News

Firstly; a massive thank you to all the drivers who have raced at DMS Model Car Club this year, it has been our most successful for many years with average attendance well up on last year and we have finally been able to clear the debts we sustained over the COVID shutdown and the costs of restarting the club.

Some Stats:

• Race meetings in 2024         49

• Attendees                           1169

• Average attendance              24 per meeting

• Club Members                     52 adult 4 juniors

• Payment methods                51% BACS, 25% Credit Card and 24% Cash

• Hall Fees                            75% of all costs

We introduced the ability to take credit cards late last year and it has taken off this year with a quarter of the race fees coming that way. It has increased our costs slightly as the credit facility adds a 1.7% fee to each sale. That said we know the convenience really helps some folks and we will continue to take cc payments.

Huge thanks to Peter Robelou; we now have this fabulous new web site where you can book in, look at your results from previous weeks races/series and even watch the races on video. This has been a long time coming and we hope to keep adding developing the site to include more content for club racers.

The club exists for the benefit of the members, we are a not-for-profit club with race fees and membership fees there to cover the costs of running the club. We charge enough so we can afford the hall rental, the gaffer tape we use for track builds and general admin costs. We also factor in a little extra so we can also afford to keep the track features in good repair. We have not had enough money to do this as much as we wanted until recently, as we have been repaying our debts, now they are clear we have started to replace the trunking and some jumps with more replacements coming over the next few weeks and months as we have time to build them.

We have faced increased costs with the school raising the cost of the hall by 11% from Sept on top of increases of 13% and 16% in the previous 2 years. We also have the costs of hosting the website and increased costs of accepting credit cards to factor in.

With all that in mind, we will be raising the race fees for 2025 to £10 for members and £15 for non-members. The membership rates will remain at £40 for adults and £30 for Juniors (under 16 @ Jan 1st, 2025).

Racing Notes: (a reminder)

Heat allocations - With increased numbers, the pace of the evening is quick, and we have found timed practice is the best way to make sure everyone gets a fair amount of track time to practice and allow us to reseed the racers for qualifying. This is particularly helpful when we see new racers whose ability we are not familiar with. You may on occasion find yourself in a heat you did not expect, please feel free to query with race control but we have a lot of racers with similar abilities and we update the ability rating after every race meeting so if you have a bad night one evening, you may find yourself down a heat the next meeting but equally if you have a few good nights, you will find yourself promoted to a higher heat.

Marshalling is critical for any RC race meeting, the rule is very simple, if you are racing, you MUST marshal, there is no exception for anyone. If you have broken your car and need to fix it, it is your responsibility to find someone to cover your marshalling point. Equally if you have a medical issue or reason you cannot marshal, please find someone to cover your marshalling duties. In some cases, we can move you to a less strenuous marshalling point, please ask race control. Once you run your heat/race, put your car down and go straight out to your marshalling point. From Jan 2025 every meeting we will put out cones with a number on from 1 to 8. You will have a race number on the heat list, that is your marshalling point for the practice heats, qualifying heats and finals.

Race etiquette is important to follow. We all make mistakes and crash into our fellow racers. If you do take someone out, stop and wait for them to get marshalled and get going again before you continue. We will not be refereeing races as in regionals and nationals, but race control reserves the right to apply time or lap penalties to persistent offenders.

If you cross over a track marker by accident, get back on track at the same place you went off the track, do not cut out sections of the track even if you wait for a period of time.

If you crash on the straight or run onto the straight from the infield by mistake, SHOUT loudly -  “STRAIGHT” so your fellow racers do not pile into you at high-speed breaking yours and their cars in the process. Once you are no longer in the way, shout “CLEAR”

Lastly while the race or heat is taking place you MUST stay on the rostrum. You should not step down until race control says the words “Race Over”. Other racers are still trying to complete their last lap, and it is unfair to distract them by stepping down before they have finished.

IMPORTANT

From the beginning of 2025 we will be requiring you to place your BRCA card in the red tin at race control when you book in. This has been voluntary so far in 2024 but will become mandatory for 2025. At the end of the evening after the track has been put away, we hold a draw using BRCA cards with the opportunity to win a £10 racing voucher (free race for members and a discount for non-members).

We usually have 24 to 32 people racing and if everyone helped to break the track down, roll up the carpets and put it all back in the cupboard, we would have it done in a few minutes. Unfortunately, we see a lot of folks disappearing as soon as their final or marshalling is done leaving the clearing up to the same handful of usual folks. We understand some of you have long trips home or work the next day or an early start, guess what, so do most of us. Please respect your fellow racers and help with the track breakdown, the prize draw is a way to give a bit of an incentive to staying.

Conclusion

Let us finish by saying that the Racing Notes are just reminders. The club is in excellent health with a great range of abilities of drivers from National level racers to first timers and you all race cleanly and respectfully nearly all the time 😊. To the regulars who build the track and break it down; you are awesome, we would not be able to offer so much track time without your help. Thank you from the three of us.

Please remember to bring your BRCA card to every meeting for the draw as we look forward to seeing you all in the new year.

Darren, Rich and Gareth