[rocksmoker]

Muley had a great post buried in the Arkansas Rides Marathon thread. So I thought I'd post up a new thread so that folks might actually be able to find this later.

Oh, and if you have a CMRA license (cheap and easy to get) Oak Hill is $75 and about 3 hrs away. And you'll OWN the track. Not a bad deal at all.

[ QUOTE ]
By Mule Madness:

www.hallettracing.com


some other good place to look for upcoming trackday dates are below

www.lonestartrackdays.com - local organizer based out of texas, no membership required, events usually on Mon. or Fri.
www.ridesmart.info - local organizer based out of texas, no membership required, events usually on Sat. and Sun. sometimes Mon. or Fri.
www.nesba.com - national orgainizer based out of pennsylvania, membership required, events vary
www.sportbiketracktime.com - national orgainizer based out of ohio, membership required, events vary


another good resource are the track websites. look at the track schedule and they'll list what event's have already been booked with that particular track. below is a list of tracks in our area.

Hallett Motor Racing Circut - about 6 hrs
Barber Motorsports Park - about 7 hrs
Heartland Park - about 9hrs
Texas World Speedway - about 10hrs

[/ QUOTE ]

I've done the RideSmart thing and I rate it highly. Usually at Cresson at the MotorSports Ranch, just south of Fort Worth, TX. You can either just do a track day ro get instructions from local racers (Ty Howard). Good guy and damned fast.

Lone Star Track Days almost exclusively do track days at Texas World, in College Station. It's an old NASCRAP track so its very big, wide, and flowing. Much bigger than most of the other tracks and the SLOWEST corner is about 70 mph. On a 600 you can be clocked coming off the front straight at about 160 or so. If you are used to the smaller and mort technical tracks this will blow your mind. Think Road Atlanta and you have it.

Kansas has a couple of tracks, there's a track in south Louisianna called Church of Speed.

There's a track in Nashville hosted by Ed Bargy Racing School. But I don't recommend a trip for 8 hrs to that track. Very, very, small - it could fit inside Hallett. But the amenities are awesome - but about the same as Cresson or Tx World.

Every motorcyclist should make the pigrimage to Barber. The museum alone is worth the drive. But they are absolute Nazis about the parking lot. If you spill fuel or oil on the lot you'll pay to have it cut out and repaired. Racers in WERA have complained loudly about racing there, so I don't think even WERA will be returning next year. The security guys hand out pieces of wood to put under your kick stands, and it gets worse from there.

But the track is great. The museum is awesome. The amenities are second to none. But I don't know about club racing there.

Anyway. There are lots of places to go track riding and if you only wanted to be a track junkie you could just about keep you weekend filled going to different track days around the region.

Naturally, some are better than others, but definately worth the time and $$$ IMHO - rather than getting popped or getting run over on the street.

j

 

[MuleMadness]

now what would be really nice is if some investor would put up the funds to have a road course built in arkansas. the facilities don't have to be real nice. hell, there doesn't ever really need to be any facilities other than restrooms and maybe even a paved area for a paddock area, it doesn't even need to be covered... :grin: something like oak hill...

 

[DynamiteTNT]

I got 80 acres.... hijack the bull dozers & asphalt trucks & "get 'er done". :waytogo:
Kathy

 

[MuleMadness]

sounds good to me... get me a topo map of your place and i'll start drawing up some track layouts... :grin:

 

[ahbe]

First off, great thread Rocksmoker; and thanx for all the links Tony. For a newbie like myself, this is the exact info I need. So, next question. If we had the land, how much money would it cost to put in a simple track like Tony mentioned? Is it something you could reasonably do with a few years of fund raisers? We are talking bare bones here. All we would really need was pavement. How reasonable of an idea is this?

 

[redelk]

[ QUOTE ]
MuleMadness said:
sounds good to me... get me a topo map of your place and i'll start drawing up some track layouts... :grin:

[/ QUOTE ]

You might need a little bit more than 80 acres. :smirk:

Hallett, which is about the most "compact" track on the CMRA circuit, takes up over 150 acres by itself. The "upside" is that all it's accomodations are located "inside" that area. The 1.7 mile Motorsport Ranch track in Cresson sits on 340 acres, but some of the buildings sit outside of the track area. The Barber complex with it's 2.3 mile track and museum sits on 750 acres. I'd figure that the track itself takes up around 200 of those 750 acres. It's obvious that a lot of research went into the design of the track at Barber. Just look at the track data at this link: Barber Track Maps and Data The Arc Length, Delta and Radius is shown for each curve, as well as the elevation. All critical factors in designing a course that is not only challanging, but realistic enough to actually navagate.

Admittedly, Oak Hill does not have a fraction of that level of research going into it's design. The same could likely be said for Hallett as well. But aspects outside the track area also must be considered as well. The most important would be the various runoff areas. Just ask Wayne Rainey about poorly designed runoffs. One would have to figure in the estimated speed and angle of approach for each runoff and include a buffer for the riders that will exceed those speeds and angles. In other words... MORE acres. :bawling:

Just guessing, asphalt costs alone would be at least $40K (depending on the compound) and that is if the ground was already prepared. Concrete could be up to six times that cost. Of course, that's figuring it at "driveway paving costs". Seeing as how the track surface needs have almost no surface irregularities to unsettle a suspension at a "bad moment" and a crown/camber that can allow of proper draining and have no puddling of water... those costs could easily go well past $250,000 in preparing the ground and laying down the surface. :shocked: That is if you could fit a 1.5 mile track on 80 acres. Odds are, it would be pushing it to go much further than a mile when it comes to figuring in the track runoffs and parking loading areas for a few friends with trailers and tents.

