Commentary by: Langley Austin ~ [email protected] (@langleyaustin on twitter)
Copper Hill, VA(December 31, 2011) — Consider this your letter from the editor or your “State of RACE22 Address”, because it’s time to ring in a new year and it’s time for us to shed 2011 and concentrate on what 2012 has to bring.
I can go ahead and tell you, if you like what you saw in 2011, you better buckle up for 2012. As a company on the news side of things, RACE22.com FAILED, we failed to deliver you news, photos, videos and more in a timely manner. And I, Langley Austin take complete and total credit for the failure.
I know some of you, don’t really know what I’m talking about, but to those of you who do, I give you my heart felt apology for letting you down. It took me almost the entire 2011 season to realize that I, single handily was bringing RACE22.com down and since I realize my mistake, I’ve been working to correct my mistakes with the help of the all volunteer staff here at RACE22.com. That realization is what gave birth to the new website layout and our integration of Content Management Software, which will allow us to do a better job or at least if we fail, we’ll not have that as an excuse.
Hopefully, since the rebuild of the website at the beginning of December, you have noticed a difference. RACE22.com is committed to being the best Short Track Racing website and living up to our slogan as the “Short Track Racing Authority”. With that said, we will be expanding further in the coming year, opening new doors and covering places and races that we never have before. We won’t be abandoning our Late Model Stock Car roots, but we will be delivering content to a broader audience in the coming year, one that will undoubtedly be a noticeable change for our advertisers as well as our core fan base.
The new website was, but the first in a series of changes, that we will make to become a better website and a better news source for not only Late Model Stock Car racing, but racing throughout the United States as a whole. Our coverage of the Limited Late Models will be expanded into the new year, coverage of the Super Late Model division will see a facelift in the coming weeks and we will also begin focusing more on the regional and national tours such as ARCA, NASCAR East & West, NASCAR Mods North & South as well as PASS North & South, CRA and so much more.
I can promise you that RACE22.com will never be the same and we won’t be spreading ourselves thin, but rather doing the job that we all know that we’re capable of. We intend to be at all the big races across the country, we intend to be places we’ve never thought of going and being the news source for Asphalt racing that we should be mirroring what some of the newspapers covering short track racing has been doing for years. There’s no website out there, that covers Short Track Racing the way we think it should be done …. so, we’re going to do it our way.
With that said, we hope to grow in the coming year, going from an all volunteer staff to having a full-time paid staff devoted to covering short track racing, the way we think it should be. RACE22.com has set lofty goals for the season ahead, but as the slogan adopted by one our favorite touring series(UARA) says, “Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.” That’s our hope in the new year ahead.
I would also like to take this time to thank each and everyone one of the people who has helped build RACE22.com to what it is today. Kimberly Smith, Corey Latham, Chris Owens, Mason Dunn, Rob Staley, Mike Neff, Andy Marquis, Mark Rogers Jr., Taylor Meyn, Adam Fenwick, John Bowen, Tony Stevens, Doc Love, Alan Dietz, Wesley Outland, Tyler Williams, Debra & Greg Manter, Roger Johnson and all the other people who I didn’t mention that have contributed to RACE22.com since our restart in September 2007.
With that, I’d also like to say a huge thank you to all the advertisers we’ve had past and present(or at least the ones that pay/paid their bills). With you guys this website wouldn’t be able to exist in the format it’s in and we would have been able to continue to expand year after year. I hope that all our readers take the time to contact our advertisers and if you can’t buy something from them, at least tell them thank you for the support.
Alright, I think I’ve said all I need to say, except that RACE22.com would like to wish all of you a Happy New Year and whether you’re a fan of our work or you’re one of our competitors, you might want to buckle up for what we’ll be bringing your way in the New Year! With that, let’s get this New Year underway!
