LAS VEGAS, Nev. (March 1, 2012) – Sports Car Club of America President Jeff Dahnert announced Thursday in his opening remarks to attendees at the annual SCCA® National Convention that the Club would move to a “rolling” schedule for the 2012 National Championship Runoffs®. The new schedule will reduce the amount of time a driver needs to be in attendance at the Club’s hallmark event.
Citing overwhelming support from a recent driver survey conducted by the Club, Dahnert noted that the longest any participating driver would need to be at the event was four days. In previous years, including 2011, that number was seven.
“Times have changed,” Dahnert said. “We have family and business commitments, tighter budgets and expensive gas prices limiting the number of qualified racers that are able to participate in our biggest event of the year. There are plenty of challenges and hurdles for a driver to overcome to become a Champion or achieve their personal goals. The schedule of the event doesn’t need to be one of them.”
The new schedule, which will be released along with the event supplemental regulations in the April 2012 FasTrack® News, represents a shift from tradition. In the past, classes had one qualifying session for four-consecutive days (Monday through Thursday), followed by individual class racing Friday through Sunday. The new schedule features racing Thursday through Sunday, with qualifying in the morning and afternoon Thursday through Saturday. Classes racing on Thursday begin qualifying on Tuesday. Classes racing on Friday begin qualifying either Tuesday or Wednesday. Classes racing on Saturday begin qualifying Wednesday or Thursday. Classes racing on Sunday begin qualifying Thursday or Friday.
Each class, with the exception of Spec Miata and Spec Racer® Ford, will be combined with at least one other class for qualifying, like in 2011. Each qualifying group will run three sessions, as in 2009 and 2010. For the first time in decades, some qualifying groups will run more than once per day, not unlike the events throughout the year.
“We conducted an e-mail survey of Nationally-licensed drivers in the last month, and 70 percent of the respondents noted a preference to the shorter schedule,” Dahnert added. “Some classes support the new schedule to a greater extent than others, but the survey data shows a potential increase in participation in each of our 28 National Championship classes.
“The responses indicate a potential significant increase in the number of people that would be able to participate in the Runoffs. We recognize that survey responses are not committed entries, the data shows that our number of people considering attending increases by 96 percent. That’s a staggering number that we cannot ignore.”
To the extent possible, classes more inclined to prefer the traditional schedule will be positioned later in the week, and those more inclined to test will be positioned earlier in the week. Any participant is welcome to arrive at the beginning of the event, or before the event to test, and stay throughout the duration.
“We are aware of the challenges this schedule will produce, mainly with parking,” Dahnert said. “We are working with Road America to address concerns about later arrivals and early departures, as well as addressing some of the issues from previous years. It will be important for participants arriving later in the week or planning to leave early to choose their paddock spaces accordingly, knowing the challenges that can come with trying to move in or out of certain spaces.”
Survey Overview:
General Data - Surveys sent: 4,588 - Responses: 1,518 (33%)
Schedule Preference - Responses to question: 1355 - Prefer Traditional Schedule: 240 (17.7%) - Prefer Proposed, Shorter Schedule: 942 (69.5%) - No Preference to either Schedule: 173 (12.8%)
Inclination to attend with Traditional (2011) schedule: - Answered question: 1366 - Yes, plan to attend: 351 (25.7%) - No, do not plan to attend: 593 (43.4%) - Unsure – 422 (30.9%)
Inclination to attend with proposed schedule: - Answered question: 1360 - Yes, would be inclined to attend: 688 (50.6%) - No, would not be inclined to attend: 301 (22.1%) - Unsure: 371 (27.3%)
Net Change from Traditional to Proposed schedule - Yes, would be inclined to attend: 337 (96% increase) - No, would not be inclined to attend: -292 (49.2% decrease) - Unsure: -51 (12.1% decrease)
2012 SCCA National Championship Runoffs
