We have tried to get Seymour to separate the race cars and street cars and there were some racers who were really opposed to it. If the race cars had to race other race cars in the 1st 2 rounds it would seriously limit their "duck hunting". I really liked it when the ducks had teeth myself. I know I've been sent home more than once by the slowest car on the grounds. I have also been the slowest car on the grounds and sent others home.

One thing that we did get through was the end of a qualified field limited to 16 cars. The first Clay City race was that way and we had 20 cars. My ex-wife was the #20 car and was out. Luckily for her, enough cars broke or left to make her the #16 car. She was runner-up to Rodney Hargis, and the car never ran faster than 19:85 all weekend.

Some of us have even put up special prize money for street cars going farthest in eliminations, beating race cars, winning races, etc., but it did not seem to help.

Wayne is doing a fantastic job of promoting on the west coast. I hope he has continued success.

I think one of the big things against us now is that there are just too damn many Mopar shows. It used to be a lot more fun when there were only 4 or 5 major shows in the country. Now it seems like there is one every weekend somewhere, and since we can not get sponsors for a lot of them we are just red-haired stepchilluns.

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Official Cookie and Mater Tormentor.

As a new rookie to slant 6 racing, I can say that the friendly atmosphere and fun in the pits is different than racing my V8 cars at the strip. I am really glad that Wayne got me into it......and the fact that my wife likes to go to the races, and talk to all the fellow racers is a big boost.
I called Seymour last night, and thanked him for coming to the Medford race, and volunteered to send him pictures from the next Redding race. I also told him how great it was getting the newsletter......and that I hope it continues on. I just like the fact that it is personel, and not a "cookie cutter" type thing.
Seymour is full of info, I hope the newsletter can stay the way it is.
Andrew/Kidd

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Wife's: 64 Valiant
My: 70 Road Runner, 67 Barracuda, AND the 62 Valiant drag car!!

Me and Bagel has tried several things with limted success. For instance at Valdosta there was five cars that raced and a 1000 dollar purse. I suggested to Charlie why doint we split the prize money 5 ways and everybody get 200 dollars I was after the points anyway. three of the five said lets race for the purse ok thats fine. Like Bagel I have been beat by 21 second cars and I have beat full electronic cars. I have cofidence in my race package when I line up to race. It is difficult for a street car to get around a race car when you put up a 20 light and can run with in 2 hundreds of a second of your dial in. I have been a supporter in the past and will be in the future of Slant Six Racing. Including supporting race purses. Norm and Elaine brought me supper tonight she is an excellent cook and we talked about thies iisues. Maybe by the end of the racing season we can go in a new direction to help Seymour. Any input would be helpful. Thanks Ron Parker

I've never attended a Slant Six race, but I've raced several slant six cars over the years, and made the Norwalk Bracket team in a $500 '72 Dart many moons ago. I hope to aquire a toy in the near future, and it'll probably be a /6. I hope that the series is around for me to race. I'll likely have a stock or nearly stock car, and from my experience I have no problem racing anyone with anything in their car. I love having cars that look like beaters and are slow, others don't take you seriously. If you want to split it into two classes, you need (I feel) at least 8 cars in each field. As far as the nOObs go, my advice for them is this: If you had your posterior handed to you at the track on a /6 day, the best way to avoid this is: PRACTICE!!! Get to your local track, run brackets, gather information on every aspect of racing from the people you see winning. Bracket racing can be a humbling sport, but when you have the trophy and/or cash in hand at the end of the day, there are few better feelings,

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Ron H.
"If at first you don't succeed, use a bigger hammer."

