Just curious how many have scaled back, scaled back considerably or outright had to park your car because of the economy?

And along with that, how many have done any of the above, not based on actual events, but fear of something happening that would make curtailing your "fix" inevitable?

For me, my regional race schedule hasn't changed, but the TnT days and out of region events have been scratched. And not because of being laid off or anything, just burying my coffee cans in the backyard in case I do.

If I didn't have a great group of sponsors and wasn't able to trade instructing for registration, then the story would probably be differnet.

I was wondering how you NASA guys afford it. ~$250 per day, and so that means Sat, Sun, and maybe Friday practice = $500-750 per weekend, plus gas, repairs, expendables, damage? No way I could afford that even with a good economy.

I don't "race" so I really can't answer your question. But I still have ~80 feet of DOM sitting on the floor of my garage that might be enough "entertainment" for the year. And yes, I have the fear of getting laid off. It happened for 1 month.

I'm starting to consider (super seriously consider) selling (or parting out) my car. I'm thinking of having a giant sale, unloading the stuff (parts, furnature, spares, some tools, etc) I can and downsizing to go back to school. I'm not sure how I'll get rid of my house without just filing bankruptcy, but since nobody wants to loan money anyway, it may not really hurt me that bad if I did.

My job is still pretty safe, I just hate it. So, I'm looking for ways to afford a pay cut. Maybe I'll go back to bartending or something and take some classes.

My job appears to be safe for now, but my wife's is a little more up in the air. I was resigned to just skip autocrossing for this season completely, but I've got some leads on some inexpensive lightly used tires. The tires I have now have way too little grip left (19 days on V710s). If I can track down a couple more used tires and then a set of cheap 17x9.5 wheels, I should actually be able to put a full local season together. I won't spend anything on parts or mods, just need to get some fresher rubber than I have now.

Of course if my wife's job goes away, then it's all in the crapper and I will sit the season out. I'll just have to hike and bike for some cheaper recreation.

Have the tax man reassess my property taxes . It's tough pinching dollars and juggling what events to run. I'm working with another friend how we want to balance divisionals and a couple national tour events. Right now, I'm just looking for new tires and if I can run a couple local events. No bueno.

I'm playing it event by event, which is $350 for most weekends out in CMC West. Out of region events are pretty much out for me right now. I decided to make an investment in a pro detailing kit and will be doing that on the side to earn racing bucks, because my racing budget is pretty much not there right now!

My car pretty much just sits in the garage and gets to me work on pretty days in the spring, summer, and fall lately. I've converted it back to a DD (racing seat and harness removed). My job is in the electric utility industry (the only thing more secure is the funeral business) so I'm pretty darned safe as far as work goes. However, being that the worst is yet to come I don't feel it would be a wise move to keep dumping money into the car at this point. I'm just saving it for a brighter time when I move up the ladder a little more. I've toyed with selling the car, but it's not worth it at this point unless someone offered me what I could've gotten before the economic melt-down. In the mean time I'm trying to stimulate the economy with 2nd ammendment purchases.

Mine as well. However, with the downturn, electricity demand has dropped 10-15%. While we've had no lay-offs, there is a wage, bonus and hiring freeze till further notice.

As of the arrival of our new property tax bill and the increased costs for my son's tuition, my "09 track schedule has had to be scrapped! I'll likely do 1 or 2 Autox events to use up my old RA1s so they don't sit and turn to stone. Beyond that, I'll be lucky if I get to do a karting event with my sons at NJMP before year's end. Hoping some of the folks that generated tis mess have to sacrifice some of the things that make life fun for them too! End Rant!

Actually our events are about $300 for the weekend not each day, but still plenty expensive.

For me personally, I have just been saving where possible for the reality that something bad could happen. If it gets bad enough, the race car will get parked.

I feel pretty secure with my job as well, I work for GE Energy, but we do have all the freezes in effect too. When my A6's wear out, I'll be back on the street tires for the rest of the year. Our club runs about 6 autox's per year and there is another club that's good for about 4 per year. I'm still wrenching on the car when I get chance and or some extra money laying around that the wife doesn't know about. (moving from FS to ESP). I'd like to do some HPDE's and some more track days, but there is a limit to the funds, Right now I'm investing most of my money in Mason Jars...

