by Tom Fisk

With a break in the action since the last Tonneau article, I thought I would take this opportunity to let the general membership know about the state of the Solo II program... for those of you who participate in Solo II, most of the information should be well known. In the September issue of The Tonneau, Norm Johnson asked if "Solo II" was listening about what we can learn from the Rally community, and I guess in a way this is a response to Norm.

Since I have joined the Solo II program as co-chair, and now as chair, we have worked very hard to make sure that the Solo II program has a good foundation; in the case of Solo II, that means that we have an active group of participants who are competing for the championship. Over the last few years, we have seen an increase in the number of year-end award winners for the championship. I think, in the end, this is a good indication of the overall health of the Solo II program.

Besides the number of year-end award winners, we have also seen an increase in the overall number of competitors. Last year, on average, we had 35 competitors per event. This year we have had an average of 40 competitors per event. Many of the new competitors we are seeing are novices to Solo II, which also means that we have been attracting those who haven’t participated in the sport before. At the Rochester Solo II event, we had 10 novices. This year, we started the mentorship program (like many other of the LOL race programs) to help these novices understand and enjoy the sport, and to hopefully come back and participate again. I think it has worked in making our Solo II program more "novice friendly" and also in improving the overall camaraderie of the participants.

We have also added events to the calendar. This year we added Rochester as a new event. In addition, we enjoy support from our affiliated clubs in Mankato, LaCrosse, and Sioux Falls.

Now if you compare this to other autocross clubs, we certainly don’t have the turnout that some of the other clubs have (I have heard up to 140 competitors at an event). While some clubs strive for this, I don’t think our club is targeting these type of events. Many of the other clubs only cater to the Twin Cities autocrosser. It is important to remember that our Solo II program is like the rest of the SCCA racing venues; we try to give members across the region a chance to participate in Solo II by bringing the program closer to them.
All in all, I think our Solo II program is doing very well. Does this mean we don’t have issues? Not hardly...right off-hand I can tell you that we would really like a series sponsor, we could use new timing equipment, and there are some things we could do better organizationally. If these things seem like big issues to those inside or outside of the Solo II program, I am certainly willing to listen to any suggestions. Finally, I would like to remind everyone that our club is a volunteer organization, and we should spend more time patting each other on the back rather than complaining. I think it would do wonders for the club.

Until next month!

Tom.

Copyright 1998, Land O'Lakes Region.
Last revised: October 3, 1998