NCR SCCA Board Meeting Minutes

June 21, 2023

Attendees: Kit Williams, Anna Crissman, James Shanks, Sam Fouse, Bruce Dover, John Bodnar, Chris Severt, Lee Hill, Megan Tyler late, Stephen Miller late, Rob Wilmoth very late

Guests: Chris Schimmel, Frank Killian, Mark Senior

1. The meeting was called to order at 7:00 pm by Anna Crissman, NCR RE
2. Motion to approve the minutes from the previous meeting (Shanks / Hill ). Approved.

Financial Report

Sam Fouse had sent the financial report to Kit Williams, Secretary.

As the details of our finances are confidential, NCR members who wish more information should contact either the Office Manager or any member of the Board of Directors. They are also invited to attend a Chapter Meeting, where such matters are discussed in detail.

VIP checks issued for April and May events continue to clear periodically, however there are no major outstanding accounts payable due at this time. Sam said it looked like our May road race may have made a small profit, and our June time trial may have been a small loss.

Chapter Reports

Lee Hill said the West chapter met at Elizabeth’s in Greensboro with a large number of attendees at 18. He said if they continue at this number they will need to find a different room to meet in. They discussed our updates with Rockingham and the SCCA Club Spec announcement. James Shanks had posted his Triangle Chapter report to the Google Drive. They had roughly 14 people and discussed the time trial that had just ended and the May road race. They also watched multiple in-car race videos, including a video from the VIR Patriot course. Their next meeting will be rescheduled to the 12th instead of the 5th due to the July 4th holiday. Chris Severt said the Cape Fear Chapter met with roughly 10 people. He said they are still looking for a different place to meet but they are making due for the time being. They had a new member attend and spend the meeting introducing him to the SCCA.

Old Business

1. NCCAR TT Debrief: Sam said we had a good TT at NCCAR, and we had a large number of people who signed up last minute, which put our numbers close to breaking even. The weather was great both days and we had a lot of new faces who seemed like they would come back to us in September. Anna said we had lots of drivers who signed up the day of the event and that other than one on track incident the event ran very smoothly. We already have registration open for our next TT in September and have made some slight changes to the registration fees, in the hope of encouraging people to sign up early instead of right at the last minute. Our relationship with NCCAR is continuing to grow and Sam True has been willing to work with us and improve his facility every time we have been there. Stephen Miller said he was there for a very short time but said it looked like we were running a very good event. Rob Wilmoth joined in late and said he had multiple responses to a survey he had sent out to participants. He said they had all said they had a great time at the event, but almost everyone has continued to comment on the gravel paddock and the effect of stones and rocks sticking to tires and causing cracked windshields. He said we will need to start sweeping the access road to the grid as well as sweeping the track as we currently do. Rob said we would also need to make sure we prioritize having competent grid workers in the future as we had multiple issues on Saturday with cars joining the track from the grid during a hot session. Rob wanted to offer passenger rides during the worker session to certain volunteers on a limited basis. This was discussed at length from both a logistics and safety standard. We felt that offering this on a very limited basis to volunteers who want to go out on track but do not want to or cannot go out and drive themselves. The goal will be to avoid this becoming a slippery slope where passenger rides become something that our attendees would do. This will continue to be discussed but we felt that offering more things that can entice our volunteers to come out to our time trials will be a huge benefit to us.

New Business

1. Certifying Track for Road Racing: Stephen Miller wanted to get the approval of the Board to reach out to a track inspector to come out and look at both Rockingham and NCCAR. With the changes in direction that Rockingham has taken in recent months, Stephen feels like we are getting very close to being able to have events at Rockingham. Stephen also said that the track inspector he is looking into contacting is already familiar with NCCAR and may be able to look at both tracks at the same time. Anna said she felt that we would need to go through the SCCA before we can initiate a track inspection, which Stephen confirmed was correct. Stephen is hoping to get a list of any changes that would need to be made to the tracks before we do the official track inspection through the SCCA. The Board was in agreement that Stephen should go forward so that we can get a clear picture of what we will need to do to open up some more options for regional road racing.
2. AutoX Scheduling: Mark Senior brought up an issue that the Tarheel Sports Car Club is planning to have an event in Raleigh at the PNC Arena on the same date as our August NCCAR autocross. The dates available to Tarheel have just become available and they don’t have much flexibility. Kit brought up that autocross event conflicts have happened every year for at least the last 6 years and it is an unfortunate reality of autocrossing with 5 different clubs in the same state. Mark said Tarheel will likely need to limit their number of attendees due to this being their first event at PNC Arena. We will pass this info on to the Solo team but this is just something they will have to do the best they can with.

Mark said he has been in touch with VIR regarding trying to work out the details of what the plan is for 2024. We still have not been given details as to how they are implementing their plan to replace our volunteer flaggers next year. We have no idea if they are going to cover all of the volunteer positions, if they will cover Grid and Pit as well, how this will work with equipment and radios, etc. Mark is planning to meet with VIR soon and will update us when he has gotten up with them.

Anna said we are already working on dates and scheduling for 2024. There is a SEDiv area meeting coming up next month that will have some discussion about preliminary dates for the division. Anna said we will need to have the details on VIR’s plans for 2024 going forward before we can truly start working on our schedule. Mark said VIR is pushing hard for all renters to rent a three day weekend from the track. He felt this would make it more difficult to give our track date to SCCA National for their time trial program.

Rob Wilmoth said he had a new update from Rockingham. He talked to Kim, the current track manager, who felt they had gotten the track ready for track events on the Roval course. They have built multiple tire bundles to the specifications that we sent them. Rob said there is a group running an event there this weekend and he is going to get feedback from people who attend the event as far as how ready the track is for an event on the roval. Rob is trying to find a way to get to the track to see the event this weekend first-hand. Rob said the track has also offered a day at the track to Racing for ALS, who are planning to make use of that day. Rob felt that if the track has built tire bundles correctly to our specs, they should be ready to host a time trial type event.

Rob said for the upcoming Racing for ALS event at VIR, Dave’s Race, anyone from NCR was welcome to attend as spectating will be free. He also said Racing for ALS has recently gone over the $1,000,000 raised and donated threshold. Rob will be offering ride-alongs during the event, and NCR is also allowing them to use the Speed Suite during the event.

Motion to adjourn (Wilmoth/Shanks). Approved at 8:02pm

Please note that all NCR members are welcome to attend NCR Board of Directors meetings.

If any member should have a question about the Region or its activities, please contact the Office Manager or any member of the Board.

Submitted by Secretary Kit Williams