Ok, I just remember it being ~250-275 per day for HPDE or TT when I was a NASA member and they sent me the invites. I never went to one mostly because I can do HPDE's through other clubs for $150/day, and I'm perfectly happy with that.

Between wedding, house, etc., I've scaled back a bit. When I first started in 2003 I used to do 18-20 days a year. Last year was I think 9 and this year I'm thinking between 8-12. I'm more concerned with gas prices. If they stay where they are I might try some long hauls to tracks I've never been to (Mid-Ohio and Mosport).

The economy is keeping me from dumping anymore money into the car (maybe a splitter, but most of that will be my time, very little money).

I wasn't going to wheel to wheel this year due to the ticker. But as mentioned before I have the go ahead for track days/HPDE type of events.
The job at Kerr (Orthodonist's and Hygeniost equipment) O.K. shameless plug, (Orascoptic, Surgical Acuity, and Demi brands) is secure. I am working overtime yet. It is an average of 3 hours a week.
The Hawk Motorsports is at a stand still. I have not made a sale since October. So I do not know how long I'll keep it up.
I got a $ 2,000 bonus check, so I am waiting for my tax return and I will be helping someone with a stimulus package of my own by buying a Z-28 or Trans-AM from them.
Will be looking for something I can DD and do HPDE with a couple of times this year.
So we are stable and doing OK.

Not only parked it, but siphoned out the gas! Well not really, but thats how it feels.

Unfortunately, it appears it will be that way for awhile. I am now working part time for a racing buddy. My 2008 income was less than one-half what it was in 2007.

Luckily the house payment and groceries are manageable with the lower income, savings, and the wife's income. Everything else is paid for including the kids' college.... Thank goodness

This too shall pass.

bock

This will be a cautious year......I "plan" the same number of races this year as in the past, but after being out of work for 4+ months last year......I could NOT swing that again....

COME ON 'OL ECONOMY........KNOCKINGONWOODLOUDLYNOW!!

Me too Rob, me too. I've gathered up a pretty extensive collection of stuff lately, waaaaay more than I should have I'm sure.

I've been pretty lucky to keep working lately. There's about 20% unemployment locally in my Union. I keep hoping the government keeps giving tax credits to green energy, as there are a lot of wind farms on horizon waiting to break loose.

I worked a lot of overtime last year, so my reserves are pretty good. I'm hoping to race a whole season if the car doesn't break too many things. Luckily, I bought most of the upgrade parts last year and now I just need to get some warm weather to work on the car and make them fit.

I haven't roadraced since '06. I've been saving some money and 'investing' in some other things. The bug has been biting me and rather than go roadracing, I decided to do some autocrossing this year. Started out looking to buy a C5 Z06 because they're getting so damn cheap, but ended up going for what I think is the biggest bang for the buck in a rwd v8 car...another Camaro. I'll still have at most 1/3 the cost of the vette into this thing, and I just sold a more expensive car anyway. I hope I can keep myself entertained with mostly local events, because if I'm gonna trailer a car all over the east coast I might as well be going to the track.

I'm getting worried about losing my job now. My company is already doing furloughs and shutdowns at three of their plants. I'm not a factory worker, but my job is at risk if money gets tight. Already got hit in a layoff at this company several years ago. I've had some work to fall back on up until lately, as business is bad for everybody around here right now.

Being in college right now seems to be a good thing. I'm graduating in May and going to grad school in the fall. Most of my friends are having a hard time finding full time jobs. Racing-wise, I'll be doing the normal auto-xing this spring thanks to the income tax return I'll be getting, and this summer will by covered by an internship. The number of track days I do will depend on what kind of funding I get for grad school. Thankfully the company I interned at last summer picked me up again this summer. Several companies that normally hire interns in the area are on a hiring freeze. Caterpillar actually retracted a bunch of intern and full time job offers several months after the people had accepted them. Ouch, right! They gave the full time offers that they backed out on $1000 for their troubles, but completely stiffed the interns. My school normally has a 95%+ placement rate...I'm curious to find out what it will be this year.

