I'm curious what your (positive) thoughts on how a person could Barnstorm the USA like days gone by with a unique Drag Car and spend very little out of pocket. I'm thinking just the basics, Camper pullin the race car, unique car that could demand some appearence money, match racing cars like Zorba's Ghost, hospitality of fellow HAMB'rs, working on the road. Lets say 3-4 months of the year, whata think?
My tow vehicle is a 85 chevy van set up with a work bench and folding bed inside. I can carry my 3 wheeler and generator with me. i have stayed out for 3 nights with it. I could stay a month on the road.
I think with fellow Hamber help and Your decal sales You may have a chance. But getting paid to show up with only Your car car would be very very hard. I would think it would take a bunch of them to promote a show to make any track interested. Its all about the money for the track not You. I belonged to the west coast N/SS - A/FX orginization for a couple years. The organizers went around to W/C tracks to get into there programs. They got a few to let us join the show, but no show up pay and a small winner payout. We raced at the CHRR in 2006. Towed the racecar from Seattle to Bakersfield and back. With gas- Hotel - food -racefuel and entry fee it was VERY spendy! The Guys that did all the groundwork and talking to the various tracks were longtime racers and knew the track owners. It tookmany hours on the phone to get into the various shows. You need to be a very good promoter and have a fair amount of cars to make a show. Good Luck FEDER
I'm positive this is an unworkable concept. You're 30 years late, and the clock ain't goin' backwards anytime soon.
ahhhh....haven't had much luck with this one. I sold about 80 t-shirts over 8 years though! Let's see, shirts cost me 7 bucks each, 7 x 80 = $560. Then sold 'em at 15 to 20 (for long sleeve) each (let's call it 20) so, 20 x 80 = $1,600. 1600 - 560 = $1,040. 4 barrels of nitro = @$8,000 60 gallons of nitro friendly racing oil at 119 a gallon = @$7,000 Food for 1 guy for 3 months at 500 per month = $1,500 Gas for the tow vehicle at 1,200 a month = $3,600 Spare parts for the race car - unknown Repairs and maintenance on tow vehicle - unknown Volunteer help at each track - zero Sleep in the tow vehicle, take "showers" at friends houses or give yourself a "*****'s bath" at Truck Stops. IN THE DAYTIME!!!! Don't count on tracks to pay you, but if they do, buy your helpers Hot Dogs and have LOTS of bottled water on ice around. NO beer until AFTER you make the last p*** of the night. Total = @$20,000 Number of T-shirts sold at 20 bucks each to cover above. - 1000 Cost of T-shirts = $7 each x 1000 = $7,000 $20,000 + 7,000 = $27,000 That's 1,350 T-shirts sold over 3 months. As a safety precaution, you should hit the road with this money in place plus at least that in the bank to cover spares, misc. etc., which comes to $54,000 total. That way if you get stranded (or crash/blow the car up beyond repair) you can get back without selling all your beautiful race car stuff for s****. $54,000 = 2,700 T-shirts, sold country wide over 3 months. Seems doable doesn't it? - Good luck!
thats a lot of t-shirts makes you wonder how many millions some of the multi-car teams now a days blow through in a year of racing. The 100K they win for a race is probably enough to cover a motor or two
What he said, don't confuse the HAMB world with the real world. The vast majority of "fans" today want to see, sponsor funded, 300 mph cars blowing themselves in half in a huge fireball. It's not a hobby/sport anymore, it's now show-BUSINESS. Wish I could be more positive but I find little to be positive about in motorsports today.
When we run the Duster funny car, the show up money from the track barely covers fuel to get to the track. T-shirt sales might cover spark plugs. The sponsor money covers various re-certifications and new safety equipment. Broken parts, various consumables, methanol, oil, filters, tires, payments of the tow rig, DOT certifications, the team covers out of pocket. Beginning with a running car at the start of the season, I think it costs us about 30 grand to run the various races we attend.
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