Cal Club Autocross Forums

Not really off topic to Cal Clubbers. I read today on a diesel truck forum that Alfa Leisure shut its plant down and laid off all its workers.

I remember his dad had a crazy cooking show on KOCE that was filmed in his garage.

http://www.hotrange.com/sys-tmpl/athomeontherange/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Great time to buy an RV right now, unless you gotta go to freakin' Poland next summer

sounds like karma has made its way around.

Now Johnny can run for public office. Oh, wait. That won't work.

Should I know who Johnnie Crean is??

Thomas Smith wrote:Should I know who Johnnie Crean is??

Unless you are a road racer or RV owner, and even if you are, no, not really...

Thomas Smith wrote:Should I know who Johnnie Crean is??

From Wikipedia entry on Ron Packard:

"In 1982, Packard lost the Republican primary for United States House of Representatives in a crowded field of candidates to Johnnie Crean by 92 votes.[1] Crean's character came into issue, with his negative ads and false claim of endorsement by Ronald Reagan, so, after some reluctance, Packard launched a campaign as a write-in candidate. Packard ran a poll which found that voters would vote for him, especially if they knew how to write him in. Packard campaigned with a gigantic pencil as a prop while giving out golf pencils to district residents. An organized effort among fellow Mormons helped the campaign. Packard won the election by 11,000 votes to become the first independent write-in candidate to defeat candidates of both the Democratic and Republican parties."

He's the crazy guy who sent all the letters out to cal clubbers about issues at Buttonwillow and stuff.

Dad founded Fleetwood then sold it off with a non-compete.
Son then founds Alfa Leisure.

He's also the guy, when he was the head of cal club, who tried to bring the Solo program under Papa Cal Club's control. Seems he saw how much money passed through our checking account, and thought that the road racers (of which he was one) could benefit. Although he stated at the time that he was doing it because some people were concerned about the Solo program....

David Avard wrote:He's also the guy, when he was the head of cal club, who tried to bring the Solo program under Papa Cal Club's control. Seems he saw how much money passed through our checking account, and thought that the road racers (of which he was one) could benefit. Although he stated at the time that he was doing it because some people were concerned about the Solo program....

He was behind that debacle? Luckily Andy Porterfield [and probably others on the BoD] big-footed that one.

That was Crean? I thought it was all Monty Holt. Mr. You should be running through 500+ cars every solo event.

Steve Ekstrand wrote:That was Crean? I thought it was all Monty Holt. Mr. You should be running through 500+ cars every solo event.

I think you are right, but I believe that Crean was involved. (the memory goes after 40).

Steve Ekstrand wrote:That was Crean? I thought it was all Monty Holt. Mr. You should be running through 500+ cars every solo event.

Monty holt?
I've made some parts for that guy. Starter adapters for nissan cars.
I guess when he calls me next time his price will go WAY up.

I've had some road race friends tell me Monty is not a bad guy. Our situation got ugly though and he was very difficult to reason with. And some of his ideas where clueless and he didn't really want any conflicting data, argument, or debate. It was pure dictator stuff.

Some guys are just fine til they get in power and then they just aren't equipped with the right stuff to be a leader. That could be the case here. I just don't know him well enough to completely trash his character. But he did piss me off something bad.

The SCCA brokered a big pow wow to sort the problem out. That was, uhm... Tense. And really kind of embarrassing to have guys like Robbie Robertson and Andy Porterfield have to wash our dirty laundry.

It's "weird" how that type of situation goes. Up in the Great White North we had similar situations of the road racers wanting the money from solo. Of course there was friction....go figure, eh!

As a consequence, sometimes I wonder if solo isn't just better off on its own without the other types of racing involved.

In fact I think solo is an end unto itself - not a feeder series to road racing. Some people moving to road racing is more incidental than anything (and this is not to put down people who do move over to road racing). In fact, I know I thought about road racing at one time but did not make the move due to cost mainly. No more. I value my hide too much and prefer the "safeness" of solo. My career etc. is too much to lose over a weekend hobby.

Heck even the challenge of solo is more for me because we never see the same track again ... unlike road courses while seldom change - boring. (same can be said for track days - been there, done that, wouldn't mind doing a few more....not too many though).

Reijo

Its a long and twisted story with a lot of background stuff that very few people know. Some of the original ideas where good. Then along the line somewhere somehow the whole thing changed to I'm a dictator, we don't need to build votes, evolve the program. We'll just take it over. A few well meaning people got caught I believe on the wrong side of that one.