My wife and I both have recession-proof jobs. I do HVAC maintenance at the Dept of Energy,(and you know energy research isn't going away anytime soon) and my wife is a teacher. This whole crashing economy thing has been weird for me. It's like I'm on the outside looking in. Actually, things have been better for me in the last few months. I just got a promotion and my wife is on the doorstep to being hired at a local school district that's tough to get into. (Been subbing for 5 years). You would think I would be dumping more money than ever into my car to make it an all out ESP car. But I just can't get motivated now. In fact, I'll probably do less events this year than I've done since I started 8 years ago. Or mabey quit alltogether for awhile. I don't know if the economy has me too scared to spend money, or if I'm just burned out of the autocross scene. I'm thinking it's the latter of the two.

My racing season is being cut back because with the fall in prices, my wife and I can finally afford to buy a decent house. For the last 2 weeks I've been unemployed, but it was planned unemployment. I'm using the time off to finish my dissertation before I start my new job in March. Because I'm starting in March, I won't have any vacation time to go to a lot of the big events like Nationals this year. I can take a cutback in racing for all the great things that are happening. The new job is a dream job and our family income will double, so I'll be back in full force next year. The only real events I'm not going to go to are Nationals and a ProSolo or two. I'm running two local series, that will keep me busy racing.

I may be bias on the subject because Washington DC is very materialistic and right of entitlement kind of city, but the only people that are having trouble are the ones that bought the crazy big house and spent money like crazy. I feel that if you are a hard worker with a good skill set and didn't spend money to your wits end, you will be fine in this economy. Corporations will always need skilled workers\contractors that bring value to the company.

Like Mitch, I'm planning on making all of this seasons scheduled races (6 weekends). Won't be doing any lapping days or test & tune days tho. I desperately need the seat time to catch up wik the rest of the pack, but it looks like I'll have to settle for just learning on the race weekends. This is parlty due to the unknown future, and partly because last year was a big spending year. Asides being my first season W2W, I bought a house in Feb, new (to me) tow vehicle in May, and my gf bought a new(ish) Sky Redline in Nov. Don't blame me for lack of trying to spur on the economy, it was a buyers market.

My girlfriend and I work at the same (big) engineering company. Just announced that the yearly performance raises have been postponed. I feel pretty comfortable that I'm good to stay, tho if she loses her job, I'll have to park the racecar until things pick back up.

Glad to hear most all are still working and planning on racing. I'm the poster boy for the "new" economy.... a small business owner who's gross sales went from around 35k/month to...wait for it....0. Well that's not entirely true. I did bill $287 for January. For me, that has translated into a complete rebuild of the race car this winter (my labor and lots of "paint it and it looks pretty" parts). I still plan on running all the NASA Midwest events, but making it to SLC in September will depend upon things turning around. I'm pretty well set for an extended "vacation", but I'll be bummed if racing needs to go back to Sunday morning F1 and the local roundy-round tracks. I waited 50 years to do this...I sure hope I can find something to do to keep the dream going....

KO

You are biased on the subject. You're also in that "future's so bright, I gotta wear shades" phase (a song I keep thinking about in a dark ironic sort of way), and that's great.

When I was in my early teens, I was into radio controlled airplanes, and was the club's main instructor for a while. One nugget of instructional wisdom I picked up somewhere was to tell the students to always fly "nine dumb thumb high". In other words, allow room to recover from several mistakes and mishaps before running out of altitude.

When I bought my house, I waited until I had the mortgage covered multiple ways, so I wasn't depending on any one thing:
- company stock options that were about to vest (poof, shortly after buying the house)
- consulting income (poof, shortly after buying the house)
- wife's relatively stable teaching income (double poof, replaced by huge cancer expenses, right after finishing expensive Master's in school administation and right after daughter was born)
- hard worker with good skill set (but I live on the wrong continent, so looming poof)

More recently:
- refinanced to INCREASE mortgage payment somewhat (at lower interest rate, shorter term) in race to get it payed off ahead of outsourcing, hoping I still had a few years to do so
- sufficient 401K and other savings to pay off mortgage early if necessary (poof)

There's a steady stream from the new overseas facility rotating through to learn our jobs, and has been for several years. Many jobs were already gone, so I was already working toward being able to survive "non-voluntary early retirement" before I reach 50, but I'm not there yet. The current environment has already led to increased layoffs (the latest a few weeks ago), and there will be more. Those jobs will never come back (in North America) once they are gone.

