SCCBC Forum - I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...

Mike_the_Oldest International License Offline Posts: 884 B.C.	I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but... Jun 13^th, 2013 at 10:09am Even though this article is about F1 and its volunteer base, the concept is applicable at the local level. We don't have many new recruits coming in (even with great effort on the part of META and CACC and SCCBC). So, this might be a timely read: http://www.pitpass.com/49267-Formula-One-and-Volunteers
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Keith Robinson International License Offline I RACE;THEREFORE I AM! Posts: 1,454	Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but... Reply #1 - Jun 13^th, 2013 at 12:39pm Looong overdue! 'Because we've always done it this way doesn't make it right' how true, it's time to move into the 21st century. The NFL tried non-pro referees; what a disaster!
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backupbob

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #2 - Jun 13^th, 2013 at 7:59pm

I know a lot of marshalls do it for the love of the sport , even at the top level . [Marshalls in the UK work the F1 by invitation only] . paying for the crews to work a big event like an F1 , could not work , who do you pay and who do you not , what about the people who work the gates and spectator areas .? . on a Saturday at Mission during the day Marshalls volunteer , in the evening , at the drag event they get paid , but they are allways short staffed . So i don't think it would help attract more people . My 2 cents worth

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Mike_the_Oldest

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #3 - Jun 14^th, 2013 at 3:26am

While the idea that good folks like backupbob and others volunteer for the love of the sport is great, I have notice that other race circuits are going to a monetary reimbursement scheme of some sort. Thunderhill compensates their track folks, for one. It's true that the number of volunteers is declining and there are not very many new folks. I've been volunteering "for the love of the sport" for almost 60 years. I derived a great deal of pleasure and excellent camaraderie along the way, but it isn't getting any less expensive to attend motorsport events.

As to where to draw the line, that's a point of discussion. Monetary reimbursement is a cost of doing business for most organizations. I know some will argue that this additional item in the budget might stop the whole event. If that's the case, it's unfortunate. I happen to think there's room for it.

One of my long-standing concerns is that, with the declining number of volunteers, we (and not just at Mission) will come up short one day and if we have a serious event, there's going to be big trouble (especially with insurance and liability).

I think this might be something we should look at carefully before we are in an compromised position.

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backupbob

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #4 - Jun 14^th, 2013 at 5:51am

Maybe expense's for all might be the way , its strange but some don't even want a nice meal at the end of the day . but if you are looking at 30 - 40 volunteers at Mission alone !!!! it will hit the entrants in the pocket and some of them might think twice before signing the form . this is a tough subject , some people travel a fair way to enjoy racing , and don't seem to mind at all ..

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Mike_the_Oldest International License Offline Posts: 884 B.C.	Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but... Reply #5 - Jun 14^th, 2013 at 6:31am As I say, it's something that should be discussed. I'm sure that there's lots of innovative ideas out there which we can explore. It's a matter of starting the ball rolling, which is what I hope we've accomplished.
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Mike_the_Oldest International License Offline Posts: 884 B.C.	Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but... Reply #6 - Jun 16^th, 2013 at 10:08am Obviously, the ball didn't roll very far. Too bad. Oh well, business as usual until we're out of luck.
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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #7 - Jun 16^th, 2013 at 8:35pm

Mike;

I don't think the ball didn't roll very far, I think that a lot of people just don't know where it's going to land, or what to do once it gets there.

Let's look at some hypothetical numbers.

Let's just say for a round number, you pay every worker $100 to show up for the weekend, and we have 40 workers (notice I now called them workers as they are getting paid), so the bill is $4000, which is more than the club makes on most race weekends. So, we pass the cost on to the drivers. Let's say we have 100 entries, which is a little light, but a good number, so we're looking at adding $40 to the cost of a race entry.

Will that break the bank? Probably not. Will that actually get more workers out? I don't know. Maybe. I think for big professional events like the Molson Indy there is definitely some justification for it as an event like that can and maybe should pay for the professional services that the corner workers and other event organizers perform. I'm sure they could role that into the budget.

