Costs of getting on the track

The cost related to getting on the track for track days, and especially for racing, can escalate very quickly to outragous levels if you don't keep an eye on yourself. As an example the average length of time a racer lasts in the racing organization I race with is about 3 seasons, the prime reason for that is definately money. I personally dug such a huge hole financially (due to going racing) back in the late 90's that I was very near filing for bankruptcy - had I not been someone who is very against bankruptcy I probably would have done it. To this day (2006) I still owe money on credit cards from my racing in the late 90's, that should give you an idea how massive my debt really was! Since going racing by doing it "the wrong way" financially back in the 90's, I have learned how to do it "the correct way". I personally pay for everything to go racing without using credit anymore, unless an absolute emergency like travel problems or unexpected expense like getting a flat tire on my bike or suddenly not being able to share travel and hotel costs with someone else who planned on going racing with you, and then didn't go.

Probably the best advice I can give someone looking to get out on the track is to PAY CASH FOR EVERYTHING! I suggest looking at all your expenses per month and figuring out where ALL your money goes (bills, food, gas, entertainment, etc.) and see exactly how much money you realistically have left over to get out on the track. I tell people to figure out how much money can they realistically live without EVERY paycheck during the ENTIRE year. As an example, if that number is $50 per week you would have $2500 per year to spend on your track time (figuring in 2 weeks of missed work for whatever). If you plan on getting on the track in the near future I would highly suggest getting a seperate checking account with a Visa or Mastercard check card just for your track expenses, in this topic I will call this your "RACING ACCOUNT". You should start immediately depositing the amount you figured you could live without every week and see if you truely can live without it, EVERY WEEK!

Now that you know you have $2500 to spend you should figure out where you want to spend that money. Let's say that the track days your looking at doing are $175 per day, gas for your bike $25 (pump gas, not race fuel), your travel expenses (gas) round trip are $75, you're planing to stay in a hotel the night before the events - $65, and you have to buy a set of decent tires for $300. Since you should be able to use those tires for a season (unless your REALLY fast) it's a one time expense for that season, if you need tires more often this will consume your available money out of your racing account very fast. A variable that many people miss in the cost equation is lost time from work if they go to a track day that is on a normal day they work. Basically you need to figure out what your lost TAKE HOME wages are for that day and deduct it from your racing account, this is because your not going to magically have that money that you normally have every week for your bills if you take time off work. This may seem overly obvious, but it's missed by many people and is a variable that keeps putting you further and further in the hole financially if you don't include it. Think of it like this, every day you miss from work (that you don't get paid for) means you make that much less money that year, on top of that your spending quite a bit of money on that day so the financial effects are very rapid.

Using the example costs above, and a lost TAKE HOME wage of $100 per day, you can figure the number of track days you can go to (on work days) as follows (remember this is purely an example and your costs will vary from this):

EXPENSES PER EVENT THAT ARE ON A DAY YOU NORMALLY WORK
$100 lost wages
$175 track day fees
$ 25 gas for your bike
$ 75 travel costs
$ 65 hotel cost
$440 total cost per event (for this example only!)
x5 events
$2200 total for 5 events

RACING ACCOUNT
$2500 starting balance
- $300 tires
$2200
-$2200 cost of 5 track day events (example only!)
$0 Balance

In this example there are ways you could save money and better use your money, I will give some examples. If you can find just 1 other person to share expenses with your costs would drop in the above example by $350 by splitting hotel and travel costs for 5 individual events. Another possibility is to camp at the track, which hopefully would be free or minimal cost, this would save you another $162.50 in this example if splitting expenses with someone. Adding these things together you could save $512.50 per season just by splitting expenses with 1 person and camping at the track. That's money that could go toward another track day, new tires, or just save it for future track time or better equipment. A couple other things you can do to save money are to attend 2 track days in a row (this saves money by eliminating extra travel costs of attending 2 seperate days), you can also only attend track days that are held on days that you normally don't work, this will eliminate the lost wages part of the equation.