I'm still solvent and in relatively good shape, but I'm running out of thumbs. As long as I keep my job, I'm fine. If I lose it, I'm not even free to relocate because I must live near family that can help when needed so I can work. I also must work for an employer with group health insurance coverage, because there is no way I'll ever be able to get private coverage. For now, I could still pay the mortgage if I wipe out my retirement savings. However, with a daughter to raise and a wife to keep alive (ever priced weekly chemotherapy for life, not to mention a bunch of surgery, even with health insurance?), I'm now wondering if it's even a good idea to try to keep the house.

I may be better off than many right now, but cancer [or a parent/spouse with Alzheimers's, or any of many other serious illnesses ...] can and will burn through that faster than you can imagine. In 2001, medical bills caused more than half of all personal bankruptcies. More than 3/4 of those were insured at the start of their illness. According to a recent ABC news report, "One in five people with cancer use up all or most of their savings, and those are people who have insurance."

Even if I don't lose my job, it's going to take years to recover.

I'll still be doing some local autocrosses this year to maintain my sanity as long as the paychecks keep rolling in. I probably won't be spending much time at the new road course that will open this year, only an hour or so from home. I certainly won't be doing much to the car, or buying fresh tires this year.

Reckless idiots got us into this mess, no doubt about it. However, the fallout will go way beyond the idiots (and already has). Those who were "swimming naked" (with apologies to Warren Buffet) have largely been washed away already. At the moment, I'm very worried about all the people who were only flying five dumb thumb high, believing they were being very conservative and responsible.

I'm biased too, of course. It just isn't the same bias. I am getting pretty tired of hearing that the only people in trouble are those who brought it on themselves. Some did. Many did not.

Sounds like you had a personal financial perfect storm to go along with the economy in general. It's actually pretty amazing that you're still afloat. Keep up the fight.

Personally, we've been pretty lucky so far. My job is pretty safe, my wife runs her own business that has been doing pretty well and health has been good. But we haven't escaped totally unscathed, the 401K is 60% of what it was 2 years ago and savings is now very thin. We adopted 2 kids a couple years ago and the extra expenses have been a bit of a strain on things but well worth it. Most of the extra expense has been day care. I can't wait for August. My son starts Kindergarten and the day care bill will drop over $500/month.

Mine too......:woot:

Maybe a new C6 if my wife and I can keep our claws on our jobs for the next 6 months! KNOCKING LOUDLY ON WOOD!!

Mine too (daughter, that is)

I'm not exactly in the safest occupation anymore, at least oil creeped up closer to $40/barrel. At least I've got a couple of years in with the company and have a reputation for being a good performer. I don't think I need to be worried about losing my job, but even if I did I don't think it would be hard for me to get another job. The house is paid down to $18,308, so I don't have to worry about losing that. I did scale back a bit for this year.... I was going to go race at the local dirt circle track, but luckily there was a cooling off period before the car was bought and I decided that giving heroin to a pothead is probably not a good idea. (In other words I did not need to get addicted to a different / more expensive form of racing). If I keep behaving I should be 100% debt free by the end of March of next year (2010), or so I hope.

But hey if you need money, live with your mother who hasn't paid her mortgage in 10 months, get food stamps and disability for 3 of your kids just go to Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills and pop out 8 more parasites to suck up all the government cheese you can.

I work for Jared Jewelry. My income in 2008 was almost half of what it was in 2007. I am a good saver though so I am alright for quite a long time even with my house and all. No sales force layoffs so far. No whispers of it either.

But my side job is pressure washing. The money I make from it is strictly for racing stuff i.e. z28 payments, z28 insurance, tires, entry fees, gas etc. made 6k in 07 and 1k in 08! Not one job since october. Only 2 calls in that time. So I am sacrifing some other things to make up a very tiny amount. So far I plan on houston tour and nationals.

But things could be much worse. For instance the The govt could borrow money from china and then use it for aahhh FTW!!!! I wanna race!