Perhaps if we had another professional series back in Vancouver, like the Formula E that everyone keeps talking about, it would be a great way to introduce more people to the sport and get them involved. We did have requirements for the Indy for the corner workers had to put in a certain number of days at other tracks before they could flag at Indy, if I remember right. But this solution would require something to happen that we don't have a lot of control over.

Smarter people than I have been working on this issue for quite some time, and will continue for the foreseeable future. Let's hope we can keep the interest up so we don't have to go to plan 'B'.

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Mike_the_Oldest

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #8 - Jun 17^th, 2013 at 8:55am

I'm pleased to hear that "other people" are looking into this. I suppose I have a two-fold concern"

Safety, first and foremost. I can't for a moment think of SCCBC running a race event without the proper number of people in place on the corners. There are other places where it's possible to skimp a little, but not on the corners.

Secondly, I'm concerned that we're not attracting new people to this area of motorsport. I know that over the last few years considerable time, effort and money have been spent in promoting involvement, but there doesn't seem to be any significant increase in the number of people.

In any case, I've made my point.

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Bob_Williams

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #9 - Jun 17^th, 2013 at 11:55am

I for one, and others may ditto.....we as drivers and all other participants are extremely fortunate and grateful for the care, concern, knowledge, and attention that we have at Mission Raceway on every race weekend. I have personally seen the on track volunteers work there magic. If there was ever a question as to their abilities / professionalism , I would most likely not participate.
All this verbality begs the question......who does one contact for information regarding "training"? Is there a classroom session, much like that of Driver Training, or is it learn on the fly? Why do we not "promote" a program like this here on this site, rather than discuss "it's lack of involvement"?
It would be in every ones best interest to hear from a representative of the very organization we are discussing.

For those folks that are NOT involved, and would like to get the "best seat in the house", it would be extremely pro active to have that contact info, or at the least, a member to contact. (most of us, reading this already know who to contact). Some readers (not all) are not racers or participants. Hand outs, flyers, etc at each event would also work. Let's do our part, and sell it somehow.

Just saying!!!! Wink

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Lynn Rimmer

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #10 - Jun 26^th, 2013 at 4:13am

Bob, to answer your question about "Training" for track volunteers, having a classroom session would be ideal for a group of people but for one or two new people it's not practical.
We have found for corner volunteers, hands on at the turn training has more of a visual/mental impact. There are a lot of things that you can't teach new people in a classroom, just like there are a lot of things you can't teach someone at Driver Training until they are on the track.

I like your idea of promoting a program on the site but how do we get people here?

In the Pacific Northwest I have had the pleasure at volunteering at 6 different tracks over the past 10 years. Average age of volunteers 55 plus. The first race at Seattle (shortage of turn staff) we added up the years of experience that we had just on the turns. It was over 500 years of experience.
These are people that, when they were young and foolish, actually had to GO OUT and get involved

We now need to figure out where the younger people are GO TO THEM.
Face it, in this day and age with social media, on-line gaming, texting, etc. the younger people never need to leave their house. How do we entice them with 8 - 10 hour days on their feet in rain, hail, heat?

META members have business cards that they put their contact info on when they run across someone that may be interested.
But we also have printed and handed out thousands of flyers at car shows. Not 1 enquiry.

What do you think of the idea of a pub crawl with pre-arranged sports bars, (maybe 2 a month) with a couple of drivers and a couple of turn workers and E-Crew members armed with a DVD of in-car action, flaggers, E-Crew to throw onto a screen and we just mingle. (beer later)

Or how about figuring out which businesses have a lot of foot traffic on a regular basis and approaching them to park some race cars, E-Truck and flaggers outside their doors. Again maybe 2 a month?

I'm just throwing out some ideas, are any of them feasible?

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Lynn Rimmer

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #11 - Jun 26^th, 2013 at 4:55am

In so far as paying for track support staff.......oh dear.

