Diecast Racing Questions

Craister S. Nelson, Sr. - a.k.a. 'Craigster Sr.' - Hot Nuts Diecast Racing - St. Petersburg, FL

First a little history...

I was introduced to diecast drag racing at the 1997 'Race to Atlanta' Hot Wheels convention sponsored by Tomart's Price Guide. A friend of mine and I made the trek to the convention with a few trades in hand, and came home with the 'new' Scorchin' Scooter and '96 VW Drag Bus among other castings, as well as a TON of information and inspiration. In our local area at the time there were only a few hobby shops and NASCAR collectible stores that carried premium Hot Wheels and other brands of collectible diecast cars. There was (still is) a yearly diecast car buy/sell/trade swap meet in nearby New Port Richey, but there were no 'Clubs'.

I grew up around antique cars and enjoyed going to our local circle track, Sunshine Speedway, and have enjoyed all forms of motorsports for years. I even did some racing myself in the late 1980's / early 1990's, so it's always been somthing I loved being involved in. All sorts of toy cars, slot cars and model kits were a big part of my childhood as well.

My late friend Gary and I decided we would start our own local Hot Wheels club in 1999, and we started meeting at a local sports bar on the second Saturday of each month. We came up with the name 'Hot Nuts' as a play on words because we were all 'Crazy about Hot Wheels'. At first we would just to get together with a couple of other friends and trade new finds with each other and talk about what was new in the hobby of collecting diecast. We each invited a few friends to join us, and soon we had a small group of ten or so guys meeting on a regular monthly basis. One meeting we started talking about tracks and what we played with as kids. I mentioned the long drag track I had seen at the Atlanta convention, which was built on the base of a pinewood derby track with a modified timer for 1/64th scale racing. It had two 50' continuous lanes of Hot Wheels orange track, and was quite impressive. Everyone at the meeting wanted to start racing!

We managed to get one of our local race shops that had connections with Mattel to purchase one 50' coil of the continuous orange track for our club. I invested in a simple but 1/1000 accurate 'win/lose' electronic finsh gate, and with a few well crafted supports and flip up start gate, soon we were running scale quarter mile diecast drag races at every meeting! This quickly became the highlight of the monthly meetings and included five classes; Red Lines (Hot Wheels 1968 - 1977), Black Walls (Hot Wheels 1977 - Current), Open Class (Any other brand of 1/64th scale diecast) Modifieds (Any brand, no max weight, but must be conceled withing casting), and Super Mods (Basically anything goes, no max weight, fill, stretch, mash-ups, but must be less than 6" long and fit on the track). We also allowed any type of lube, so it was quite interesting to see what people came up with trying to find speed.

Wives, children, and families all came to join the fun, and soon we took over the whole side of the sports bar with our montly club meetings, and we even had our own custom 'Hot Nuts Club Car'! We did this for five years and enjoyed lots of other activities such as case opening parties, custom car contests, door prizes, ribbons & trophies for racing, special event races, and of course new trades and stuff for sale every month! It was a a blast, but since I did all of the organization, operation, hauling, hosting, etc. it became like running a small business. My son started to get more interesed in sports, karate, music and school, and my late Wife's health began to fail, so we disbanded the club in 2004. Nobody wanted to take over all of the responsibility of running the club, so all of the stuff went into storage for years.

I stopped collecting to in order to save money and care for my ailing wife while working full time and taking care of our Son making sure he got to school, did his homework, went to band practice, learned karate, etc. My wife passed in 2015, and it wasn't until the pandemic hit that I started going through all of the collectibles and diecast stuff I had packed away years ago.

In 2020 was searching the internet, watching 'Marbel Racing', stumbled upon the '3D Botmaker' YouTube channel, and was immediately hooked and blown away! I started researching and following other tracks and beagn to participate in diecast races 2021. Now I finally have an outlet for all of these mostly carded cars I bought, and am avidly collecting new castings again as well.

 

1. Fat track or Drag Racing?

Drag Racing is my first love in diecast racing, but I really prefer the open 'Fat Tracks' as it lends itself to more action and excitement. The drag racing is great for proving pure speed or quickness, but the overtakes, lane changes, lead swaps, wrecks, and unpredictible mayhem of open fat track racing is what got me back into racing Hot Wheels.

2. What do you like about Diecast racing?

The friendly community and the competition found within all of these great tracks that keep coming out!

3. What do you dislike about Diecast racing?

The fact that I can't possibly enter every single race!

4. Are you more interested in Diecast racing now than you were a year ago or less interested.?

Much more interested!

5. How long have you been racing and how long do you plan to continue?

1999 - 2004 (Hot Nuts Club - Drag Racing)

2021 -  Present (Hot Nuts Diecast Racing)

I will continue as long as I can afford it and my health allows!

6. Where do you get your Diecast racing information?

Red Line Derby, Facebook Track Pages, YouTube Track Channels 

7. Should race hosts race in their own races?

Sure, nothing like beating them at their own track! For those who don't or circumstances do not allow, maybe a 'Boss Mode' race off for the winner to face the track owner?

8. How do we get more people interested in hosting races?

Word of mouth, promoting by posting & sharing on social media. I share on my personal page as well as my 'Racing Page'.