Basically, that is why we don't have any decent tracks here in Arkansas. :frown: Building even a small "open to the public" road course track would take millions in not just building costs, but in meeting all the various regulations for federal, state and local agencies. Not to mention liability insurace costs. Even if all types of riders (HOG, Gold Wing, Cruisers, etc.) attended every event or open track day, it's doubtful it could be profitable within a reasonable time frame. Plus the upkeep would be brutal. :808908-wtf:

On the OTHER HAND.... a lil' hare scrambles course would be COOL! :waytogo:

 

[DynamiteTNT]

Pretty true Sherm... already checked into it & the track we want, without any facility costs is 3.5 mil. Ahhh... but dreams and wishes are free. :grin:

However... someone show up with the green & make me an offer... the possibility is there.
Kathy

 

[ahbe]

Well, thanx for the break down redelk. The thought was nice anyway. Hey, I'll tell you what. If I win the lottery I'll build a track here in central Arkansas. I figure it should only take about 500 million to build a MotoGP calaber track. Hey, forget Laguna Seca, Little Rock Arkanasas is where it's at! :grin: The sad part is, you could win the lottary at a record level, dump all your money into a track, and then go broke because you couldn't afford upkeep/insurance.

Here's another question I have, redelk mentioned the need for a track to be smoth so you don't unsettle the suspension at the wrong time. Well, I spent all last evening wondering through all the links Tony posted. Hallet doesn't look all that smooth at all! In fact 341 looks to have a better surface then Hallet. That thing is patched all over the place. Can someone who's ridden there tell me, is it as bad as the pictures/movies make it look? /wwwthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif

 

[DynamiteTNT]

It is that bad... IMHO.

Please quit the 341 reference on these big sites... just use AR Gap. Let's keep that specific favorite pc. of hwy. a bit more private for us AR Gap riders like y'all and me. That's part of the reason for the name. So we can all type where we are going without really telling others where to go. Get my drift? :rolling:

That is also one reason Arild & I started the AR Gap website, was to get y'all over there to stop the national publicity of our local paradise. (that hasn't worked yet though) I don't think y'all want the over popullated Deals Gap situation with LEO, chopper patrols, cruisers and all, do ya? Same thing with the AR Grand Canyon... aka our other favorite pc. of local asphalt which 1 person on this site even uses as his name. (no offense, OK)

Discretion on big national sites can be a valued asset for us locals for some years to come. Just my :2cents:
Kathy

 

[tuzem]

Too late perhaps? I've seen the GAP at a few magazines already. Man, it's going to suck for me when I move to Florida... I'll be riding on sport-touring tires /wwwthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif .... and dodge old fart cagers! You know... old lady with the terminator goggles who's going 45mph regardless of the speed limits!

 

[DynamiteTNT]

Not to mention them old ladies in their 80's, like my godmother that lives there, and is "technically blind" and I took her keys away from her last year and she finally gave in and gave her car away and don't drive any more. At least I cleaned the roads for ya of 1 old lady that shouldn't have been driving for the last 5 years. But watch out... there are more of them living in that area! :help:

 

[MuleMadness]

[ QUOTE ]
ahbe said:
... Here's another question I have, redelk mentioned the need for a track to be smoth so you don't unsettle the suspension at the wrong time. Well, I spent all last evening wondering through all the links Tony posted. Hallet doesn't look all that smooth at all! In fact 341 looks to have a better surface then Hallet. That thing is patched all over the place. Can someone who's ridden there tell me, is it as bad as the pictures/movies make it look? /wwwthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

it is true the optimal track would me smooth as silk. however, much like people, one of the things that give a track character are it's little imprefections. there are several sections of hallett that are relatively rough, but that's what makes the track fun. as it was told to me, ty howard, the current lap record holder, said that one of the great things about the cracks and patched sections of hallett is that it give you reference points. you know to can use this crack as a brake marker and pick your line between those two pieces of patch work etc...

some tracks are very smooth and some tracks are not. that's part of the game. aswell as setting up the proper supension settings for specific tracks. at the novice to begining-intermediate levels, it is not absoulutely crucial to have your supsension setup exactly, eventhough it does help. the main goal at that stage of your introduction is to get a feel for the overall track experience. learning proper body position, throttle control, braking technique, and so on... it would be fair to say that importance of suspension settings are directly proportional to a riders speeds and lap times, and a good rider can ride on any surface...

the point to all my ramblings is, yes, hallett has its rough spots and yes, ideally they shouldn't be there (but then again life is less than ideal at times). however, you shouldn't be intemdated or afraid of less than ideal surface conditions. this is not to be confused to mean that you can go balls to the wall. rather, you should respect the fact the surface conditions are less than ideal and compensate for them and try to find a way around it...

i hope i haven't come across to preachy. it's late, and i am tired... :crazy:

 

[redelk]

If you want to talk about "less than ideal", nothing beat probably the most fun track in the CMRA circuit....

OAK HILL!

 

[rocksmoker]

It's a common saying - if you can go fast at Oak Hill you can go fast about anywhere.

It's still one of Nicky Haden's favorite tracks. :laugh:

 

[MuleMadness]

Aswell as Colin Edwards... :grin: