Grassroots Motorsports

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Grassroots Motorsports
Editor David S. Wallens
Categories automobiles, motorsports, do it yourself
Frequency 8 per year
Circulation 60,000+[1]
Publisher Tim Suddard
Year founded 1984
Country United States
Language American English
Website grassrootsmotorsports.com
ISSN 1047-0298

Grassroots Motorsports (GRM) is an American periodical devoted to hardcore sports cars, driving skill improvement, technical advice and amateur motorsports such as road racing, autocross and rallying. It was established in 1984 and is published eight times a year.[2] The magazine’s parent company, Motorsport Marketing Inc. is based in Holly Hill, Florida and also publishes Classic Motorsports magazine. Motorsport Marketing, Inc. is also an event company, hosting several large events annually including the Tire Rack Ultimate Track Car Challenge, GRM Speedfest at The Classic Motorsports Mitty, The GRM Experience at the Rolex 24 At Daytona, and is present at most large national and regional automotive enthusiast events with ties to modern and vintage sports cars.

Magazine History

Grassroots Motorsports was originally called "Auto-X," and started in 1984 in Deland, Florida by publisher Tim Suddard and his wife, Margie. The name was changed to Grassroots Motorsports a few years later.

Project cars

Grassroots Motorsports magazine's "Project Cars" section focuses on a wide variety of staff-owned road and track cars and presents in-depth technical subjects with a very hands-on, do-it-yourself point of view. Recent GRM project cars have included a Mazda MX-5 24 Hours of LeMons racer and autocrosser, a MINI Cooper S race car, a BMW M235i track day car, a Volkswagen New Beetle multi-purpose car and a LeGrand Mk. 18 race car built for autocross.

One of the most famous project cars in the magazine's history is the Ro-Spit, a 200-plus-horsepower, rotary-powered Triumph Spitfire.[3]

Subscriptions

Grassroots Motorsports' regular one year subscription price is $19.99.[4] The company occasionally holds sales, sometimes offering subscriptions during the holidays for as little as $10 per year.[5]

Grassroots Motorsports $20XX Challenge

The magazine holds an annual competition called the $20XX Challenge. The name of the event changes to reflect the year (i.e., $2015 Challenge in 2015). The main goal of the Challenge is to demonstrate that fun, capable and attractive cars do not have to be expensive. The total budget for entries cannot cost more than the year in dollars (i.e., $2015 in 2015), hence the name. The competition consists of an autocross competition, a quarter-mile (0.4 km) dragstrip time trial and a concours d'elegance.[6]

A special points system determines the final rank of each entry based on its performance in each segment of the competition.[7] Along with first-, second- and third-place trophies, other awards are distributed to deserving competitors, including “Most Spectacular Failure,” “Challengers’ Choice," and "Editor's Choice."

The first Challenge event was held in 1999, before the “year as the budget” policy was instituted; the budget cap for entries in that event was $1500. The second Challenge event was held in 2001 with the budget cap set at $2001. The event then became annual, with the budget cap increasing by one dollar each year.

2015's Challenge winner was Andrew Nelson and his V8 Volkswagen Beetle. Nelson has been attending the event for the past 11 years.

Ultimate Track Car Challenge

In 2007, Grassroots Motorsports added another competition to their lineup with the Ultimate Track Car Challenge. The goal of the UTCC is to discover the fastest track car in a field governed by minimal classifications. It has since become an annual event held every summer at the Virginia International Raceway.

Thirty-six cars competed at the Virginia International Raceway North Course in 2007. The overall winner was a Dodge Viper Competition coupe with pro driver Tommy Archer at the wheel.[8] In 2008, the event moved to Buttonwillow Raceway Park, and Bart Carter took first place overall in his Radical SR8.[9] In 2009, the event was held at the Virginia International Raceway Full Course; Marc Goossens beat out a field of more than 50 cars to take the overall win in his Riley Technologies Track Day Car. Tire Rack has since signed on as the title sponsor, and the Tire Rack Ultimate Track Car Challenge will once again be held in May 2016 as a part of the Hyperfest weekend at Virginia International Raceway.

Internet forum

The Grassroots Motorsports online forum is a section of the magazine's website which allows discussion on almost any topic, automotive or not. Message board users can also schedule gatherings of forum users, information about race dates, or other events on the forum.

Users must complete an online registration and create a username to post to the forum. The forum is moderated by magazine staff. Users gain "Dork" status as their post count raises.

New reader - 0 posts | Reader - 100 posts | Half Dork - 500 posts | Dork - 1k posts | Super Dork - 2k posts | Ultra Dork - 3k posts | Uber Dork - 4k posts | Power Dork - 5k posts | UltimaDork - 7k posts | MegaDork - 10k posts

The "Ignore" thread and the "Hotlink" thread have reached 300+ pages of posts by regular and new users alike. As of April 2014, the "Hotlink" thread had reached 2387 pages with 59656 posts. There are many inside jokes specific to the GRM forum that have evolved through regular postings by some of the most prolific users. Several thousand posts per user is not rare, and are often racked up in less than a year.

Memes

There are several anagrams used for common phrases in the website. YMMV means Your Mileage May Vary, or "your experience may be different than mine", SWMBO means She Who Must Be Obeyed, or "your significant other", IIRC means If I Remember Correctly. In the for sale section, "NMNA" is used meaning "Not Mine No Affiliation" it is a link of something interesting for sale (usually on craigslist) that may be of interest to the community but is not being sold by a forum member. Several words are automatically filtered to keep the forum family-friendly, but they are filtered and replaced with unorthodox alternatives as follows:

E36 M3: for the "S" word.

Berkeley: for the "F" word.

Bob Costas: for the "P" word in the context of the female anatomy.

Shiny Happy Person: for the "A" word.

Forum members have also developed the following slang terms:

Canoe: used to label spam posts inserted by bots or other non-regular post methods.

Flounder: a person or post that pushes a political ideology, but doesn't necessarily add to the thread or topic - a type of political rhetoric spam. Based loosely on the National Lampoon's Animal House character

"Yeah but do all the pixels work?": Something to ask anyone who asks a "should I buy this car" or "what car" type question. Should thoroughly derail the thread. In reference to BMW's of the '90s and early '00s that had readout panels famous for losing pixels as they age.

External links

References

  1. ↑ http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/media/files/2009-GRM-media-kit.pdf
  2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ https://secure.ablesoftsolutions.com/pdmg/SecurePages/NewSub.aspx?pi=grm
  5. ↑ http://hosted.verticalresponse.com/206167/8a910b3ef7/TEST/TEST/
  6. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ [1][dead link]
  8. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  9. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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