Quote:
Originally Posted by PT Cruiser
The announcement does not state it explicitly, but I'm assuming from the diagram of the 2012 "ladder" that the National Series is being eliminated after this year.
I suppose it was inevitable given Mazda's decision to insert the USF2000 series into their championship ladder, but I'll be sorry to see the national series go. At its best, it served up some remarkably competitive racing.
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Very safe assumption, Peter. With entry lists in the low teens the last few years, it probably did not make business sense to continue. In the past, series like the Barber Dodge Pro Series and the National Series operated at a loss some years to serve as a beacon for young drivers, as well as a selling point for recreational drivers to race in a series with high credibility. There were good years, of course, like 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008, when the series had excellent car counts and notable and successful drivers like Raphael Matos, Marco Andretti, Conor Daly, Josef Newgarden, Connor De Phillippi, etc. Still, as a business that is tight on cash, I can see why the National series would have to go for now.
I don't think the addition of USF2000 to the Mazda Road To Indy Ladder hurt National enrollment so much as the economy did. Numbers began to fall before USF2000 began its new championship. Also, F2000 Championship Series (the other F2000 series with very healthy car counts) had co-existed well with Skip Barber even during the National's good years. F2000 formula cars are different enough from Skip Barber cars to be really different products. There have to be enough funded customers who need Skip Barber training at this price point for the series to make sense.
Let's look into the past at how the Regional Race Series developed drivers before there was a National Series. The first "National" race was a season ending one-off invitational race that took place at Lime Rock, won by Ryan-Hunter Reay. The drivers were invited from the Regional series. In years prior, Regional titles were often won by the same caliber young career-minded drivers that drove later in the National series. Regional champions and selected standouts were invited to the "Big Scholarship" shootout each winter in Sebring, to drive the carbon fibre V-6 powered Barber Dodge Pro Series cars for a few days and compete for a sesaon in the Barber Dodge Pro Series, a value of about $200,000. Ryan-Hunter Reay was one of the winners of that intense shootout.
It is my opinion that the Skip Barber Race Series will continue to produce top caliber drivers without a formal stand-alone National series. They will do it the same as they had many times before the Natinoal series was created.
I will miss the National series dearly. But given the resolution of other current issues, the Skip Barber program will still be an awesome place to learn to drive a race car.