I am a member of a local R/C club (RC Ottawa) that operates a stand-alone carpet track. Our membership is made up of predominently TC roadcourse racers with a few other classes 1/12, micro, etc. I am trying to convince people to try oval racing here.

I have set up a couple of race dates when we are between track configurations to minimize the disruption and to make it easier for myself since I will not have to put the boards back exactly as I found them.

I have been met with a somewhat positive response. There are some members who do not see the challenge or the interest of oval and I am looking for suggestions on how to "sell" them on trying the race beyond saying "just try it".

Anyone with similar experiences or suggestions I could really use the help.

Greg

unfortunatley alot of touring or affroad guys find oval boring.. They thing how hard can it be to turn left.. Then they try it and find out how hard oval really is.. Each type of racing has its own style, and most guys who are fast in one type of class, may not be fast in the other.. Its hard to get them to go from a fast guy to a average guy. The extra money they have to spend might not be worth it.. You figure 300 for a car, then they need 4 cell packs, ect. They might not think the money is worth it... If you can, set up a car or two and give them a cchance to drive it.. Also show them how much setup oval really takes.. Maybe they will give it a shot..

You could also try a 12th scale class.. Alot of road course guys have 12th scales.. its a pan car, and can be run on an oval or road track..

Do you have cars for them to try out? The only thing that is going to sell them is trying it.

If you're buddies with any of the guys that are against oval convince one of them to come to an oval race with you. Set him up with a car to run and make sure he has a good time. It'll only take about 15 seconds to figure out it's not so easy. He'll tell the other guys and interest will snowball, hopefully.

Our membership is made up of predominently TC roadcourse racers with a few other classes 1/12, micro, etc. I am trying to convince people to try oval racing here.

Another issue I see a lot is, if you have a good group of one type of racer...they HATE sharing the track with another...

I've seen too many tracks where (I'll use the On-Road Guys) the group complains the OTHER group (Oval) messes up the track, takes too much time away from THEIR practice, etc.

If you try to combine they - too often the ON-ROAD guys complain the track layout isn't as good, cause you ruined it with the OVAL...and non-local OVAL guys will talk down about a facility not being worth going to..cause you have to share it with On-Road guys. (Usually NEWBIE Oval Guys - don't know any different)

Too often we all become 'primadonnas' in our little niches - and get pissy with change.
(Off the preaching pulpit now)

What I have seen work to get some On-Road Guys to try OVAL was something I did at our LOCAL club last year...

At that time I had 6 'extra' pan cars that I put together with all the spare pieces I had laying around. Almost all of them were 10L4's...

I mounted up NEW, CLEAN Bodies and wings on all of them - had radio gear mounted in almost all of them (at least motor, battery, servo and esc.) and I brought ALL of these out on 'Road Course Day' and talked the guy setting up the track into layout out a really crude OVAL on the outside of the onroad track. (The track was HUGE) I had 3 or 4 of my local OVAL buddies show up (which is all we had for local oval guys)and hand picked a few of the On-Road Racers to drive one of my LOANER cars.

We ended up picking up 7-8 NEW local Oval Guys...although not all of them run OVAL every time we do a local race, they did buy cars, and they do run the oval once in a while..and they have a little different opinion about it...which is about all you can ask.

Another thing that may help in the future, if the touring cars guys change over to LIPO's and you offer Lipo oval, that may smooth the transition to oval by eliminating the 6 cell vs 4 cell issue!!!

I would agree that the best way to get on-road guys to make the switch is to setup an oval class that they can use their existing equipment with.

On thing that I thought was fun and it had limited success is that we had a track that made the oval guys run road course for 1 week, even with LTO pan cars. If you have a dual purpose track you could run it road course only for 1 week and oval only for 1 week, but make it part of your regular program. It may seem like a gimmick, but having an excuse to run something different may work better than begging and pleading people to try it out.

Our local track has had 2 tracks in the same building. Now our oval track side has been rented out. So we now race on the same side as the tc guys. We have to set up and tear down. The track is huge and fun. We have been getting more oval racers. Just 2 weeks ago, there was no tcs. Everyone that raced tcs bought losi sliders. Its the most fun they have ever had. Know our oval turnout is getting were we are out of room for pits. Your guys will get used to it. Offer a tc oval class..