As a spectator for more than 15 years at the festival I note the following:
1. Crowd size has been diminishing steadily for the last 2-3 years. The
past 2 years
have had some really nasty weather that could be blamed for that, but
this
year's weather was good overall.
2. Concours participation was down about 2/3 from previous years. No
Shelbys
and no Vipers. Participation could be upped considerably by removing
the $50
entry fee. On Sunday, the car show and flea market are pretty much
the whole show. It seems to me that spectating on Sunday is
going to be reduced
if the car show shrinks so dramatically.
3. For me, the scale is starting to tip towards newer cars than I'm
interested in.
I like the production cars from 50s -70s. Maybe I'm getting older,
but it
bothers me to see IMSA cars racing as "vintage". Doesn't seem that
long
ago that I was watching these cars race at Sebring. And who thinks
anyone is interested in watching NASCAR vehicles during this event?
4. Again, the "little guy" appears to be getting the short straw. Flea
market
spaces went up from $100 to $200. A lot of vendors were complaining
and
there was a notable absence of the guy who was cleaning out his
garage/basement of parts in favor of the commercial
vendors. Plenty of
spectators come primarily for the flea market and are going to be
turned off if the parts they find are already available by catalog.
5. Same thing with the "little guy" racers. Seems to me participation in
the 50's -70's production car races were down. I noticed some of
the "regulars" absent and heard some talk that increasing entry fees
was one of the reasons.
6. No featured marque this year accompanied by a "name" associated with
the marque.
7. Addition of auction on Sunday was great idea. I don't know how it
compared
to other auctions, but it seemed that a bunch of cars didn't make
their
reserve. There did seem to be some genuine bargains for
bottom-feeders
though.
8. Event T-shirt stunk. (Talk about nitpicking). Again, focus on the
newer cars made the shirt look like one I could pick up for the
Memorial Day event.
Sounds like I had a miserable weekend, but I didn't. As usual, I had a great
time. It's just that I love this event and hate to see it's essence
diminished by a change in focus.
Rick
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