There are several factors that have gone into us losing attendance. There's been issues with:
1. management of the USRCCA (Jason and Badger have their hands full with this site, but when they tried to hand the reigns over, the person taking over made us look like a laughing stock and lost us industry support from companies like ProLine forever). The USRCCA was at it's peak, and had showed incredible growth. We had the industry looking at us to be the next big thing, but the actions of one person killed it. With Fish in charge, it's been better, but he was handed a bit of a sinking ship.
2. top level competitors getting burned out and/or becoming a vendor, and leaving the hobby (best way to ensure you don't enjoy a hobby is let it become your job...it loses it's fun quickly, especially when you hear all the whining and bitching about your product from people who want to you give it to them for free).
3. Brian Parker (somebody very respected in the industry and our segment of RC's) leaving the USRCCA and forming his own comp format, rather than trying to introduce it as an option within the USRCCA. Not only did he go, but he took the date and venue for the West Coast Championships as the time for his Axialfest or whatever he called his big comp. I don't know if he was butt-hurt from not gaining partial control of USRCCA after Worlds 2009 or what, but he furthered the image that we are an unorganized group with drama and in-fighting.
4. Lack of industry support (alot of this has to do with what the mismanagement of Proline Worlds 2009 by King Bling...which included abusing his role as rules martial to run an illegal truck). After all, why should the industry provide major support for a segment of the hobby that appeared to be so unprofessionally managed. Somebody can't just walk into their local hobby shop and see comp rigs/kits on the shelf along with competitive upgrades.
One of the biggest factors, though, and the one that we can change moving forward, especially with the qualifiers, is the elitist attitude that has turned away the casual competitor. No, I'm not saying everybody should win, but the idea that courses need to be extremely tough has ruined the experience for so many up and coming and/or casual competitors.
On top of the thousands of dollars we already spent on the trucks, to go to a qualifier, they now need to take time off work, pay for a hotel room, meals on the road, gas, etc... All this to go to a comp, run 3-6 courses and be lucky to get through 1 or 2 gates per course. There's no satisfaction there.
So that guy ends up with a negative attitude toward the hobby in general. I, personally, took it as a goal that I wanted to get better so that I could finish more courses and place higher. However, many people that get into this hobby realize that they're not going to win. They're looking for a venue to run a truck and have fun. Our comp rigs, while impressive in what they're capable of doing, aren't a lot of fun to just run through the woods, so they look toward the competitions as the only time they really run them. If the only experience they have is frustration at only running 10' and 1 or 2 gates of a course, they're soon going to become frustrated and find something that gives them some satisfaction and feel of accomplishment.
Many of these guys moved on to the scalers. With a scaler, if they can't get through a section, they winch through. They cover 100 times as much ground and get the satisfaction of accomplishment of finishing the course. Even in racing, the slowest guy still gets to drive his laps.
Now, I've heard the argument several times calling these people out for having entitlement issues or expecting to be handed a win. There are a few like that, but for most, that's simply not the case. Often times, it's the guys who travel to the qualifiers and compete at the higher level that are organizing the comps, setting up the courses, and conveying the attitude that this is the level we need to keep the comps. Unfortunately, that makes everybody but the top level competitor feel like they don't stand a chance and that the hobby just isn't for them.
I've been preaching this point for the past few years, and it finally looks like people are taking notice, especially with the introduction of the Trail Class. If you want to keep people coming back, you have to give them a good experience. When it comes to courses, the course needs to be able to be finished by the majority of the competitors...especially at the qualifiers. Use bonus gates to separate the field. The better competitors will run cleaner and will have the challenge of the bonus gates to keep them feeling competitive at a higher level, yet the rest of the people will feel the accomplishment. Honestly, back when ECC used to get 120 drivers, I bet only 20-25 of them ever thought they had a chance of winning. The others were there for everything else it had to offer.
Let people feel like their money was well spent. Get them having fun, and you'll keep them coming back. Limit them to only a handful of gates they can drive and you're going to find fewer and fewer people attending. Assure that it's fun for them and they'll return, and maybe even bring friends. "thumbsup"
