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Last night both shows for Wheatland paid $6000 to win,3000,2000,1500 for fourth and $600 to start. Cedar USA Nationals is $6000 to win Thursday, nothing Friday as it’s 2 sets of heats to qualify for Saturday. Many if not all these shows are set up this way. No wonder cars stay home it’s ridiculous. Prelim nights should pay $10,000 to win and $1000 to start as they are still charging $30 tp $35 in the grandstand and pit passes for the drives and crew are the same.
That could be taken a step further if you consider that the price of everything involved in this sport has gone up (including ticket prices), while the payouts have generally stayed the same for at least 20 years. Just recently Lucas Oil races have bumped up their purses and the WoO followed suit this year, but other than that the pay structure across the sport has remained unchanged. The Summernationals have actually lowered purses slightly at times (they paid a minimum of $6,000 to win at some points). Tracks that still run weekly late models like Farmer City, Tri-City, and I-55 and still pay in the $1,000 to $1,200 range are slowly losing late models for weekly shows. I agree with you, but the payout situation seems to be across the board and not just prelim nights for big shows.
The Prelim nights for the Show-Me weekend are designed as the regional series MLRA purses, which is what they were designed for in the first place not as National Tour events. Cowboy was the co-owner of the MLRA until selling to Lucas in 2012. The Gibson's started the Show-Me at West Plains.
This is right on. History copy and pasted from the MLRA website:Quote:
Originally Posted by slideiton
In October of 2012, Lucas Oil Products announced the purchase of the Lucas Oil MLRA from Allen (Cowboy) and Harriett Chancellor. For sixteen years prior, both Harriett and Cowboy had been at the helm of the nation's second longest, continually operating, Dirt Late Model sanction.
"I've enjoyed it, we both have," commented Harriett on their time spent running the series. "Hopefully we've done it some good too. We really had to work at it year round. It isn't just a summer thing for us. We met a lot of fantastic people along the way too."
The Chancellors inherited a series void of a title sponsor following the 1996 season, and quickly brought on O'Reilly Auto Parts. Later they partnered with Lucas Oil Products, first as a presenting sponsor, then as the title sponsor for three seasons.
In April of 2014, Allen Chancellor passed away when he succumbed to a short illness. To honor the "Cowboy" (as he was affectionately known throughout the racing industry), Lucas Oil Speedway's Dan Robinson announced the inaugural "Cowboy Classic" to kick off the annual Show-Me 100 event over Memorial Day weekend.
June 17-18-19 at the Mag, paying $5000, $5000 and $15,000, don't know the gate/pit prices or the start money, but we will be getting 3 nights of great SLM racing.