-Westerners as sheep shagging farmers). Its all jest, and im happy that everyone else seems to get involved in the joke (and even joke back) with out thinking that everything is super dooper personal.

So what do you want me to do then Ash? How do you propose I rustle up applicants from the South Eastern region?

:thumbdown:

PS: If you are not attending Round 1 then can you arrange for someone to cover the role of PRO please.

nationals
 

Just to clarify, I wasnt complaining, merely stating a fact about the location in relation to me (and I am considered fairly central - as I pointed out) all of these "essex girls" ;) are even further away then we are.

For "some" micro racing is everything, their only (or at least "main") class of racing for others it is secondary, or even only participated in during the winter months and my point was that since micro meetings only take place on the one day, the mileage/time spent in a car is very excessive for anyone wishing to compete from around the south east corner of the country in the "national series". For those where micro is only an additonal or alternative class the travelling commitment is huge the further south or east or worse still south-east you go... but I did state I understood why and was not complaining about one single venue.

The locations of the national rounds this winter are due to one thing - a lack of suitable applicants from other areas of the country! If there had been applications submitted from the south east that met the requirements then they would have been awarded a round - simple.

High Wycombe applied, but we didn't get a round because of our venue size. I have no complaints about this, and have told Cris that we are here if needed as an emergency venue at any time.

My concern about the nationals is that the new rules (for both cars and tracks) means that lots of clubs are being prevented from applying to host meetings. High Wycombe is an OK size for an RC18, an FTX Blaze or even a SWB shark, but it's simply not big enough for a LWB shark or a Carisma GT14B. It's supposed to me 'micro', and yet the cars are now larger than a 1/12th scale car!

The 1/12th section struggles to find suitable venues for its nationals because the cars need such large tracks - micro is going the same way I'm afriad. We will be racing on 1/10th buggy tracks with cars that aren't much smaller than a B44 before long!

Date clash permitting, I would support and race in a south east regional series, and would happily host a round at the High Wycombe club.

One thing I have noticed develop with the micro class is the significance of which club people come from. I can go to a 1/12th or 1/10th tc national and not be able to tell you which club half the people are from. Yet at a micro national it is immediately obvious due to who's pitting with who and what people have written on their t-shirt.

Micro club racing at High Wycombe is really struggling - 2 years ago we could expect to get more than 20 drivers quite easily, but recently we haven't been breaking into double figures, and a couple of weeks ago there were only 4 of us. Why do we think this is?

Fair comments there Mark......

Maybe there is some "mileage" in the idea of somthing dooowwwnnn sooouuuth then as a seperate series after all......... and since we are based in Watford, keep me posted since we have a heat or two of keen micro racers too who may be interested.....

d'an south!
 

Most of the venue's I've had to go to for the past few years, have been at least an hour's drive, High Wycombe and Leighton Buzzard we're over 2 hours, with Cardiff being 3, and Swansea being an extra 30mins on top of that, and then I didn't even get to race there.

Before the start of the national series proper, a friend of mine who had been doing micros, said he wasn't doing them anymore, as they we're all "d'an south", and that was with Tamworth, Ellesmere Port and Chesterfield in the series.

I will go to places to race when and where I can, I think most of us will, but we pretty much all want the venue's on our doorstep, but this is a NATIONAL series, not a regional series.

I do think however, that the the size requirements for venues, needs to be thrown out completley as we've been to clubs like LB, Wycombe, Macclesfield (rip) which weren't the biggest, but used what they had and put on a bloody good event, and my immediate thoughts when I heard about the size requirements was a feeling that those smaller venues we're being snubbed, ie "thanks for all your help, but we want BETTER now", I've also heard worrying rumours about why foams we're banned, but the rubber tyres we're using now seem to be the tyre of choice at the mo', but again, that feels like a big snub to Gecko, who have supported our series almost from the start.

Sorry if this sounds bitter, guess that's just the mood I'm in right now.

extra
 

Knew there was something else I wanted to put but forgot it. If, the venue's applied before the EGM, then the drivers who attended, could vote on where we race for the following season.

Wouldn't have made much difference this year, as fewer suitable clubs applied than there were national meetings to fill, so there would have been nowt to vote on!