Let me see, In 2007 seeing that things where not looking good for the future, my wife and I decided to start to tighten our budget. A college course that I was teaching and have been teaching for the last 12 years is canceled due to low enrollment. So our income was starting to shrink.We didn't have much debt other than medical bills due to my wife's ongoing medical condition. So after getting rid cable tv and any other luxuries, I decided to sell the CP firebird. In February it was sold and in March it was on it way to it new home in NY. We bough a used car cash, payed a few bills and bought a few parts to prepare my wife's stock Z28 to compete in ESP so I can keep my racing going on albeit in a very limited fashion. At this point Racing was limited to 1 Auto-X a month and no Track days for this year. My department at work goes through a re-organization and the new Boss kicked out 12 or so people after reassuring everyone that there would be no layoffs. So in May I was out of work. House goes on the Market for a Short Sale as we can no longer afford the payments since our priority had to be to keep our medical coverage to the tune of over $600 a month. Beat's paying for $6,000 treatments every 3 weeks out of pocket without it. Get a new part time teaching work at a different college teaching 2 classes and try to work as much freelance as I can get under the table. On January still no Job and now due to a screw up unemployment stops. February we move to my mother in law's house. Still the house sale is cough in Paper Limbo at the mortgage company in spite that we have a cash buyer ready but since we could no longer afford the utility bills on $100 a month we moved. Good new is that we got a grant that will pay for the medical insurance premium. Bad new is that we are still living on about $100 a week. Soon as much as I hate to do this Race Rims & Tires and anything that we can sell will be sold. With Luck will be able to keep the car but who knows.

I've been building my freelancing company during all this time but that is a slow process that with luck will start paying off soon. I've also been applying to jobs all over the place for full time positions, including out of state (Canada, New Zealand and Australia) to no avail. I may decide to go back to school and try to finish my degree but don't know for sure yet as this would help me if I want to continue in as an educator and not as a Graphic Designer /Animator/ Multimedia Specialist (portfolio rules over degree in those areas). So it looks like there will not ba any racing in my future for a couple years.

The funny thing is that I really don't know how we have managed the last few months apart from God's grace and provision. I mean every time we have been really up against the wall somehow we have gotten an unexpected freelance project or a gift from a friend. So I'm filled with Hope! not because of the president on the white house but because of he who presides over my life, Jesus.

Here's wishing you and your family ALL THE BEST in the future! I was out of work for 5+ months last year so I know the pain/stress of it, but NOWHERE near your level.

GOOD LUCK!

well guys, wish me luck. The third round of lay offs will happen tomorrow. Even my somewhat specialized job as a Metrologist is in jeopardy due to outside sources biding on the lab work. If it does happen, I'll be one of the *lucky* ones and get 16 weeks of severance.

Selling Tacos and Margaritas on the beach of Cabo San Lucas sounds like a viable alternative to Corporate America ;-)

Good luck. May the axe let you pass unscathed.

I took a lay off on Friday since the contractor I worked for hasn't had work in 6 weeks. I'm insanely glad I didn't take everyone's great advice to buy a house last year. I was putting a big chunk of my check into savings every week and unemployment is about what I was seeing as take home on my check.

Racing on unemployment here I come!

I made it through another day but, they still havent done the lay off. No one is sure when it will happen now.

We've gone through several rounds of layoffs at my place of employment as well, and my wife was let go from her job at a local church this past week (their tithing went down 30%, she was the last one hired...) So while I haven't been on track in who knows when, I too have been participating in the Second Amendment stimulus package. Way too much crazy border-related stuff going on.

Well Corporate cutbacks hit my family too. I thought we were pretty secure, I'm an engineer for GE in the energy sector, and my wife was an attorney in a large global firm. In April they cut her practice group accross the board and she was let go. (6 figure income is difficult to lose) In the end, we hope it will be better, she has started her own firm and has high hopes most of her existing clients will come with her. But the next few months are going to be a real wake up call for us. I'm only doing the Auto-X's I signed up for with my club dues and no track days this year.

Larry, I'm in the same boat - more layoffs announced, but I don't know when I'll know. My area is definitely in the crosshairs. Having a blade hanging over my head for months at a time is getting really old.

