2019 IMPBA FE Nats Atl.Ga. feeler thread

[Doug Smock]

One of the stick points is that its, Too close to the spring nats.

Yep Michigan Cup, Southeastern Tunnel Championships, and club members with conflicts.

I love the idea the only issue is the dwindling daylight in sept? may june july you have sun till 8;30-9pm sept you'tre lookin at 6:30-7 but I think it'll work

It looks like daylight will only be a problem if ya wanna run 100+ heats/day. Sunrise about 7:00 am sunset @ 8:30 pm according to what I could find online.

[don ferrette]

Well the other issue is Huntsville is hosting the 2019 Internats (long format) targeting the second week in September but still working out details.

[don ferrette]

Any further chatter on this recently?

[longballlumber]

Any further chatter on this recently?

It was just recently communicated to me the Atlanta Model Boat Club will not be able to facilitate hosting the a 2019 FE National event.

[don ferrette]

It was just recently communicated to me the Atlanta Model Boat Club will not be able to facilitate hosting the a 2019 FE National event.

Bummer.

[Doug Smock]

Sorry fellas. Perhaps down the road.

[T.S.Davis]

Any talk of an alternative site?

[longballlumber]

Any talk of an alternative site?

Back to the "numbers" discussion again... Other than AMBC and MMEU who even has the capacity to accept the challenge?

[T.S.Davis]

How the heck does nitro pull it off? By the numbers puts them about as pathetic as we are. haha They raced 226 boats for the 2018 nats. Some of those classes had as little as two boats that actually raced. Sport 40 was the best at 25 entries. Think we were around there for spec sport. The average entry count for the nitro nats was 12 boats per class over 18 classes. Looked it up.

I'd have to get with Tom to see what the real totals were after people entered and then bailed but at one point we had 278 boats registered. I'll bet it's around the same as nitro. Maybe less. 200 or so? Yet there's still a nitro nats. Just bums me out that there might not be one because of "numbers" when other fuel sources are able to get around the numbers.

MMEU just can't do another nats. We're baked. Well....at least I am. I'd be willing to support one but hosting....not so much. I'd rather heckle and be a nuisance to someone else.

[longballlumber]

How the heck does nitro pull it off? By the numbers puts them about as pathetic as we are. haha They raced 226 boats for the 2018 nats. Some of those classes had as little as two boats that actually raced. Sport 40 was the best at 25 entries. Think we were around there for spec sport. The average entry count for the nitro nats was 12 boats per class over 18 classes. Looked it up.

I'd have to get with Tom to see what the real totals were after people entered and then bailed but at one point we had 278 boats registered. I'll bet it's around the same as nitro. Maybe less. 200 or so? Yet there's still a nitro nats. Just bums me out that there might not be one because of "numbers" when other fuel sources are able to get around the numbers.

MMEU just can't do another nats. We're baked. Well....at least I am. I'd be willing to support one but hosting....not so much. I'd rather heckle and be a nuisance to someone else.

Its hard to directly answer you question how they pull it off... More racers that are committed to making an event of that caliber happen; I guess.

Based what I just read in the August Rooster tail:

2018 FE Nats had 35 racers and 240 boats (ultimately both were slightly less from what I recall after the drops). I seem to recall the number of racers ended up below 30. However, I am going off memory from a conversation with Tom. Again I am going off of memory, but 40% of the 2018 FE Nats racers were MMEU Club members of some sort?

2018 Nitro Nats claims 300 boats and they stated that 88 racers showed up to the Banquet. I can only assume that not all boaters went to the banquet. I have a feeler out for the exact number of racers/boats. As a matter of fact it wasn't a specific club that put on the 2018. It was a couple of guys that took on the initial responsibility, they were well organized, asked for help in places they needed it, and had many racers volunteer to fill the voids where necessary.

At the end of the day they may be boats, but it's not the same when comparing Nitro events to FE events. There are more nitro racers, there are more nitro clubs.

Just curious, will MMEU be hosting the MI Cup in 2019? The reason I ask is because of your last statement. Was hosting the 2018 IMPBA FE Nats/MMEU MI Cup significantly different than hosing a normal MI Cup race?

