Pre-race meet the drivers for the divisions, I was at Kawartha and it seemed liked the fans really enjoyed the drivers walking around on thier side. Meet the drivers has always been a good crowd draw at Flamboro, as a matter of fact it's usally thier best nights for fan attendance

i like how they do the fan ride along nights

i like how they do the fan ride along nights

That would be cool

I love these kinds of threads.  🙂

Now you know I'm a Delaware homer, and I make no apologies. From a fan-in-the-stands perspective, I think Delaware's doing it right and has been since the period where Kevin Bulmer was in charge. (2004-5?) There's not much radical change to make. The program is solid. But there's a few small tweeks that might make it better.

1. To expand on the earlier idea. We have an hour of dead time between 7 and 8. No reason we couldn't bring the cars out of the frontstretch for a meet and greet during that time. Maybe do one division per night...or what the heck, maybe all of them. 

2. One thing I thought was cool at Barrie last time I went (This was a few years back and may have been particular to that evening) was that every race car participated in the opening parade lap. It was like an opening wave lap to the fans. No biggie but it was kind of neat.

3. Start with your big guns. Do something at the start with the highest powered (read: loudest) division: 6 lap dash for cash, top 10 eliminator....something. Start loud and proud. "Gentlemen start your engines" for an 8 truck heat race lacks any kind of drama and actually has the opposite efffect that its supposed to.

4. I know the teams might not agree, but more features and less heats. 2009 was an incrdible year to be a Delaware fan. (once the rain stopped) and double features for LMs every night was pretty awesome.  Of course, they should be getting paid for the effort. I've long been an advocate of shorter features anyway. Do 20 laps each for your backup divisions and 25 for your main event, then invert the lead lap and do it all over again. Who needs heat races anyway?

5. Anything that allows the fans and drivers to acknowledge one another during the show. Actually this is a common theme with me. When the chaos guys drive up top after their race and sign autographs, thats gold. Wave laps are awesome, although they got overused a lot this year for some reason. The aforementioned idea of opening the frontstretch for autographs works. As does a victory lap after a feature. The driver basically acknowledges the fans - even the ones in the cheap seats, with the checkers and they acknowledge him back. (I've been singing this one from the rooftops for a couple of years now, and they still won't do it, so they either A: Think I'm all wet on the subject or B: they really need that extra 30 seconds after each feature for something else.)

6. Just another idea. What about if you had a small group of guys up top every night between 7 and 8? And I mean guys that are racing that night. Have them up top in their driving suits, signing autographs or doing sponsor giveaways...and work it out that everyone has to do it on at least one night over the course of the season. Then the kids can watch the guy race that they just chatted with. Instant fans.

Thats all I got for now. Please discuss.