Actual racing is somewhat of a different animal, it's more expensive and requires dedication if you want to compete in a full season. This also normally requires that you take time off work to attend at least some of the races that are thruout your region. I live in an almost ideal location for my racing region (Northern Illinois), I can make it to every track in the Midwest region by leaving after I get off of work and arriving by 2am at the furthest destination I go to (which is Heartland Park in Topeka, Kansas). This allows me to miss the least amount of days off work, and still be able to get some sleep before morning registration and practice at the track, that trip is over 500 miles each way and takes me a little over 8 hours. This is the kind of thing you get use to doing as a motorcycle roadracer, travel is a requirement and you have to learn to enjoy it or it will probably become a boat anchor to your racing enjoyment. This is one of the big differences between track days and racing, the amount of travel you will be doing and the costs associated with it are substaintially more than most track day riders are willing to invest. An example of this is what many racers consider a "close event", which I hear often times as an event that is within a 5-6 hour drive each way, to which I agree. I have heard track day riders complaining so many times of having to drive 2 hours (or less) to go to a track day, that to me is REALLY CLOSE, but I suppose it's all relative to what your use to. A variable that kinda sucks with racing is the fact that the practice day is generally the day before the event and it falls on a work day (usually Friday), so you lose your wage, plus the cost of the practice day ($80 at Blackhawk Farms), plus the gate fee. If you don't do the practice day your practice time will be limited usually to 1-3 short practice sessions before the races each day, depending on the event.

Racing expenses include the figures I gave previously about track days, but at elevated rates, and include a few more costs. The following is a typical CONSERVATIVE race weekend for me going alone to an average track that is 5-6 hours away while racing with CCS, not attending the Friday practice day, not buying race tires, and missing work Saturday.

$100 lost wages
$175 travel costs
$130 hotel
$40 race fuel (mild race fuel with conservative 50/50 mix with pump gas)
$25 gate fee
$190 race entry fees
$660 TOTAL

That $660 would get me (2) 15 minute practice sessions on Saturday and Sunday morning and (4) 16-20 mile sprint races over the course of the event for a total of ( sessions on the track. This is an example of me racing very conservatively and being in the slower 1/2 of the racers.

As an example of what it was like when I ran with the fast guys I have to increase the costs quite a bit. The added costs would include actual race fuel at about $16 PER GALLON, a set of race tires per event, missed wages on Friday to do the practice day and it's added cost as well, and racing 2 more classes for the event. This would put me at a PER EVENT cost of apx. $1200! Now of course I can save money as well by buddying up with another racer to split costs, but this doesn't always happen and the end result is still quite alot of money.

I certainly don't want to scare people away from racing or track days by revealing this information, instead I want to arm you with the knowledge of what your getting into and to prepare yourself accordingly. The "Racing Account" I spoke of earlier is probably one of the best things you can do to last in this sport because it doesn't leave you caught unexpectedly with massive expenses you didn't anticipate ahead of time. I have been to the depths of credit Hell personally and I can tell you it's not an enjoyable place to be, anything you can do to prevent even begining down that road is highly advised. I can tell you that since I switched to "paying as I go" for all my racing expenses I have alot less stress, and the feeling of not having ANY racing debt at all at the end of the race season is a great feeling as well! Another great feature is the record keeping capability of having all your racing related stuff on an account that you have a record of every month, especially if your going to try and deduct your expenses from taxes (don't ask me how). Figure out what you can afford, figure out what you NEED (as opposed to what you WANT) and what can be sacrificed to get on the track in what ever capacity you choose. Believe me that if you've never been on the track, and you have some experience riding a motorcycle, you will absolutely have a blast on a track. The feeling of being able to ride a sportbike like it's made to be ridden is an exhilirating experience that you won't soon forget, most likely you will be so anxious for the next time you can do it that it will drive you crazy waiting (that's what's already happened to us crazy track junkies! ).