Peconic

The Factory Class Meeting in Fort Lauderdale is being organized by Lou Anne Campbell, co-owner of Screamin’ Eagle, and a selfless person. Only a truly selfless person would choose “thepilotswife” as her email address. I have been asked to be a moderator for the Factory Class Meeting in Ft. Lauderdale. I think the reason why I was asked is that I have nothing to lose (I don’t race in APBA) and nothing to gain (I don’t race in APBA.) Before someone says: “He doesn’t even race in APBA:” OK, I’ll race a bat boat in Lauderdale with Randy.

The Factory Class Meeting takes place on Friday, October 3rd at 4pm at a location T.B.A., but in walking distance to the mandatory Driver’s meeting at 6:30 pm.

The Factory Class Meeting is by invitation only. All Factory One and Factory Two teams are invited, along with any teams who want to move up/into a Factory class. We’ll be checking at the door. Factory racers applaud and encourage the finding of common issues and the formulating of common goals in each class.

It has been suggested by people not all too friendly to our cause that Factory racers are timid, scared to speak their mind, afraid of retribution. We think this is baloney, and this meeting is proof. The fact that Randy is short is not due to his head having been chopped off. To shield Factory racers from any possible retribution, real or perceived, the meeting will be held in total privacy, without any outside observers. Mike A. and Steve M.: We’ll invite you to join us around 5:30 pm, and we’ll give you the sanitized Reader’s Digest version with any names redacted out.

We have received a lot of input on the issues that concern Factory racing. Most of the issues discussed were voiced by Factory One racers. Therefore, the recap that follows reflects mostly what is on the minds of Factory One racers. Shouldn’t F2 have two issues for every one issue at F1? Speak up, friends at F2.



Issues recap.

There appears to be broad consensus for “1 engine, 1 weight, 1 drive.” Racers want consistency and continuity.

1 drive: There is consensus that the drive is a Bravo. Racers want support at the races, they want parts to be readily available. They want to be able to buy a drive off the Mercury truck if they have to. They would like to pay less, but that’s a separate (albeit important) issue. Which Bravo? The trend goes towards XR. Folks with lesser drives should be able to upgrade theirs to XR specs. Which lower unit? The Sportmaster doesn’t seem to have too many friends. To be resolved: Which Bravo? XR or any Bravo? Which lower? Sportmaster or any stock Bravo lower? X-dim: Leave or relax?

1 weight: There is consensus. To be resolved: Which weight? Current proposals are 4600 or 4700 lbs. People proposing these numbers readily admit that they are more or less arbitrary numbers. Nobody appears to have a problem making that weight. There is an open secret in this class: The dry weight of most boats in the F1 class (with the exception of the Superboats) is around 4000 lbs. Nobody wants to admit it, because of the 3% over fixed weight rule. None of the racers has to admit it. I will. The truth is that there are boats that have close to half a ton of sand in their boats. Current rules dictate more sand for more HP. If that sand could go, even a vanilla 496 might produce speeds close to what we see today. Boats could be built even lighter and yet stronger, but boat builders see no incentive: “If I take more weight out of my hull, they’ll just add more sand.” So, why not 4200 lbs. minimum weight for all boats?

We’ve received back channel messages that APBA may be for one weight, but only for boats 27 ft. and over. Variable weight for lesser length. Drivers polled by us are against this simply because 1 engine, multiple weights, 1 drive would ruin the simplicity of 1+1+1. Randy, owner of a 26 ft. boat and sympathetic to the cause of short people, is all for having less weight than his competitors. But for simplicity’s sake, he opts for one weight for all. Looking at the lists, there don’t seem to be too many shorty boats in F1 left anyway. Speak up, shorties!

1 engine. There is consensus. The question is: Which engine? Racers want the best engine with the most support at the lowest price. There are a number of options being discussed. There is growing consensus behind a movement to specify the engine, along with the support and the contingency program requested, and to put that up for bid. The specs for the bid document would have to be discussed at the Factory Meeting.

This is the agenda for the meeting:


A. How can we make Factory racing more popular?
- For the racers
- For the public

B.) The pre-meeting consensus appears to be one engine, one weight, one drive.

- What engine?
- What weight?
- What drive?

C.) Course layout

D.) Race support
- Fees
- Parts
- Fuel
- Other

We have a long way to go and a short time to get there. Please come to the meeting prepared to constructively discuss the above topics. The goal is a resolution of these issues by the St. Pete race and bids to be submitted by engine manufacturers not later than the Worlds. See you in Ft. Lauderdale.

TYPHOON

I think you better put tmes to each topic or we may never get to subject 2.
MD

screamin eagle

That's why we have a moderator - to keep us focused on the issues and to move us along if we get bogged down in the minutia.

Peconic

Time constraints are also the reason why we are discussing most of it on-line, before the meeting.
The intensity of on-line discussion can also work as a gauge for real-time needs during the meeting.

If y'all think, 1+1+1 has been exhaustively discussed pre-meeting, let's move on to the other agenda items.

Course layout: Too short? Too long? Too calm? Too rough? Too much ziggie-zaggie? Use technology to bring racers and viewers closer together?