How much are track days? Can we do better?

At the moment it is Goodwood or nothing, although if it works out I'll happily do more of them in different places.


More questions:


How long do people expect to be on track? Would three 20 minute sessions work for people?

105db or is 98db okay for most people?



Just trying to keep the barrier for entry as low as possible.

You can do proper motorsport in your standard road car for a lot cheaper than a track day. I do Motorkhanas at Pembrey motorsport centre. For £30 you can have 6 competitive runs. It's not high speed stuff but it is quick and most important a hell of a lot of fun. I use my mk1 escort but the most popular car by far is the mx5. It's like an auto test but on a lot bigger scale using the whole track and some of the surrounding runways too.

well Pembrey is the other side of nowhere!

When you say "proper" motorsport, what exactly do you mean? Proper motorsport to me is governed by the blue book (FIA?) and beset with expensive to comply with regs about the car and the driver and what you wear and which sort of crash helmet you need to buy!
The TR club days at CC are meant to promote their Sprint/hillclimb championship which IS so regulated. I looked into it and it was going to cost me over a grand in licensing, clothes, shoes, helmet, roll cage, fire suppression, other cheaper car mods etc then up to £100 a day + travel expenses to do half a dozen 1-2 minute laps or runs at a hill. Which struck me as expensive!

Steve

A few years ago the MSA realised the entries in motorsport were on a down turn. They asked the question what can be done to combat this. Like you say the MSA have brought in so many rules for this type of sport and that type of sport that it is prohibitive. You build a car for one thing and that's the only thing you can use it for. What if you could have a genre of motorsport where all (ok most) cars would be welcome. To do an auto test none of the motorsport parafanalia is required. Motorkhanas are basically an auto test but expanded. Auto test rules are that you must be able to see the whole track from the start and the car must be standard production.

My brother spoke to the MSA and forwarded an idea of the Motorkhana where standard production cars, road rally cars, juniors (14 year old and 1400cc), stage rally cars (with MSA log book) hill climb cars (with MSA logbook) can all compete at the same event in their relative class. A helmet is not necessary but as a club we stipulate that one must be worn. Cars leave every minute where there is only one car on track at an auto test

The track is very well marshalled and all emergency equipment is too hand should there be any insidents.

As with auto tests there is no fire proof kit, in date seats or belts.

There is a manoeuvre every (I think) 100metres but the course is much bigger lasting around 3.5 mins instead of about 0.5 mins. Usually we do about 5,6,or 7 runs dependant on the size of the track and break downs stopping play for recovery.

There are 60 entries and we usually do two separate days so there are 120 places up for grabs. Grids are usually full.

It is an experimental motorsport that the MSA is trialing and only our motor club is aloud to do it at the moment.

As for Pembrey being the other side of nowhere, in don't understand what you mean as it's only 15 minutes down the road? You need to move .

Have done a couple of the PPC magazine track sessions at mallory Park when they had their own car show, from memory each session was around £20 for 15 minutes. Very good fun and about the right amount of track time to keep concentration. A friend of mine, Trigg, organises track days at Castle Coombe, those days are around £150 for an open pit lane set up, works fairly well but obviously you can get issues when people want to get on track at the same time as others are going around enjoying themselves for 45 minutes at a time! From a personal point of view, timed sessions are easier to police as everyone knows where they stand

Goodwood - defo yes
If only open to RR - defo yes (hopefully mean minimal idiots on track)
Sessions would be fine as my car wouldn't cope for that long anyway!
I'd pay between £100 and £150 for a full day of something like this

Another one in favour of Evening sessions.

The best track days I have done include all day Pitlanes and Half day track days. Sure, the "taster" 30 minute track days are cheap but IMO it also shows.

I did a cheap 20 minute session at Castle Combe in the Clio during a Forge Action day. Not only were we packed like Sardines onto a track, I could not really take the Clio anywhere near it's potential, and of course there were people breaking rules left right and centre (like the no overtake on corners and 2 cars passing a slow car, but of course, one would be on the wrong side). It really was not fun TBH.

The Pistonheads Sunday Service wasn't too bad in comparison which was much of the same at Silverstone, but again it was a little crowded. The fact that my then Escort ended up destroying the session for everyone, as well as my day entirely (the car threw oil out on right hand bends) didn't help matters. A 30 minute session became a slidey 15 minute session for others, and of course I couldn't book a later session as they had all sold out.

Cadwell was superb for the full day in November. The numbers were half decent, most drivers were compliant and there was no real hotheadedness present, despite there being some pretty powerful stuff present.

As discussed Goodwood don't run open pit lane. Normally 5 or 10 cars on the track each time. I prefer Open Pit stuff but oh well. 3x 20 minute sessions does seam a bit lean though.
Other things to consider are to employ an instructor or two for the day to give tips, you can also sell them to come out in a car for a session for roughly an extra £20 or so. I can put you in touch with some good ARDS instructors if need be.

£30-35 per 20min session sounds fair to me. Trackdays at decent tracks don't come cheap. I'd say Goodwood is a decent track just because of its heritage.

At retrokings we paid £20 for 15mins which I thought was a bargain.

Openpitlane I'd be expecting to pay alot more for a whole day but like you say it won't happen. Id like to have atleast 3-4 sessions tho. Its a fair treck for alot of people so would rather do a day than an evening.