Home Set Racing - Alive and well.

This is my first blog article for Slotter’s Blotter and I now have my own blog called Home Racing. I have been hesitant to write one since I have seen what Vincent Vega (Slot Blog) and Michael Delaney (The Pits) have written, and not being the motor sport experts they are, it seemed a little intimidating.

But I do race slot cars, home racing my specialty, and have so for many years, so I figure that qualifies me as an expert, maybe in my own mind. So you’ll not hear anything about 1/24th scale racing (commercial racing) or even HO scale since those cars are much to small for my bifocals to focus on. 1/32nd scale is what I grew up with and still race.

One of the urges to write this blog article actually came from reading about the slot car hobby in the Wall Street Journal, an article by Julie Jargon. She had contacted me and since she also lives in the Chicago area, we decided the best way to learn about the hobby was to visit the stores and race with the racers. I thought she did a great job in her research and certainly spending a whole night with 18 slot car racers didn’t dumb her down at all for writing the article. This along with the video she took was a great shot in the proverbial slot car arm. Here is a link to the Wall Street Journal article. Imbedded in the article is the video.

All in all the health of the home set slot car racing hobby seems stable, even though the price of our hobby is escalating on a consistent basis. Here in the western suburbs of Chicago, we have one of the largest concentrations of home set slot car racers. Some of these racers have formed racing groups and some have formed a more formalized club. No matter what kind of slot car racing you yearn for, there is a group around here that does it. How much better can it be?

So I’ll just let Vincent and Michael do their thing in keeping us informed as to what is coming down the road or just arrived and how it runs. They do a great job. I’ll be concentrating on the local racing groups, the series racing and special events they do and the “spirit” of the hobby.

Peace,

Father Bob