Future of the Pro Sportsman Association

With the 2015 racing season rapidly approaching, the Pro Sportsman Association is at the juncture of 'where do we go from here?'

We made progress on a number of fronts in 2014. We established a budget and workload that focused on our members and didn't make commitments we couldn't pay for. We were able to give David Smith some help with his expenses. As I review the remaining budget, I hope to be able to give Steve Fuhrman a little compensation for his photography help as well.

We also built and expanded our working relationship with NHRA on coordinating the Top Alcohol autograph sessions. The success of those is contingent on the pre-posted event schedule and how close the race is following that schedule. It's a bit of a moving target, and the location of the Lucas or Mello Yello trailer is another key to their success. While we had a few that had less foot traffic than desired, the majority were successes and some were homeruns. Some events due to scheduling, having an autograph session wasn't viable. Sure as a racer, taking time out of your day can be a pain in the ass, but if we want to be treated like professionals, we have to act the part sometimes.

We also developed some plans with input of some of the teams to expand our social media footprint. We hope to be able to act on those plans in 2015.

What we really fell short on is manpower and man-hours. From the first meeting when I pitched this at the IMIS show, one of my primary concerns was this would be a very difficult undertaking if it was to rely on volunteer effort. Every one of us that have been involved in running this organization have other jobs that we have to attend to, families to spend time with and racecars to get ready for the next race.

Managing, making decisions on what direction to go isn't so bad, it's the legwork this type of deal needs to expand and thrive that really needs someone on the clock to some degree. Unfortunately we haven't had the level of monetary support that would require.

With all of that said I would hate to see what we have built up go away. The reality is someone or a group of people need to step up and take the reigns of this. I accepted a full-time position with another company in August and have not scaled back my involvement with my websites or tuning consulting. It was tough to find the time before, now there just isn't anything left.

There is still a great need for this organization. We need to stay organized to build our value to the fans, tracks, NHRA and Lucas. We aren't entitled to have a class, a payout, places to race, etc. If one takes a quick look around outside of our classes, we have it pretty damn good compared to other classes where they are having to pay to have a class. As I have said numerous times we can raise hell that NHRA should promote us until we are blue in the face, and while we may be right, that doesn't mean NHRA or the tracks will promote us. It's up to us to make sure the Top Alcohol classes are being promoted.

So that brings us back to the original question. Will you the racers step up and help keep this deal going or do we close up shop? This deal is going to need the monetary support of the racers to have a budget to work with and is going to need the help of a group of people to make it happen.

Speak up or forever hold your peace....

If you would like to email one of us, our emails are:

Will Hanna
will.hanna@insidetopalcohol.com

Mark Billington
mark.billington@pepsico.com

Jay Blake
jay@followadream.org

 

organize

I'm sure disbanding the PSA will send a great message to NHRA and Lucas.

 

nhra

if nhra wanted us to go away that could have happened by now. contrary to popular belief there are many in high positions that are in our corner and have no desire to see our classes go away. however only a fool would sit back on their hands and just assume the status quo will continue. i think the Pro Sportsman Association gave those who do go to bat for us some ammunition.

the point was that we were using the PSA to promote our type of racing to get and KEEP tracks and the fans interested in us.