Hi all,
It is with sadness in my heart I must write to let everyone know that Raceday 2020 has been canceled to maintain public health in the face of COVID-19. Although this is terrible to hear, we are going to do our best to help the students in any way we can and deliver as much relevant content as we can to everyone over the next few months. We are holding a town hall meeting next Sunday, March 22nd at 2pm on the videoconferencing platform Zoom to discuss how we will move forward. A link will be provided here when it is available.
There are several announcements to outline, which we will provide as much information on as we can going forward. We hope to have substantive updates as we communicate with CMU staff for each item during the town hall meeting, which we plan to record and post online as well. Many of the following points will be expanded into their own posts in the coming month.
- Our hope is to roll over any efforts from 2020 in to 2021. This includes applying membership benefits that were purchased this year to Raceday 2021. We would like to make Raceday 2021 into the amazing event we had planned for Raceday 2020 but need to consult with CMU staff to see what their intent is.
- We are proposing to fulfill the Buggy100 commemorative t-shirt reward on Raceday 2021 and ship all Raceday 2020 BAA members a print of the original design in consolation. This is pending an estimate of the costs of printing and shipping, which we hope to absorb fully.
- We have actually spent very little of the considerable budget for Raceday so far. The budgeting for Carnival comes from many sources so it will take us some time to track down how many are still on-board for next year, but at this time it is clear that most of the budget has been saved. We will outline for everyone roughly where the budget stands during the town hall.
- We expect many people will be able to recoup their travel bookings so far in advance of the event. We are considering whether to expand Homecoming Weekend next year and suggest that as a potential option to change your flight if there is interest. Please comment below on your opinion on looking in to expanding Homecoming 2020, which (my guess) is Oct 16-17th, 2020, based on the Academic Calendar. We would administer bigger events, potentially sponsor a winner for “mini-raceday” or things like this.
- We still have many items of content that are still relevant and hope you will enjoy this year. Chute the Sh!t, a Buggy podcast from the BAA in collaboration with Will Weiner, will be published regularly starting very soon. Also we eagerly await the conclusion of History of Buggy from our own Bryan Arsham! We are currently exploring a Carnival Livestream of past races on Saturday. We could also do a mashup of everyone’s favorite buggy videos which we could solicit in the next couple of weeks.
- Elections will move forward as regularly planned, we’ll get you more information on that in April, with potentially some new positions planned.
- We are looking for ways to support teams through these tough times. We are also considering providing graduating seniors a special consolation gift such as a badge or poster of some kind, in addition to as many exhibition races as we can get in 2021. Let us know if you have any suggestions of things we could do for graduating seniors.
felmley says:
This is excellent work in rough times.
I know our SRS folks are reeling, both students and alumni. It was our 35th anniversary as well as buggy 100.
I do especially feel bad for all the seniors on all the teams.
We will ruminate on this and get back to you.
Mark Estes says:
Sad for those graduating. By this point in the season, they have put in a ton of effort.
I will see you all at buggy 100 next year.
Elmo Zoneball says:
Hold the races in the fall, while it’s still warm enough; end of September, early October.
Then hold the 2021 races on Schedule in the Spring.
Connor says:
I’ve heard this suggestion I just don’t think it’s a good idea and here’s my reasoning:
1)Teams at that point are training new mechanics pushers and drivers, beginning new builds and likely have new leadership still learning how to work together. Adding prep for a fall race will likely have poor results with many crashes and dq’s and it could hurt prep for the spring race having to focus on the fall.
2) Sweepstakes will all be new to their roles and won’t have the experience of running many rolls to fall back on during the fall race.
3) Cost. Running raceday is a huge cost financially and regarding time spent organizing. Most students and faculty involved with buggy are burnt out by the weeks leading to races. I think doing it twice in a year would do more harm than good.
4) Athlete involvement. Many sports are mid season or have just begun by mid fall when teams would have enough rolls to qualify. Thus they would likely not be able to compete due to conflicts or coaches forbidding it. This will lead to slower times in the fall and much fewer teams competing.
This sucks for all but we should take our punches now and be extra excited for 2021
Mark Estes says:
my first reaction was a fall race but many of connor’s points are valid. The people graduating will have moved on by then, so it does naught to make them whole. The kids who are inheriting leadership roles will have less on the job training at both the sweepstakes level and within each org. Not every org will come through this with with same level of know how transfer.
on the bright side, this is all part of flattening the curve. which is way more important than buggy