When we have a two-day race, we dedicate usually Sunday to be the day to race for slant6 National points. At Redding on August 25-26, we will "bracket" the slower cars together and then "bracket" the faster cars as group. Will put up $50.00 for the winner of the slow group and $50.00 for the winner of the faster grouping. Then let each winner from each group run each other for another $50.00. This will give the slower cars some "seat time" and then on Sunday, race for the $600.00 which will be spead out all the way from lst to 8th place plus incentive "bonus". We are not trying to change what Seymour has in place but just trying to get as many involved as we can, making it more fun for the slower cars. This is what seems to be working for us out "West" ..you can "fine tune" your own racing on the day "off" that doesn't count for slant6 points.. At most tracks, you can have a rider come along..get your wives, girlfriends, family, ect invovled..during time trials. The new members from the "Memberlist" are great places to find those with slant6 cars from your area. Welcome them to the website and let them know about up-coming events from your area. Once you recieve a email or response from them, you will have a high percentage of gettting them to your race..even if they decide not to bring their car and run..Just get them there..

Just wanted to clear up the previous.. We run all cars on Sunday after drawing from the "hat' and using Seymours brackets as one group. The "off day" which is usually Saturday we can 'customize' our own brackets and on this day only, we will run the slower cars as a grouping and the faster as a group. The number of cars in each group will depend on the number of slower cars versus the faster ones. At Medford we had 12 slant6 cars.. Only four were considered 17-20 second cars...the remaining 8 went into the faster group . Everyone who shows up at your events knows of other slant6 cars from their area. Get them to at least bring a friend for "support" or "pit crew" ..these are future racers..get them to the track.

I'm one of those procrastinators who's trying to build my Slanter along with all the other projects I've accumulated over the years. The going is slow, plus my work schedule was so inflexable, getting enough time off to make a race was quite an undertaking. For example, the closest slant six race for me would be Monster Mopar, and that's a twelve hour drive. In addition, Monster pays $3500 to win Nostalgia Super Stock. Guess what class one of my other toys runs??. Now that I've retired, great, I've got a freer schedule, but I have to watch the money a little closer. The cost of traveling has gotten a tad pricey this year. Anyway, let me get my gripe in. I tried to organize a Slanter race at the Mopar show in Houston last fall. I had promises from TEN, YES TEN slant six cars they they would come and race. Three more were on the fence about making it. Mike Jeffrey and a gent from Dallas showed up. One other fellow came from San Antonio that I hadn't talked to. I had a three hundred dollar purse and no cars to run. (They put Mike and the others in Pro). If you're gonna commit to something--commit, don't leave us standing there with poop on our shoes. If you can't make it, fine. Things happen. Now what do you think my chances are of getting a separate slant six class?. It's hard enough to convince the Hemi/Six-Pack/Max Wedge etc bunch that we're seroius about our racing. Our Mopar club is having a small show/race on August 11th for those of us that couldn't swing the Nationals this year. If your a Slant racer/enthusiast let's say, within a six or so hour drive of the Dallas/Fort Worth area. Contact me. If our show does well and we do it again next year I'll have a whole year where I can organize a fun bash for the Slanters. I'm still good on my promise that if I can get eight cars to run, I'll see we race for something tangable. Get involved-It's fun!! Now help me down off this soapbox somebody (bad knee...) RICK

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If you can't be good, at least be colorful

Rick, I know the feeling. Went through the same thing trying to get cars at RT66 when they first ran Mopar shows.

I also arranged a sponsor for us at Monster Mopar. We had a good car count, but the promoters jerked us off so bad that most of the guys vowed never to set foot in Gateway again.

The sad part is that Seymour wants the focus to be on fast Slant cars, and we keep losing them instead of gaining. I know of at least 2 bad hot rods that will not even move this year because of lack of interest. As much fun as a Slant race is, without the fast cars and sponsors we are just space filler, and mostly a joke to the fans in the stands.

I thought I recognized your name from the NSS board over at BK's.

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Official Cookie and Mater Tormentor.

I for one am finally in a place where I can help out here. I would be happy to start shouldering some of the burden to create an electronic form of this, and I just need to call Seymour up and see what we can arrange. I know that people writing articles is hard and takes time, but if we want to attract sponsorship for races and get people out to them, I think we need some sort of outward face like a website/publication.

What do you all think?

