Same as us.  Not sure where cost can be cut easily, though.  I've heard tires, but I'm not so sure... Up at North Bay we ran street tires and the way the track ate those, I'm not so sure the bill didn't add up about the same.

And if the answer is "go back to stock intakes and log manifolds"... That's dumb, because downgrading still costs money, and it's harder/more expensive to find used cast iron manifolds than it is headers these days.  And new ones cost more than headers.

Of course it's easy to say "increase the payouts" or "decrease the entry fee", but we don't run Delaware's books, either.  Plain and simple, we're looking at $200-$250 every Friday, factoring in fuel and tow expenses.  Three races a month, that means $600-750, and finding sponsors in this economy is getting to be impossible.  I have part sponsors, I have graphcs sponsors, but actual cash? Not happening.

So, unless you win every Feature, you're not close to breaking even.  😛

And as I've already mentioned, racing Friday nights is killing us, due to work schedules, and the crazy rush involved.  "Getting ready the night before" can only do so much.  I know I'm in the minority here, the poll Delaware did makes that clear, but it still doesn't help.  I grew up racing Sundays in North Bay, and it was really awesome spending all Saturday taking our time getting the car ready, and then waking up at 8 or 9 on a Sunday, having breakfast with the team, taking our time loading up the hauler, getting to the track around 11, and having 3 hours to unload, set up the car, practice, and get into race mode.  As opposed to rushing home from a tough day at work at 5:30, scrambling to get all the tools loaded, getting the truck on the trailer, rushing out to Delaware, probably getting in around a quarter to seven, unloading. barely making ONE Practice because we're rushing to set up, and then suddenly it's the driver's meeting.  That's just us though, clearly plenty of other racers don't mind it.  Maybe a lot of you guys have Fridays off or something?  ???

Obviously that's not something Delaware can fix though, unless we suddenly started race night at 10 pm.  So it's just something we have to try our best to deal with.

EDIT: anyway, don't take this as whining, every racer has to do what they have to do to find money to race, this isn't a "boo-hoo why me" rant.  Just explaining why we couldn't make it out this season.  It came down to blowing tons of money on racing, or blowing a fair bit of money on house renovations and, for the first time in years, a decent vacation for the me and the wife.  The wife won this round.  😀

if the cost is the same or close to a SS why run one...with an SS you can atleast race other tracks...i kno a few guys with trucks just sitting behind garages and they all say the cost and you can only run them one place, so theyve gone to SS or minis...plus all the money you put into one and then have a hard time selling to move up so they just move up or move on instead...its too bad cuz they were a great class to watch..

I guess if we had the answers we would be running tracks  😉 So I guess questions are all I have.

If you made trucks run for race purses only and forget about championship payouts would that help? If the purses were increased of course. The more trucks that run the higher the payout maybe? Fewer races / higher payouts? Make every race be like the only race? Or the championship for the trophy and bragging rights only with no points fund? Run the trucks on Saturdays with Enduro? (personally I don't like this option as I think the Trucks need to be on the regular race night)Delaware run on Saturday instead of Friday with Enduro on Sundays? Lots of argument for and against that I know. Change the rules so the truck chassis are the same as SS so a truck could be rebodied to move to SS or even move from SS to trucks if someone wanted to do that and then the money and time put into the truck is worth something since as someone else said there isn't anywhere else that runs trucks? I was going to say move up to SS but I thinlk the trucks are a good enough division to stand on their own if numbers increase.

Lots of different questions and I freely admit I don't have any answers.

I agree that this division is too good and too fun to watch to let die.

Or are we seeing a problem where none exists and the low numbers in trucks is a cyclical thing and will come back again?

I guess if we had the answers we would be running tracks  😉 So I guess questions are all I have.

If you made trucks run for race purses only and forget about championship payouts would that help? If the purses were increased of course. The more trucks that run the higher the payout maybe? Fewer races / higher payouts? Make every race be like the only race? Or the championship for the trophy and bragging rights only with no points fund? Run the trucks on Saturdays with Enduro? (personally I don't like this option as I think the Trucks need to be on the regular race night)Delaware run on Saturday instead of Friday with Enduro on Sundays? Lots of argument for and against that I know. Change the rules so the truck chassis are the same as SS so a truck could be rebodied to move to SS or even move from SS to trucks if someone wanted to do that and then the money and time put into the truck is worth something since as someone else said there isn't anywhere else that runs trucks? I was going to say move up to SS but I thinlk the trucks are a good enough division to stand on their own if numbers increase.

Oooooooh would I love it if we ran only Saturdays.  8)  My team would be much more likely to make it to every race.  Can't speak for everyone else though.

Basically you're suggesting what they do with the Mods right now.  If it was money only, maybe 5-6 races a season, but a bit more money on the payout, that might entice some of us to plan for those "big events."

I don't like the idea of a Truck body on a Super Stock.  I see the reasoning and that's kinda cool, but the "soul" of the series is to have a big, nose-heavy truck with leaf springs, and an automatic.  (SS requires manual right now, I don't think a lot of us would want to junk our drivetrains to do it.)

If it's gonna be THAT way, might as well do what every other "Truck" class does, and just run fibreglass bodies on a tube chassis.  😉

The expense is getting that way, it would almost be cheaper, less time consuming to have a tube chassis (camaro clip like superstock) with a 1500-2000$ body, and they would look a hell of a lot nicer. These things are not an entry level class anymore and never will be again, if you want to learn the track and what not thats what enduro is for now. Most guyst run 1:1 automatics anyhow, so slapping a clutch in with a standard geared 1:1 wouldn't cause a lot of drivetrain remodeling, at least not for my truck anyhow.