The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Lemons Newcomers → So, uh, how do you get in?
So, we entered like 4 times, finally getting in for Buttonwillow. We had a BLAST, did reasonably well, managed not to kill anyone, and couldn't wait to run again.
From what I understand, previous entrants are given priority for the next races. So we entered again, same team, same car, same theme, same everything for Thunderhill. Shot down again.
What gives? How the stink do we get into this godforsaken event?
Can you supply details of your applications (photos, essay, team info, etc)? Of course, other than the organizers, I don't think any of the participant REALLY know why the did or didn't get it. At least for me, I'm just guessing.
This is our car:
One experienced roadracer, one "licensed", unexperienced racer (me), two mechanics, copious alcohol consumption, little sanity, terrible paint jobs.
http://jalopnik.com/5357813/pink-pigs-a … -fall-2009
Read the 2nd or 3rd paragraph, that might explain it. OTOH who the hell knows why?
Aaah...oh well. Dammit.
i would say you should come up w/ a more interesting theme. even though we haven't repainted our cars ever, we always come up w/ something different. it helps if they know you and know that you're fun in paddock and clean on the track.
my advice would be to move away from the car-related stuff, as it's likely already been done at least once. there are plenty of pop-culture (old and new) things you can incorporate. we tossed around 5 or 6 theme ideas just on the ride home from CMP. none had anything to do with cars. costumes during BS help, i think.
if you're really stuck, email one of the judges for an idea. they'll give you some ideas they'd like to see.
Bingo.
Imagine that you are looking through a couple of hundred applicants, trying to weed out a third to a half of them.
One team is going to show up as '49-ers, with pick axes, frontier costumes, a lady of the evening, a car that looks like a gold panning slucie complete with recirculating running water, and promises of gold nugget bribes.
The other is a cop car with a light bar. Which one would you pick?
As proof, there's another cop car in your photo!
For example, as Near-Orbital Space Monkeys, we bribed with bananas and Creme de Banana (before moving on to esoteric beers and single malt, when the going got tough). My daughter wore a monkey costume in the paddock. We made a lot of ee ee, oo oo sounds during BS inspection. Our car had huge rocket motors with orange flames on the back and a space capsule on the roof. A monkey in a space costume and helmet rode shotgun. Our theme was unique and we (over) worked it. We had fun and we hope others enjoyed it too.
^^nice. you shou;dve had an old dude playing John Glenn, and kicking the monkeys in the ass, telling tjhem to get in the damn rocket.
or a charlton heston character telling the damn dirty apes to get their hands off him.
We went another way, we decided to go over the line to the side of "not exactly funny, more creepy" by dressing a guy up as pedobear and giving away free candy/kidnapping people. 
We've got a much better theme for next year, we've got a great plan in place, will take a bunch more time than we have this year.
LOL I wanted to do a pedobear theme but I didn't know how to make or buy a costume...plus I figured most wouldn't get it 
awesome btw
That was our fear as well. Ebay had the costume, it's pretty creepy.
I so wanted to do a 9/11 theme for the Lemons South race (tech was on 9/11). Fortunately my teammates are smarter/less-tasteless than I and nixed it.
@NDGeist: did you guys come to the Lemons South Spring race with the kidnapper van with "free candy" scrawled on the side? I still tell people about that van.
I, for one, would find it quite entertaining to see a Sexual Harassment Panda at a Lemons race.
St_rage: The only pedo-van we have doesnt have free candy on the side. We have one, but it's just white. We thought we were going ot take it as our tow vehicle, but due to the fact that it's a dodge van with a hojillion miles on it, the transmission would go out before we hit the mississippi river, so we decided to take one of the guys trucks. 
Oh... so that was a real pedo-van I saw.
Flat black. "free candy" scrawled on the side in pink chalk.
This is our car:
http://photos.motoiq.com/photos/622910569_Af6yt-M.jpg
One experienced roadracer, one "licensed", unexperienced racer (me), two mechanics, copious alcohol consumption, little sanity, terrible paint jobs.
If what you posted there is the entirety of your application, you need more. For the 3 races we've gotten in, they each ran about a page of text with more as captions in the photo. Choose your theme so that you can make jokes about yourselves, your car, and the race. Racing for charity (get pledges on a per-lap basis) seems to be a good idea too for getting in. Make sure your roster is full or nearly full, it makes you look more dedicated.
Think from the perspective of Nick/Jay as well:
-Do we know these guys will be fun?