MJ

Thanks Rick, Menko ,Dennis von La Grange, et al. We are getting several different concerns which have all lead to the decrease in interest and attendance most of this years slant6 events. Rick spent lots of time and probably some personal $$ and ended up with a low car car count. Dennis had a good car count but bad promoter...How want we "resurrect' both these events? In the last issue of Newsletter, I didn't see many (if any) of the faster cars from the Redding race. The issue featured mostly if not all new racers who were attending several of the West Coast races. I recieved calls from several who were so excited about seeing their slant6 cars in the newsletter. We might see several of these slower return from the "cocoon" as faster cars in the near future. Our car..The Swingin' Six started out as a 18 second car... For us, we wanted to go a little faster and faster (like many will want to do when first show up at a slant6 race.) We now are running is the low 12's. I can't urge strongly enough that the future of our slant6 racing, is with the new "first time" racers. Get them to your event somehow...Tell them to show up just for testntune..tell them they can run just for times only..tell them if they need technical support, someone will be there. Tell them to show up just to show off their slant6 cars. Once they are there, pay some attention to them..show them how the staging lights work..Might even offer to ride with them the "first time out"...Get them over their "butterflies" of the first time run down the track. Stroke them...priase them when they run their first sun-20 second run.. Praise them when they cut their first sub .300 light. Get someone from your area to be the "secretary" for your group, get someone from your area to use the Membership list and email all from your area. Most have access to a computer do maybe one of the wives or girlfriend could do this on a weekly or bi-monthly bases. Keep track of those who contact you back and get a email address or phone number and start your own "file" on those potential racers and you will be surprised at the percentage who will show up if you stay in contact with them.
You will hear many "excuses" ...not only from our current list of members but from these "newbies" who will contact you. "Have a exhaust leak...radiator problem...carb problems..so can't make it...Why not try to stear them to a source that will fix their problem....We all have extra "parts" laying around and just the personal touch that there is someone from their area the gives a 'rats ****' about their slant6 car
will go along way towards getting them to your event. Now I will take a step down and join Rick...Keep the ideas for correction coming...

Wayne, the trouble I have around here is that while I live in an area with over 8 MILLION people, I know of 2 other Slant cars that will come to the racetrack. I think that around here way too many of the A/F bodies have just plain rusted away.

My personal issue is that my biggest desire is to get into Super Pro, and that is a tough nut to crack with a Slant at the weight I can get my car to. Slant cars make great Pro/Sportsman cars, but to get into S/P and be a player is tough.

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Official Cookie and Mater Tormentor.

Wayne is right on the money here--trying to build the local community and get people to help you work on stuff would certainly help get more people out. I have been way-laid many times on things that having someone with more experience helping out would have been great. Then you get to drag everyone along with you. I know that several people in my area have lent a hand, and that always helps to get you there. Wayne even offered a car when mine was not going to be able to make it--just to have people there. That's the spirit we all like.

MJ

I can understand why Seymour is getting tired to do the news letter.. Time to put it together, cost just think of the mailing costs. I think a web based news letter would be the way to go, A new thread Slant Six Racing News. Devoted to the Slant Six Races. If somebody wants to do this I think every member ought to donate a membership fee per year. Racers and everybody. I will support this idea and help fund it. Any Ideas. Thanks Ron Parker







Jaggers Fabrication Slanted Attitude Dart

I think we could figure out how to promote it either from within slantsix.org (with Chuck's blessing of course) or a separate website. It wouldn't be too hard. I would be happy to take some initiative here, if there is interest. I'll try and call Seymour this weekend and see what he thinks.

MJ

I think we should be clear here. What is special about the SSRN is the complete and well crafted articles, and attention to detail.

If we are to do this online, we should try to do the same and actually craft some articles. Another thread or forum would just be redundant with what already happens on this site.

I am willing to write some articles, as I have been doing occasionally, but there will have to be many other people committed to the cause, or one REALLY committed person like Seymour has been. We have been very lucky indeed to have him working toward the success of the racing group!

My two cents...

Lou

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