I recommend Pepcid AC and beer, not necessarily at the same time or in any specific order. Also, just as with my wife's illness, I find it difficult to think about anything but driving for the duration of an autocross run - while I can still afford it, anyway.

The company I work for had it's first round of layoffs since 2000 last week. We lost almost 10% of the company. I was spared this time. They say no more layoffs are planned, but neither was this one. If business gets bad enough, my position could find it's way onto the chopping block as well.

We haven't been spending on much of anything lately, but I have also been contributing to the second amendment stimulus package. I never thought I would spend several time the price of a pistol on ammo for it in the first few months of ownership. It feels like buying a car and then stocking up several years worth of fuel for it all at once.

All this news makes me grateful. But.

I own my own company, but we are paid on commission (real estate appraisal). My income from this source is one-third what it was in 2006 and going down. I may have to lay myself off.

I now work part time for a friend (in a lab) in addition to the hit and miss appraisals. Altogether, my income will be half this year what it was.....

Keep the faith.

bock

I graduated in May and was laid off after being at the job for 7 months. Somehow I got really lucky and was able to find something somewhat local, even with every other bizjet OEM laying off engineers as well. I can't say my job is 100% secure, but its looking really good for at least the next 6 months. Hopefully the ecomony will somewhat rebound by then if the work drys up.

I was planning on heading out to at least one or two national tours, but I lost all my accrued vacation starting the new job, so taking a few days off to travel is out of the question. On top of that my car budget has been put on hold, the girlfriend and I decided to take advantage of the low interest rates, our excellent credit, and the soft real estate market. We're planning on moving into a new to us house at the end of the month. I can't wait to finally have a real garage again and a place to finally call home.

Mine's for sale http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c6-corvett...onv-m6-z51.html

I'm at the other end of the children scale, In 18 more Long months, my $1300/month child support roles off, Just in time to buy a new Z-28! What? it's cancelled? Maybe a new firebird then, what? no more pontiac? Damn the luck!

Maybe I'll suck it up and eat roma noodles and try and keep the vette...

Good luck to all of you in these trying times...

Mills

I understand how it feels to be under the Guillotine. Having your wallet decapitated is a humbling experience to say the least. The company put a freeze on the lay offs until sometime in June. So, now we wait. If it does finally happen to me - It will be the third time in my 25 years in Arizona. First was the aerospace industry in 1992, Second was the Semi Conductor industry in 2001, Now the Implantable Medical Device industry in 2009 ?!?!??

Selling Tacos and Margaritas on the beach of Cabo San Lucas sounds better all the time ! (All FRRAX members will get a 25% discount ) lol

Sean - You're probably already aware of this but, If you do become involved in a RIF, The current administrations Stimulus plan will reduce the cost of COBRA by 65% 9 months on medical costs.

When I married my second and present wife, we honeymooned in the Virgin Islands (partly courtesy of ff miles). We met a bartender who was a former BASF engineer. If I didn't have a wife and kid ....

There is a heckuva joke in there somewhere ...

My strategy is diversifying my skills...well with respect to the power industry and welding. I have a certified welding inspector title, in addition to engineering degrees, and am hoping to take the national board's authorized inspector course. That and I've been working on my welding skills and researching NDE certs. I hope to be a tube welder by the end of the year...or at least qualified. Fortunately there's still plenty of demand in boiler and pressure vessel repair and fabrication.

I thought it was a requirement to have a couple of felonies to be a Boilermaker

Not going there, but let's just say I've encountered some colorful characters. I just intend to do inspection (QC work), but being proficient myself doesn't hurt.

not the economy, but the decision to send my daughter to a private high-school pretty much killed the idea of pursuing racing at this point. I have a CMC car, which I am now selling. It is a very cheap series to run, but even if I do half the season and it costs me $5K, that is a good chunk towards the tuition bill. And there just is not enough $$ floating around to do both without making some drastic cuts in other areas. So racing was the first thing on the chopping block. Maybe later when the kids are out of school I can revisit it.

I don't.... (and I'm an ex bartender/bar manager)

Actually, I'm signed up for a college welding course starting soon. I'm going to try to work through and get certified...just because it's a good thing to have. Then I'm going back to work on my degree. Of course I'm working on a cover letter right now for another job in another state, so this is all subject to change.