IMO the size of the cars is going to become a problem, and to be truthful has already. Bigger cars need bigger tracks, and they can also handle more power, so guess what? They need even bigger tracks!

If the dimensional rules were SWB shark sized maximum, then there would be more suitable clubs able to host big meetings. As it stands I reckon you need a track area of at least 12m x 24m (micro x size, which was quite small compared to the size and speed of the cars I think!) - which is what 1/12 scale were running on less than 10 years ago! What clubs are there who support micro and have a track of this size? Only a handful by my reckoning...

Like I say - we'll end up running on 10th buggy tracks before long, but if/when that happens I may as well go and race 1/10th buggies thanks!

As for the tyres - I have heard lots of rumours too. The fact is the change of rule will not affect the results at all - the Micro X proved that. What it will do is hurt some manufacturers (i.e. gecko), hurt people in the pocket and perhaps force them to run a different tyre. I am currently running rubbers at club level as there's no point in running foams if I can't use them at the nationals. The set of rallyblocks on my car were new for the micro X, and they are already severely worn after that and 3 club meetings. I used to get 2 moths or more out of a set of foams, which were also cheaper to buy in the first place. BRCA rules are for nationals only, but there can be no doubt that they affect club level racing to some degree...

I for one will be at all rounds, and will gladly help in anyway that I can to promote your club and any future round of the Nationals etc that your new venue/club gets. All you gotta do is just ask me :)

As for rumours, rumours are what cause arguements.

I could post up numerous "rumours" that I heard about relating to people on this thread, but what will it do? Nothing more than create tension are arguements.

The EGM has been and gone. The "racers" (not me) voted in the rules for this year and so be it.

I have heard nothing from any club saying that they feel snubbed or that they feel that the rules are made to prevent them from applying, that is either because they dont feel that way or because people think it is better to whisper opinions and rumours around than to contact those involved directly and discuss the matters at hand.

Please remember though, every year I go through the same old process of shouting from the rafters "Its your Series, you vote the rules in, make sure you come to the EGM and vote!" yet every year the same old same old wait a few weeks before thinking that the rules are rigged or manipulated to produce some sort of controversial effect such as "putting Gecko out of business" or "stopping X, Y and Z club from applying".

why would we all scrub it mike? if were willing to drive to broughton, then surely we're willing to drive to ockenden (a journey which i've done in an old VW bus, maybe a 7 hour trip).
to paraphrase an awesome baseball movie, "if you host it, they will race"

It does sound bitter sarah, and if you'd seen the pace of the cars @ microx, you'd understand marks concerns, we cannot go back to the smaller venues with the LWB sharks and GT14's, they are just too fast. Maybe we'll get to the stage where we are hosting a separate 1/18th scale series at smaller venues, we'll see.
In no way have any rules been voted in to spite smaller clubs and or go against foam manufacturers, too many people have to vote for that to be possible.


the man talks sense, but i've never had any trouble with yellow blocks, last me all year. ( but the i don't drive as hard as mark does)

finally, if you do host a regional series, let us all know the dates i'd definitely be up for racing at a few of them.

Mark - I don't think we need bigger tracks to suit our cars. The challenge of racing, is modifying your car or your driving to suit the circumstances or track. Currently, indoors with my TC, I'm going really well, only being 4 laps down on the top driver, but within fractions of a second for laptimes, outdoors on Sunday, because I forgot to raise the ride-hide and other things, my performance was down considerably down, with my lap time being down by 1-3 seconds. Biggest thing to remember is, regardless of track size, did we have fun at those smaller clubs, because that's why we do this. The instant this stops being fun, I will stop, and I'm guessing I'm not the only one in that. I understand that not many clubs did put their names forward, but as I understand it, a lot of clubs that do or did race micros, aren't big enough anyway under the current rules, I think that with this new rule, we're cutting our noses off to spite our face.

Matisse - anyone can drive fast, not everyone can drive quick. Based on your posting, we might as well just run an oval.

Cosie - I didn't say anyone had complained of being snubbed, or anyone was being put out of business, I said those we're "my" feelings on the subject, and you know how things work, people will complain amongst themselves about things, but never tell you if you ask them directly if there's a problem.

thanks sarah, i musta missed that memo re: less haste more speed.


