Only for some of their enthusiasts.......

Nothing if you actually race in Ontario.

Eric

 

Weren't you the one who said it was CASC who ignored Mazda? Mazda Canada is in the business of selling new cars. Do not think for a moment sponsoring grassroots motorsport is the most efficient use of marketing dollars intended to get new cars off the showroom floor. They are doing a kindness to our hobby. Just because your "high end" racing association ignored them is no reason to get pissy at Mazda.

 

The Sigma Time Attack Mazda support gets Mazda a lot more exposure then regional racing ever would lol.

thewird

 

Exposure is one thing but are the people they are exposing themselves to at Sigma really the ones that are going to buy new Mazda cars? I like Mazda and I like their new cars enough but if I had the money needed to buy one there are a lot of other things I would consider first despite their grassroots support.

I cant be the only. I imagine a lot of people involved in Motorsport would feel the same way. I will never understand marketing. I appreciate what they are doing though, even though I will not see any of that money either.

 

Dude, you don't know me or what I have done with Mazda or for how long. I have been racing Mazda products since 1997, have had personal support from Mazda Canada and was involved in discussions about bringing this program into Canada from the US. I also know exactly what transpired when the decision was finally made to roll this out across Canada. I am not blaming Mazda Canada or their support of motorsports, but at some point they have to accept the apologies from the people at the CASC and extend the program to CASC events. I have spoken personally with John Doonan a couple of times about this exact situation, incuding this past December.

I am not "pissy" at Mazda, I am pissy about the insulting way that CASC treated Mazda the first time around, I am pissy at Mazda Canada for not extending the program now (3 years later) and I am especially pissy about how much we spend to go racing, even at a supposed Club Level and that I can't get a cent up here. I can cross the border, finish 3rd at an SCCA or NASA event and make $250. Here I get squat. It costs me a minimum of $1500 a weekend to run my car and that US style $250 would help.

By the way, this is not a `kindness`Multinational corporations do not do ``kindnesses``. In the US it is to promote the whole Mazdaspeed parts program, which by the way is actually turning a profit for Mazda US. In Canada it was put into place to sell new cars.

Eric

 

Your right, I don’t know you. I have a couple posts to base my entire opinion of you on. In which you come off as condescending and passive aggressive. I don’t mean to insult you or get in your face but your posts with no context make you seem like an entitled adolescent.

You’re right again. It’s not a kindness. They are spending money on us in the hopes we spend money on them. What I mean is they don’t have to do this. There are much more efficient ways they can spend their marketing dollars. Therefore they are doing a favour to the people receiving this money. We should be appreciative of any support they want to extend.

With the context you supplied your posts make a little more sense. But you could still post in a positive and constructive way instead of a couple sentences complaining about how daddy Mazda doesn’t give you free money even though you compete in the best series.

 

I know Eric over the years has worked hard to get Mazda to extend the same sort of support they do on the US side of the border to Canada, so I think he's fairly placed to offer reasoned critique. I too find it frustrating to be part of the Mazdaspeed program - and get the emails regularly - with the little caveats at the bottom or in the fine print "not available in Canada". I don't expect to make money competing, but I have carried the banner for 15 years now, and I'm a fan of the products - both old (my car) and new. I'm someone who other people come to for car advice - the kind of person many manufacturers look to reward a bit through motorsports parts and competition rewards programs - even Scion is doing that. Mazda is still the "zoom-zoom" company, but Mazda Canada seems to forget that's their core audience.

 

A reasonable critique is one thing. This thread was about thanking Mazda for their support. Eric did not need to show up and complain about how someone who races is a "low end" series got that money instead of him. He showed up with a bad attitude and acted like organizations like SRTA and CSCS are less deserving of corporate acknowledgment than CASC. CASC may be the highest governing body in the land but that doesn't mean there are not deserving people competing elsewhere, for various reasons.

With the information coming to light I perhaps jumped on him a little to hard and for that, Eric, I apologize. I really am a a friendly person and should we ever meet in person I'm sure we would get a long fine.