-Do we know these guys aren't whiners?
-Do we know these guys 'get' the race?
-Do we think that if we accept these guys, that they'll show up at the race?
If you think your application gives the appropriate response to each question, you'll probably get in.
If the rumours of a 20-race schedule (plus chumpcar's nearly 20-race schedule) are true though, it may be possible that everyone who wants to race a shitty car next year will be able to.
Finally, keep in mind that Thunderhill is pretty much the most coveted race on the schedule. There were more than 200 applications this year, so it was tough to get in.
I feel honored, we got in on our first try, though there will be 150 cars at Thunderhill!!
IMHO besides a good theme and costume it's important to pick the right car. If you want to get in stay away from cars made in countries associated with good automobiles (Japan, Germany, US) and go instead for cars from countries that most people don't even realize *made* cars. Think Yugoslavia, Russia, Eastern Europe or France, or if those scare you then Italy, UK and Korea are all good bets. It's not like it's that hard, Murilee posts all the time to the Cars for Sale forum listing cars he'd like to see in the race. Buy the Yugo-camino with the Strada engine and I suspect they'd send you a gold-plated invitation without even knowing what your theme is.
Of course this is assuming that you're either a masochist or mad as a hatter but then if you're reading this forum the odds are pretty good that one or the other is true :-).
I feel honored, we got in on our first try, though there will be 150 cars at Thunderhill!!
Where did you get that number? Inquiring minds want to know.:D
IMHO besides a good theme and costume it's important to pick the right car. If you want to get in stay away from cars made in countries associated with good automobiles (Japan, Germany, US) and go instead for cars from countries that most people don't even realize *made* cars. Think Yugoslavia, Russia, Eastern Europe or France, or if those scare you then Italy, UK and Korea are all good bets. It's not like it's that hard, Murilee posts all the time to the Cars for Sale forum listing cars he'd like to see in the race. Buy the Yugo-camino with the Strada engine and I suspect they'd send you a gold-plated invitation without even knowing what your theme is.
Of course this is assuming that you're either a masochist or mad as a hatter but then if you're reading this forum the odds are pretty good that one or the other is true :-).
True, but we want to actually race rather than spend the whole time in the pits. lol
Solracer wrote:IMHO besides a good theme and costume it's important to pick the right car. If you want to get in stay away from cars made in countries associated with good automobiles (Japan, Germany, US) and go instead for cars from countries that most people don't even realize *made* cars. Think Yugoslavia, Russia, Eastern Europe or France, or if those scare you then Italy, UK and Korea are all good bets. It's not like it's that hard, Murilee posts all the time to the Cars for Sale forum listing cars he'd like to see in the race. Buy the Yugo-camino with the Strada engine and I suspect they'd send you a gold-plated invitation without even knowing what your theme is.
Of course this is assuming that you're either a masochist or mad as a hatter but then if you're reading this forum the odds are pretty good that one or the other is true :-).
True, but we want to actually race rather than spend the whole time in the pits. lol
Don't forget to check out ChumpCar as well, they might have races near to you.
The other thing you might want to do is travel. I think the California races are the hardest to get in. If you don't mind taking your car on a road trip you may be able to find easier races to enter and get to see a whole new group of people.
True, but we want to actually race rather than spend the whole time in the pits. lol
We went for a French car and yes we did spend about an hour and a half in the pits trying to get the shifter to work but we also spent about 12-13 hours on the track (and half an hour in the penalty box unfortunately) and had a great time in the process. Would we have had more fun with a more reliable car? Somehow I doubt it and let me tell you we were all very proud when the checkered flag dropped with the Peugeot still running!
priapism wrote:True, but we want to actually race rather than spend the whole time in the pits. lol
We went for a French car and yes we did spend about an hour and a half in the pits trying to get the shifter to work but we also spent about 12-13 hours on the track (and half an hour in the penalty box unfortunately) and had a great time in the process. Would we have had more fun with a more reliable car? Somehow I doubt it and let me tell you we were all very proud when the checkered flag dropped with the Peugeot still running!
Well said, sometimes the adventure of the fix and the trials and tribulations are half the fun. At the end of the day who's got the better stories? Folks on the track all day or folks fighting their oddball car and whipping it into shape? I'm a firm beliver that life is all about having good stories
Hey Priapism....this is just a guess... it might just be that irritating siren...
The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Lemons Newcomers → So, uh, how do you get in?