But, by my post i am not advocating oval racing, far from it as i race regularly at the smallest club space wise in the uk, WORM (i challenge anyone to have less space then we do), but, at a national, when points are on the line, people are nervous and triggers fingers become heavier, fact.
the rules worked @ microx,if the feeling is after the nationals thats the rules aren't working, then there can be another vote on it, until then lets make the best of it.

Getting back on track, if there are some meetings in the SE or some regional events I'm up for it when the Carisma comes out! :thumbsup:

As current Chairman of LBMCC we took a year out of Micro National due to the guy organizing it basically having to do everything single handed, say for a few helpers. And most of the racers left the building before the trophies had hit there hands! I appreciate people have got traveling to do but we all have homes to go to.
I for one didn't want to run the race as all I got last time was complaint after complaint as I sat at that computer all day doing timing when I dont even race the class.

I honestly think micros are getting out of hand there supposed to be micros when do they stop becoming micros? longer chassis wider track!. 1/14th - 1/16th - 1/18th what was wrong with the blaze? and the micro t. People wanted 1/10th handling rather than learn what was there. I got out of micro racing when it was just the Blaze and Micro Ts on the shelf and have stated several times how the bubble burst once before and it would again.
Darren at DMS was very instrumental in getting Micro Racing going the first time round im not sure if his track out back still exists but after a period of highs the lows followed and micro t racing went the way of the dodo.
(I FORGOT THE ASSOCIATED BUGGY)
Dont even get me started on costs of parts but when titanium pivot balls cost £11.99 a pair its getting a little pricey!
Thats why many parents at lbmcc have encouraged the kids to sell up they simply cant afford to keep them running.

Well thats my tuppence worth.

Im off to race my Tamiya Mini :thumbsup:

That really knarked me at Dudley last year, people just upping and leaving as soon as they're finals had been run. If we all just stay an extra 20-30 mins after the last final and help out, then we'll be done, rather than the usual few ending up having to stick around for hours afterwards.

Always the way! Tonight will be the same 98% of the club is local within 10 minutes of traveling time we have to be out by 10pm but lil junior must be home in bed by 10. Dry that Bull out and you can fertilize my lawn!
Myself and couple of other members live 30 mins to an hour away.
Thats life grin 'n' bear it and smack em all in the face before I pop my clogs!

and yes im feeling rather agressive today!
:lol:

Matisse - nice post, I like your style! ;)

Cris - I don't know about anyone else, but my posts above are most certainly not an attack at you or anyone in particular. The rules are decided by the majority - it's a democratic process. However, what I am questioning are the motives behind the original poroposals and peoples reasons for voting in a particular way. I always vote for what I feel is best for the section - not necessarily where my personal interests lie.

As for the trophy presentation - it gets my back up a bit when people dont stay. It was a bit of a joke at the Micro X - only about a dozen people saw Phil presented with his trophy! We can't make people stay if they haven't won anything, but there must be a way to encourage them to do so!


A very well known and respected figure in the industry asked me for a copy of the 2010/11 micro rules today. I asked him why he wanted them (in case there was another new car or product in the pipeline!), but his response was, and I quote;

"nah, just to see what is going on and what classes are running outside of their scale because they are better that way!"

This happens at clubs up and down the country every week, and has done for many years.

Oh I know that. A local club to me (that I havent' been to for ages), again, it's the usual few, plus even some that don't even race, and SHOULDN'T actually help for health reasons anyway.

Some people are just selfish narwats, but if more people help setup, more people help packup, we can get more racing done, but some are just too stupid or too lazy to realise this.

As far as getting people to stay and help pack away etc, try what we do at our club....

When they book in, racers hand in their BRCA card, once all the racing is finished, we put all the cards into a tin, 50p from each entry goes towards a sweepstake, which is then drawn using the BRCA cards from the tin. Track goes in away in just a few minutes and you can identify anyone who sneaks off early becuase you still have hold of their BRCA card..

