Short Track News is closing down….
OK, not really but a couple of times those words have been on my lips. I love local racing and do whatever I can to promote it. It’s been a huge part of my life. I started my first website in 1998 called Raceway Park News and it covered just Raceway Park. When that track closed down we started covering Grundy, Illiana and other stuff in the Chicagoland area. It’s been a lot of fun, a lot of good memories, a few struggles and a few headaches. Overall, I wouldn’t change a thing. Let me take that back. I would change one thing. I wish more people supported the site and helped keep it going.
Before I go any further I have to say if it wasn’t for a few great people this site wouldn’t still be here. Dave Gentile, his son Dave Jr. and Oval Engineering have been huge supporters of the site the last few years. Jimmy over at Auburn Supply and Tom at T&C Auto Repair have been with us since day one. Ronda from the Circle Restaurant, Tom from Plymouth Speedway, Ron from R1 Graphix, Helen & Barb from Jade Grafix, Dan at Lefthander Chassis and the guys from Racing Rod Ends and Rander Car have also supported us. Mick from M/R Racing Equipment and Brad from Bullet Proof Chassis are both located in Wisconsin and yet still find our site a valuable advertising outlet. As much time and effort I put into the site, it wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for these generous people. Please support them whenever you can.
I never set out to get rich doing a website like this. It was done to give fans and drivers a place to hang out at online. There are fees involved in doing a site like this. You need a domain name, web space, hosting and software to be able to do this. The free classifieds and ever popular forum board also need to be paid for on a yearly basis. The only thing I can’t put a price on is my time. A lot of time and effort go into the site and it’s almost to the point where I have to go in my own pocket to keep it going. When it got to that point, I had some thinking to do. Let the site go, pay for it out of pocket or come up with a new plan. I chose the third option. I can’t picture local racing without the site Short Track News around. To keep it going though I needed to make changes and need some help from you people out there.
I’m not Jerry Lewis and this isn’t a telethon but Short Track News is now taking donations to keep the site up and running. I noticed a lot of other sites out there doing the same thing. There is a donate button on the top of the home page. It’s linked through PayPal and is safe and secure to use. Over 100 million people have PayPal accounts and use them to make internet purchases every day. If you have a PayPal account you can donate that way. If not you can still donate to my PayPal account using a credit card without being a PayPal member. Any amount will be accepted and appreciated.
Another option is advertising. I’m not looking for a hand out but advertising on the site is more affordable then you think. I never understood why companies would buy a billboard at a local track for $500 when they only race 14-18 nights a season. You don’t get much exposure for your company that way. Others pay about half that to be in a race track program. Most tracks print less then 5,000 programs a year. We get more visitors then that in a week. The best part of supporting a website is we offer exposure 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. What good is your billboard doing you on a Tuesday night in March? It’s simple math if you ask me, yet programs are filled every year with 50+ ads while we struggle to get 10 people. Get great exposure for your company and help support a website that most of you come to on a daily basis. By all means, keep supporting the local racers and tracks. If you go to a track though 20 times a year and feel the need to support it I would hope people that come here 200 to 300 times a year would do the same thing. More info is on the “advertise” page.
Last but not least was Google Ads. I can place ads on the page that are racing related and hopefully suit my fans needs. If you see something you are interested in, by all means check it out. I also put Google search boxes on all the pages. It works just like the regular Google search. So if you ever need to look up anything on the web, do your search though Short Track News. I have other special offers on the site. If you ever need a website I can build you one. However, if you ever thought of doing one on your own then click on the Homestead banner on my site. They offer very affordable rates and easy to use software. Try it FREE for 30 days and see if it’s right for you before buying a package. Other offers include year long subscriptions to magazine like Stock Car Racing, Circle Track and Speedway Illustrated for a $1 per issue. Some are as low as $10 a year. A deal you can’t beat.
In order to make the site even more appealing to advertisers I decided that to make this work I needed to expand. If you check out the site it’s completely different with a little bit of a new look and a whole lot more information. Took a couple weeks to do everything new but I’m hoping to get enough support from the people that come here to make it worth it. I’ve been doing this 10 years (man how quickly time goes by) and hope to be doing this 10 more years. I hope you enjoy the changes.
Thanks for your time and consideration.
Happy Holidays,
Steve Bechtel
