So many of us who have been around since the beggining of Paved Oval Pan cars or longer seem to all have stories about 'The Old Days'

Back when Oval racing was a 2 class (Actually 3 at the events I attended) Event.

We had

6 cell GEAR BOX
6 cell STOCK "Live Axle" Pan Cars (Which I had no clue what that meant, I had a RC10)
7 cell MODIFIED

The GEAR BOX class quickly disappeared after cars like the RC10L hit the market, although my first pan car was a BoLINK INVADER. We moved outdoors onto the Asphalt with our RC10's and our NEW Invaders, and a few Road Wizzards and started running road course races. Years before this, we had some 1/12th scale locally but it had since died...and our best driver left to pursue a R/C Racing Career (Some of you may have heard of him. His name is Tony Neisinger)

Once that RC10L hit the market, OVAL Paved Racing took over as the Hot Local form of racing. We'd use our 10L's one week for Oval with a STOCKCAR body, then Next week we'd use the same car w/ a TOJ body and do some road racing...oh these were great times.

It was pretty awesome how that car could be used for more than just one type of racing, just like we did with our RC10's a few years earlier when we'd run DIRT OVAL one day, and Off Road a couple days later. That original RC10 worked GREAT on the OffRoad, Dirt Oval and wasn't too bad outdoors on the pavement (It really sucked, but what did we know)

As the cars became more specialized, I watched the number of racers start to shrink. Dirt Oval went to Custom Works "HAND BUILT" Prototypesin our 4wd class, and Brian and Jerry Landgraff would come to our track with these...and 11 guys bought them (They were $1000.00 a kit), our Dirt Oval numbers fell from 50+ to 25-30...but we marched on. The 2wd cars were being more and more "specialized" too, short shocks...tranny's that took HOURS and HOURS to properly build...then the MIP's and STEALTHS. The numbers kept falling...

The STORE closed less than 4 years later, and dozens of guys were left w/ 1000's of dollars worth of RC Stuff. Some sold, some started travelling the rest of us went PAVEMENT....back to the 10L's

We watched our number of racers get pretty strong again w/ these 10L's. They were simple, everybody pretty much run the same car. There were a few TRINITY or LINX cars, but mostly the old RC10L's. At a race in Bakersfield less than 2 years later a guy had a NARROW car that looked a lot like a stretched 1/12th scale car...WHAT IS THAT was the buzz. IT'S THE FUTURE of R/C Oval Racing...it's the NEW NARROW Superspeedway Car. Some said..."That will NEVER work", but less than 3 months later, if you didn't run NARROW..you might as well stay home. (Which it seemed a lot of people did..cause it seemed we lost another fairly good size group of people, and now if you wanted to race...you had to travel to have good size events) The guys still racing didn't notice...they were travelling and racing.

We watched most local track programs get smaller and smaller....until awesome tracks started closing all around...

So, WHO KILLED R/C OVAL Racing?

i know the culprit... Ronald McDonald... sellin all that bad food, makin all your little kids want that crap, wastin alot of money on that, and that hamburgular didnt help.... on a more serious note i think it was pure competition, i mean if you dont have the gratest stuff youre gunna lose and thats not fun, so no one WANTED to race, causing closed tracks and small hobby profits...
seeya,
mike

Long live the Tranny Car.Those were the good days!!!!!!.

It hasn't been killed around here, we have hundreds of guy's racing oval...The problem is, TOO MANY CLASSES.
If there were only 2 classes, we'd have huge classes.

I had a blast when Cleveland indoor championships has 2 classes, 12'th stock and mod. If you made the "A" there, you really did something. 200 drivers in each class, Imagine, 20 heats of the same class and making the "A" I actually did that and finished 4th :cool: , one of my proudest moments.

Fewer classes would help racing a ton :thumbsup: .

I miss the days of Lake Whipporwill Speedway. Stock and Modified, 300 or so in Stock and around a hundred in modified. Then there was the Elite Factory Modified where the pro's raced the pro's. I won the c main in stock in 92, 21st out of all those stock racers on an e-4's salary. That is still my most valued trophy!