Of course we have some exceptions, very young children, those who travel long distances to race with us, those who get up silly early for work the next day etc, these people just come up and collect thier card before they leave, but we do ask them to make an extra effort with all of the setting up tasks.

Then of course those who have snuck off early, you can catch red handed when they next come up to book in and they dont have their BRCA card (since it is still in the tin from the previuos week... simples)

As a rule, if we get approx 30-40 people racing, we tend to split the sweepstake up into several cash prizes mounting up to the £15/20, so there are several winners, increasing their chances with each going home with between £3 and £7

We did also try charging the extar 50p, then giving it back at the end to those who helped, this just did not work since for the sake of 50p most people still just left, however the incentive of a chance of winning one of 2 or 3 slighly larger cash prizes proved to work much better.......... (for us anyhow)

Then when it comes to getting people to stay back for trophy presentations, if it is at a meeting with a raffle, just present the trophies at the end of the racing and then draw the raffle straight after that, this tends to keep people behind to see if they have won anything, the event does not finish any later since the raffle would have only took up time earlier in the day anyhow...........

Interesting. I know at Stafford, once the track's put away, you book in and if you've helped, you get a pound back at the end of the night. Sometimes I help, sometimes I don't, I know I'm one of the people complaining about those who don't help, but I help when my health allows, and only rush off if Sam needs me urgently for something.

The club I mentioned earlier, has tried allsorts though. I just think some of the people there have a bad attitude, and then they wonder why numbers are really low, and the race fee has rocketed.

I think we have got a bit off track here I am still interested to hear from people and clubs that would be up for some kind of regional or South East Micro Cup series. Thanks Ashley

micro's
 

we have a club in the south west and hopefully it wont be dying out here for a while..we get between 10 and 20 members every week turn up.......look on facebook for torbay micro racing club

and in the winter another club opens in torquay that races 1/18th, 1/16th/, 1/12th pan cars and 1/10th saloon and approx 40 to 50 turn up each meet to race at that event

on the subject of people staying behind at the end of the race meet to help out most of the guys at the club stay to put away the track but like all clubs you will get the odd few that won't...

doesnt bother me though, i'm just happy to be able to race in a great club

How many clubs in the south east actually race micros or would want to? I was down at West London club this weekend, and they we're telling me that their nearest decent indoor club was either Milton Keynes or Wycombe. Maybe we should start looking at running the "normal" nationals as it is now indoors, and having regional outdoor meets during the summer, possibly tagging onto the bigger scale weekends, that way we might also convert some of them to micro along the way.

New venue just outside of London: http://taplowrc.co.uk/
Had a few micro's go round, they coped fine with the 1/10th offroad track that was laid out. If there are 4 or more cars we can put a heat together.

I'm with Mark on the size of the cars and venues leading to people giving up. I used to race at Wycombe, and did the nationals a couple of years back, and i have to say Wycombe was the best round by far for me thanks to the dedicated indoor layout. It also provided a really nice technical track that wasn;t just about speed. I think it's sad that it has been ruled out of the national series now based on size. As has been said elsewhere in the thread, it is up to a driver to set up there car and drive according to the track, not design the tracks just to please the speed freaks. If people are crazy enough to run an 8.5 on a small track then they will probably do rubbish.

The cost is the main killer for me though. I bought in when the shark was about £130. But now the price is silly, especially when you have to lengthen it to compete. Factor in the brushless kit (with a 10th speedo because the mongoose is crap) and it rivals 10th offroad prices.
It boomed back in the day of the mini-t and Rc18. Cheap ready to run, equal paced racing, which made it a lot down to driver skill. Now the size changes are killing it and ruling out some manufacturers.
I just don't see what was wrong with the original shark.

shame, as i used to enjoy a blast indoors over winter.

The rule changes to split the 18th and 16th cars was designed to bring everyone in tho and give the mini-t and rc18 a chance to compete with comparable cars.
Agree with the length of straight rule, but hey, I wasn't at the agm so can't complain!

Speedo
 

Well I've just gotten myself an LRP Nexxt40 for the shark, which seems fine so far (not had a full testing of it), but it seems comparable with my SPX for the touring car, but at under £100 retail (God I love getting my own stuff at trade prices, but even then, it's still expensive!).