For those racing organizations that are for profit, yes, it is the cost of doing business. But from what I have heard, safety isn't high on the list.
One organization when they first started out in the Pacific Northwest, paid the turn staff, only one per turn. They turned away and refused experienced Volunteers that just wanted to help. They didn't want to be paid and were still refused. Good heavens!
So who is there, should that one person have a medical emergency or slips and get injured. There is no one watching their back. Again, safety not on the list.

We have another for profit organization entering into the Pacific N/West that pays their turn staff. But what is the calibre or knowledge of this staff, or is it a case of they just pay someone to show up?

Volunteering at one track south of the border, who paid local people to work track days (not full out racing) asked these same people to volunteer on a race weekend as they were short of people, and they were told that they didn't volunteer as they were paid professionals. (these same people wouldn't know a brake fire if it bit them in the butt). It ended up where they had 2 people per turn. One got paid the other was just a volunteer. Talk about a hornet's nest.

I have done track days for businesses and gotten paid. Business is business, but on an amateur level I think the calibre of care would drop because people would come out of the woodwork for a cheque.
Yes, it cost me to volunteer, but that goes with anything you do that you enjoy. We spend about $2500/year volunteering as we choose to travel to all the other tracks, but it would cost me more than that for 7 days (1 vacation) in Hawaii. Racing gives me over 15 mini-vacations a year. Win Win

With the experience and calibre of the volunteer staff at Mission we are professionals. Getting a pay cheque doesn't make you one. My .02 cents worth.

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Mike_the_Oldest

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #12 - Jun 26^th, 2013 at 6:16am

The original idea behind my first post on this subject was to start a "dialogue" on the issue. Given the number of people who appear to have read the various posts, I'd say that we're some way towards that goal.

I think we can all admit that there is a diminishing number of people available to man the corners. Over the past few years considerable time, effort and money have been spent in attempting to enlarge the volunteer base. By putting the article on the forum, I had hoped to encourage people to come up with ways to bring along some new people.

Obviously, there are a number of issues which surround any efforts in this regard. And, we need to have an extended conversation on the subject.

This isn't related to just our club. As Good2Go has pointed out other racing organizations have exactly the same problem. SOVREN, the vintage racing group out of Seattle, is begging for volunteers to man the circuit in their latest newsletter. They have an even bigger problem in this regard than does SCCBC. And, they do help to defray people's expenses, so that's not necessarily the complete answer.

Hopefully folks will chime in with even more input. We need to enlarge our volunteer base somehow.

Thank you

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Bob_Williams

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #13 - Jun 26^th, 2013 at 8:15am

and......with only a few more w/e events remaining for this year......the season will be over, and we'll be servicing this topic next year, AGAIN. and so on. etc.
Let's have a casual get together with some order Grin

, (had to do it)
.....an agenda, folks from the existing volunteer group, kick around some REAL ideas and suggestions, have a plan together, implement it. DONE. This SHOULDN'T be difficult.

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Lynn Rimmer

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Re: I hope this doesn't stir things up to much, but...
Reply #14 - Jun 26^th, 2013 at 8:25am

Just to clarify Good2Go......is actually Lynn Rimmer President of META
I should change my screen name.

And yes Mike, we need more dialogue on this. Most people know what the volunteer support base is dealing with and needing. Yes, the turns are stretched but the administrative end of things is not a picnic either.

Who are the drivers out there that can brainstorm and be creative in this regards? We don't volunteer without them, but they, in turn, can't race without us. We are all segments of the same really big pie chart.

Mike, if you notice though how many people have posted here as versus how many times this post has been read???? Is there too much apathy out there? Or is it going to be a continuing problem of 10% of the members doing 90% of the work until we all burn out and have had enough?

If you are a member of a club/organization, what have you done for them? How involved are you or how involved are you willing to get? Have you ever thought about your reasons behind joining that particular club?

I would love to see some drivers come to the META meeting and give us some input. What do you need, how things can maybe work better from their point of view. We really never get a chance to hear from the drivers, and face it, that's who we are out there for.
7:30 tonight at the ABC Restaurant at 153rd Street and Fraser Highway in Surrey.

It might be a start.

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