I miss the days of Lake Whipporwill Speedway. Stock and Modified, 300 or so in Stock and around a hundred in modified. Then there was the Elite Factory Modified where the pro's raced the pro's. I won the c main in stock in 92, 21st out of all those stock racers on an e-4's salary. That is still my most valued trophy!

Cool! I still have mine too.
They don't give big trophies like they use too. :thumbsup:

The Jet

Too many classes?

What?

Stock
19t
Mod.
Spec 1
Spec 2
Spec 3
Truck
Indy
Bomber
Novice
Brushless A
Brushless B
Brushless C
Touring Oval
1/12th Oval
SK Mod's

There's plenty of room for more...

At the recent DIRT OVAL "Nationals" held at the track in Bakersfield, I heard they had close to 125 entries...but 13 different classes. Now THAT'S a lot of classes...but provided something for everyone and it seems that all had a good time. (But winning a "NATIONAL" title should include beating more than 7 other cars to be a real title.)

The race and the track is always fun. I haven't made it to one in about 3 years due to schedule conflicts...but those who do love it.

Yep, they were good times and I follow along some of the same lines. First car was a RC10. Then an Invader and when I finally bought a 10L, I though it was a Cadillac! The first narrow car I saw was Joel Johnson trying to make one work at the Peach Bowl…..it was actually funny! I also remember trying to convert a belt drive Hyperdrive over to LTO………don’t know what those guys were thinking, this will NEVER work!

And TOJ’s …..dang, I had forgot about those. I guess some of the “kids” reading this will think we are talking in code. LOL

But you know what, THESE are the good old days. Back then I couldn’t afford any of the new stuff………still can’t but I do it anyway LOL if I went to the Whip, it was a major trip and I had to save for it….hmmmm still have to do that too. And yes the crowds are not as big but I can’t blame that entirely on the “latest and greatest” deal. I think you can compare it to C.B. Radios. In the 70’s and 80’s EVERYBODY had one. But to a lot of people it was just a fad and it was replaced with something else. It’s the same with what we do, once the newness rubs off it gets replace with something else.

I've recently got a few guys back into the hobby who I use to race the old TOJ bodies against. 2 of them still have thier cars from them. (I too have one buried and disassembled in a bag), but I also have the DREAM CAR I wanted in those later years and couldn't afford then...it was a HPI ROADSTAR On-Road Car... I've been itching to get an old TOJ body for it and try to revive that class w/our touring races.

As far as 'saving up' for races...I remember doing that for the RCThunderdrome races...save for 6 months to have enough for the entry fee, save the next 6 months for a NEW body, motor and battery pack for the race (Just ONE pack and motor) Every extra penny, nickle and dime went into the "Change Bucket" all year long.

Ah, the good old day's, my favorite races of all time are the '92 Novak 200 at the Whip. Enduro racing with pit stops was way cool back then, '93 Pro-Car race at the Whip getting paid was even better, '93 Thunderdrome race in Cali. 15 car main was fun, and how can I forget the 24 hours of Winterblast, running the stock main at 6:00a.m Sunday morning after being their since Saturday, then getting ready to run Modified practice at 7:00am. Probably on of the all time greatest spectacles of oval racing never to be duplicated again.

SL

Maybe I got in too late to R/C, but what is TOJ body? I still have a 10L wide car sitting around waiting to race. Funny thing was that my first RC car was a narrow/super speedway 10L and I had to buy a wide chassis to compete on the on-road! :)

http://www2.gpmd.com/image/a/ascc3155.jpg

Mine was a Hornet, modified with Thorp gear, Hot Trick front arm support,Parma oil shocks,nerf bars, anti roll bar. Did well enough to win several races in offroad and on roller skating rinks with a modified wedge body during winter months. Yes I moved to the RC10 (1 original,2 with Composite Craft chassis). Then I sometimes raced 2-3 classes 2wd stock, Super Stock (240st/7cells) and 4wd (stock,super stock or mod) first with RC10 MIP, a RPS Yokomo SE and later a SRP1. At the height of the craze I had 5 RC10s in different configurations Offroad, Sprint Car, 4wd, oval conversion, RPM conversion with a couple aftermarket trannies, Advanced onroad/oval chassies.