9. Any other input? I know how much work the track builders out there are putting into hosting races, and I just want to say Thank You!!! I love seeing all of the different takes on points, scoring, format, themed scenery, track layouts, and all of the creative ways people are expressing themselves. Car Builders and Track Hosts alike are doing some amazing things, and I hope it continues for years to come!

If I had the room, I would build a track myself... Maybe some day... Enjoy!

Great survey!

1. Drag racing is my preference even though fat track racing is exciting at times.

2. What I love about diecast racing most are the racers. It's a good group of folk overall. Also the ingenuity and challenge of becoming better at a hands-on hobby.

3. What I don't like is the expense of the sport and the fact that I am competitive but can't put in as much as it requires to become great, and it is frustrating. Also the amount of time it takes to get really, really good is (relatively) immense. I just can't build as much as I would like.

Also it would be great to get back to more open-casting drag racing instead of  having one or two castings to choose from for a race. It was fun modifying a favorite casting you always wanted to modify.

4. I'm less interested than year ago, because seeing hardly any improvement is very, very, very discouraging. I try to stay competitive and I do try to put my best out there. But man it hurts when spend time away from your family and you're build performs badly. So I'll definitely be scaling back.

5. I've been racing seriously for almost 2 years now. I plan on continuing until my life doesn't allow for it. But it will be limited racing here on out.

6. I get my diecast info from this site, FB, and anywhere else remotely relatable to try and get some ideas or tutorials on how to improve my builds.

7. This is a tough one. Being as hosts have the home court advantage doesn't mean they will win a race though. Nevertheless it's an advantage. I would say they should still be able to race. Being that they are hosting and putting a lot of work in recording the race and organizing it. I can imagine that hosting is not easy at all.

8. I think we can get more people into it by evening the playing field for some races. Maybe having tiered races would be good. Let's say, having amateur, intermiediate, and expert level races. So people know what to expect and folk are going against people on the same level of experience. This gives people the ability to improve and then they have to move up when they win a certain amount of races at a certain level.

9. No other input but a huge thank you to the drag racing hosts and using their time for the hobby. Without you there would be no excitement in this hobby and it would be nothing but 3D Botmaker- type fat track racing...Lol

I'll just reiterate maybe doing a couple open-casting drag races where we can choose more castings to modify.

- GHOST

If we did have flexibility in choice you'd probably have to eliminate V-16s and Zoom Ins or that is all you'd have in a race.

I'm a little late to this party but the fact that there's been so much conversation already has been wonderful to review and analyze. I'm still reading through it all, but believe me, I'm studying all this so I can think about how RLD fits into the bigger picture going forward.

I've been diecast racing for the last 14 years since 2009, and I've seen this hobby evolve a ton. It's gone from Flintstones to Jetsons, and it's been incredible to watch. What started as simple drag racing has turned into episodic diorama racing. If I want spectacle, I watch the open track...if I want competition, I watch drag racing. It's pro wrestling vs boxing, and I enjoy both even if I'm only capable of one.

Diecast racing is silly. It's a group of folks that finally have the time/money/skills to play with their toys like they always wanted to when they were a kid. That's what's great about diecast racing. That's why I like it, why I got started, and why I continue to be involved.

But as the hobby has evolved and expectations have grown, the barrier to entry has gotten higher, in my opinion. Sure, it's still really easy to roll cars down a hill, but sharing the fun with others now requires a lot of extra work (and skill)...and that's a challenge for me. It's a challenge for me technically which makes it hard to get excited to even start in the first place. It's still a struggle, honestly.

Hosting races is always going to be a tough sell, if you ask me. People want to roll cars and be YouTube stars but less want to deal with the money and shipping & handling of cars. I get it...anyone that has hosted knows it's a PITA to host a mail-in. But I think a partial solution to that is just having a framework and resources to deal with it. If you have tools to make the hard part easier, more will at least give it a try. It's something I think RLD can help with...that's what I'm working on, anyway.

Where do I go for info...well, mostly just here, but I guess I'm a bit biased :) I know a lot of people have spun up their own FB groups and YouTube channels but I don't have the desire nor time to bounce around to see everything. I've joined a few FB racing groups and since left most of them. BUT...I also don't send in cars so with no horse in the race, I'm not that motivated to go to the effort to chase down information. I can come here to get a quick read on what's happening and I'm happy.

My whole intent behind RLD in the first place was to be a hub for the hobby. I realize the internet at large has changed since 2009 but I still think there is value in having a single place where you can reference historical conversation and reference articles. Facebook and Discord and all those things feel temporary and I find them hard to follow. Again, probably biased (and old).

Creating and sharing content has become amazingly accessible over the past decade to the point where everyone wants to be their own island, and that's hurt "old fashioned" message board websites like RLD that rely on others using it for regular conversation. It's a Mom & Pop Store vs The Mall type situation. It's a puzzle I'm still trying to figure out but that's part of the fun for me.

I haven't hosted a race in almost a year. I don't send in cars to race. Every good D&D campaign starts in a tavern and the most fun for me is trying to make RLD that place. Giving folks a place to start their journey, learn, share, and make friends. And no matter what path you take, you know the tavern will always be there and welcome you back.

As a side note....it's motivating and heart-warming to see this type of conversation here on RLD. I appreciate BLR lighting the fuse and everyone else for sharing their thoughts. It tells me there's still a need for RLD in the diecast racing universe. I think it's the kick in the pants I've needed and I hope y'all will keep Redline Derby in your diecast racing toolbelt.