[T.S.Davis]

The 226 number I quoted was from the results on racemaster. I didn't count boats that never made a start. I think yer about right on the number of guys that bailed on us. 30 sounds more real.

FE racing is such an anomaly. If you take the 226 boats that actually raced at the nitro nats and divide by the number of racers you get about 2.5 boats average per racer. We average 6.6 if we went 200 boats and 30 racers. I don't have a feel for why that is. Maybe because that's what it takes to make an event go?

I'd have to think on the Cup vs nats thing. Work load is the same but the stress is higher. Can't explain that either. It certainly was many of the usual suspects.

[longballlumber]

I'd have to think on the Cup vs nats thing. Work load is the same but the stress is higher. Can't explain that either. It certainly was many of the usual suspects.

Again, going off of memory; it seems to me there were more racers at the 2017 MI Cup then the 2018 FE Nats/MI Cup. My point in stating that is the number of racers didn't dramatically go up because it was "The Nats". It actually went down.

IMO there are VERY few FE racers that are dedicated enough to the FE segment to take on the responsibility. How many other FE ONLY clubs are there in the IMPBA AND capable of pulling off a multi-day national race? None that I know of. There are several clubs that have mixed power sources, however the FE guys are still the minority. You will be hard pressed to find a group of IC guys agree to put on a race where that isn't their primary interest.

Just my $.02

[T.S.Davis]

How many other FE ONLY clubs are there in the

...............United States? MMEU may well be the only one outside of ERCU. I'm ignorant on that one too Mike. I'd love to know of the other clubs are out there but I just don't. Could be there is a club out there that could totally handle it but they just don't know that they could totally handle it. Fear of the unknown etc. Or maybe they just don't wanna do it.

I didn't think about checking a Cup vs a nats numbers wise. It is so strange the way the numbers fluctuate with these events. We try every year to estimate attendance. Phone calls to racers. Emails. Texts all over "Hey, are you interested?" kind of inquiries. Then we get guys we didn't expect and lose guys that committed. I never have a feel for it exactly who is really coming to race.

Didn't nitro struggle with participation when gas become all the rage? How did they come out the other side? Or is participation still lower than it once was? Again, showing my ignorance. Trying to learn something we can use to expand our ranks moving forward.

[Doug Smock]

Gas is the only fuel source that doesn't seem to struggle with a Nats. In 2013 & 2014 there wasn't a Nitro Nats IIRC.

There was some talk (BOD) a few years ago about only holding the Nitro Nats every other year, every three or five years.
Chris re wrote the procedures giving clubs options on format opened the door to clubs that couldn't or wouldn't spend a week at the pond. The US1 format was killing it IMO. Yes it's cool but...

[don ferrette]

Gas is the only fuel source that doesn't seem to struggle with a Nats. In 2013 & 2014 there wasn't a Nitro Nats IIRC.

There was some talk (BOD) a few years ago about only holding the Nitro Nats every other year, every three or five years.
Chris re wrote the procedures giving clubs options on format opened the door to clubs that couldn't or wouldn't spend a week at the pond. The US1 format was killing it IMO. Yes it's cool but...

Actually Chris did not re-write the procedure, the 3 Nitro Nats format options (old US-1, new US-1 and heat race only) were around before him. I remember we talked about having the US-1 format like every 5 years, that kinda got tabled. And I agree while it's a neat format when you run the "newer" version where you heat race 1st and the top 5 or 10% (whichever is greater) go on to ovals and SAW rounds it is a good bit of extra work and cost (triple the amount of trophies). And then there are a few stuck in the stone age who keep wanting to run the "old" US-1 format where EVERYONE runs time trials first then heat racing. Nah, had enough of that format in days gone by plus since the emphasis is placed on heat racing with final heat racing points getting doubled it's a huge time waster in my opinion. I didn't go last year because it was old format, went this year as it was heat racing only and not going next year as again the dinosaurs want to run the old format (there are other reasons too but that's the main one). That's why I was really excited at the thought of Atlanta doing the FE Nats, was gonna go there instead. While it's disappointing for sure I thank the AMB club for even considering it.