I must not be as old as some my first car was a Bolink Eliminator 10,it lasted about two months then I had to have a new car,newbies are hard on cars,LOL,Bolink LTOSS came next,it was a narrow car this was around 90-91.We had stock class,super stock, then pro stock that was it.We had 60-70+ drivers on any given friday night,get there early if you wanted a pit space.At the nats there would be 400-500 drivers easy.We must not be doing to bad around here we stilll have 50+ drivers pretty regular.

"I think you can compare it to C.B. Radios. In the 70’s and 80’s EVERYBODY had one. But to a lot of people it was just a fad and it was replaced with something else. It’s the same with what we do, once the newness rubs off it gets replace with something else."

My NEXTEL will be getting replaced with a CB its cheaper and will talk just as far for FREE.:dude:

I dont think I would attribute the death or cutback in oval to the wide versus narrow... I remember that time and something bigger was messing stuff up.. TRC LynX2 SS and RRC10L SS and the HYPERDRIVE H10RS all came out about that time.. I can remember a little grumbling about it..BUT the big grumbling was BATTERY COST.. that was on/around the same time as 1700 SCRC batts showed up.. I can remember paying over $100 a pack for stout packs.. the packs made such a huge difference that you could not compete without them.. Many guys who were running F-main did not want to replace their $25 a pack batts with $100+ packs.. combine that with Kits like the hyperdrive andf LYNX2 that were seling for over $200 bucks (RC10L kit was like $110)and people had some decisions to make.. Many guys when they came back 1991~1992 race season and got WHOOPED by the new cars/new batts went it and figured Forget it.. At least where I raced at..(Loveland Ohio Banked track) we were left with mostly hardcore racers.. and RARELY got any new blood..

I remember when I started the LHS had some kind of package that was $300 out the door.. you got to choose BOLINK or RC10L graphite.. a base radio..Like futaba sport or whatever, a pro-tec wind up charger, 2 packs of batts, a body,wing, paint, and a novak T4 speedo.. Back then when you looked in the pits most of the guys had a lot of that stuff.. Sure a few guys had better radios or chargers.. but it was not unusual to see a guy with most of your stuff running in the A..

Just a few years later there was no such deal.. You were spending well over 1G to get rolling competitively.. and People who showed interest ran from STICKER SHOCK.. When the cost to play was $300 you got TONS of new people who were just impulse buyers.. this looks like fun...wow 300 bucks and I can race.. cool Ill take the kit... Later it became.. WOW This is too rich for my blood and people would leave...

Ah, the good old day's, my favorite races of all time are the '92 Novak 200 at the Whip. Enduro racing with pit stops was way cool back then, '93 Pro-Car race at the Whip getting paid was even better, '93 Thunderdrome race in Cali. 15 car main was fun, and how can I forget the 24 hours of Winterblast, running the stock main at 6:00a.m Sunday morning after being their since Saturday, then getting ready to run Modified practice at 7:00am. Probably on of the all time greatest spectacles of oval racing never to be duplicated again.

SL

Yep, I remember that Winterblast, the first of the round-the-clock R/C races. Awesome time.

-E

Nice...so what youre telling me is if we pull all-nighters this year ... you will be happy (lol).... I mean we are open 24 hours from Friday on.......
Gosh after Thanksgiving I can only imagine how crazy an all-nighter at the track is going to be with you Scott (LOL).....

You can still race for under $300 if you buy used stuff and don't try to jump in at the top level, people see these guys going fast and don't realize that these are guys that have been at this for years and years and have built up their equipment and experience,A oval RTR class is available for a very reasonable amount to start,under $500, this is the class to push on the new guys.There really isn't room for excuses at this point,the class and equipment is there.