mcduck

Okay, everyone... here's the start of the official thread for the ZDayZ at Tail of the Dragon event. Any event information I have will be posted here as it becomes available.

Further, if you have questions, you can post them to me or to this thread and I will do my best to answer them (based on the confirmations I have, etc.)

ZDayZ at Tail of the Dragon

When: May 20-24, 2004

Where: Fontana Village Resort, Fontana, NC

What: A huge weekend event for all Nissan/Datsun Z-owners! The activity schedule is still being worked out, but we're aiming for group drives, a car show, a dyno day, prize drawings, a vendor lot, and more. As events are confirmed, we'll post it on this thread!

This event is aimed at Z enthusiasts in NC, SC, TN, KY, GA, northern FL, VA, WV and anyone else who wants to make the drive!

Z-Club Sponsorship
At this time, we have verbal confirmations from two NC clubs to sponsor the event and I am confident they will follow up on those confirmations. We are waiting on replies from around 15 more clubs!

If you are a member of a Z-club, tell your club president you heard about the event here and want to be included! If you're in the southeast or south regions, chances are we have contacted the club already and are just waiting to hear back from them.

If you or your club needs more information about attending or sponsoring the event, you should contact Andy Morris at mcduck@earthlink.net

Vendor Attendance/Sponsorship
Z-car parts and service vendors interesting in attaining a vendor spot and/or sponsoring this event should contact Morris Morgan at mlmorgan5@adelphia.net. NOTE! Space is very limited, so if you are an interested vendor, contact us soon!!!

We have just started soliciting vendors so we still have no confirmations at this time, but there has been pretty high interest in vendors sponsoring the event. Still not to clear a picture on actual vendor's coming to set up in the vendor lot.

Other Information

Sport Z Magazine has informed me that they will be attending to cover the event!

Fontana Village Resort is our host resort for the event. Find out more about the location at their website...www.fontanavillage.com

Tail of the Dragon.com is sponsoring the event. Tail of the Dragon products will be available at ZDayZ and you can find out A LOT more about the event location by visiting their website... www.tailofthedragon.com


That is all for now! Updates to come as we get more confirmations and news!

mcduck

If you decide to book rooms for this event early, be sure to tell Fontana Village Resort that you are booking a room for the ZDayZ event and what Z-club you are attending with, if applicable!

The last part is very important if your club is sponsoring the event.

Room rates for this event are at a 20% discount to those listed on the Fontana Village website.

350zSpeedRacer

Wow! Andy this sounds like it's going to be a helluva time! I'm gonna have to talk to hubby tonight and see if we can take a mini vacation next May.

mcduck

It's kind of far, but we did send an invite to the Z Club of Texas, Christi. Maybe you can start up a list for a caravan!

mcduck

Hey, Christi... I know it would be here for a while, but is there any way I can convince you (or one of the other moderators) to make this a "sticky"????

RedHerring2

I'd be there, but not likely now that my wife is due to deliver twins sometime in that period. Can't go just before, can't go just after. ( would that seem irresponsible? insensitive? )

Have fun, you bastages.

aengus777

hey mcduck
will you repost this closer to may as well?
i live in sylva/cullowhee area so its right down the road.
it sounds like great fun!!
my superblack track will be there wearing its new volk gt7s in gunmetal and---who knows what else by may!

mcduck

Hopefully, this thread will keep popping up toward the top of the list as we post updates.

Also, everyone please tell your friends with earlier generation Zs... I've posted on zcar.com, but am not familiar with all the earlier Z car sources on the web. Trying to get the word out to as many people as possible!

Morris

iTrader: (1)

As one of your able assistants (well maybe just one of your assistants) you know I will be there.

Should have news on sponsors SOON!!

88 Shrio Special

iTrader: (1)

I am making arrangements NOW!!!!! Karl

350ZnTN

Looks like a rockin' good time, count me in!!

z-bear

so we loaded up the Z and head north like a hill billy...

I say we just give that Z a chance to stretch it's legs

I'm in...

VandyZ

iTrader: (2)

Just some questions and concerns . . .

I have been volunteered to be the club liaison for this event (notifications and such) and am writing an email to all members of the Middle Tennessee Z Club. Now I know what it takes to have a successful Z event and I also know how easy it is for one to be unsuccessful.

I am personally having a hard time putting together an email to "sell" this event to our club members. (A sale has to be made because it involves $$ and travel) One of my concerns is the advanced notice required for this event. I don’t know about your area Z people, but an 8 month notice with promise of a drive and a few events with little event info (or event pricing info) and no clear Z club or ZCCA backing will not cut it, especially with a 2 week deadline. Our club meets first Thursday of each month so this deadline falls in between meetings.

Please post more “hard” information and possibly delay the deadline.

I have received the emails and have read your above post, so if I have missed anything I am truly sorry. I look forward to this event and hope we can attend. I know the MTZC would add all sorts of craZyness and fun to this event.

If we can get a good showing by the end of next week consider this event on our event calendar. It would also be a good idea to get this on the ZCCA calendar. We can do that for you if you want.
Adam
MTZC

MY350Z.COM

iTrader: (2)

just curious, is this all legal? a bunch of my motorcycle buddies rode the dragon in an event and cops were waiting for them and had hidden cameras and stuff.

mcduck

Adam, I'll try to answer your questions as best as I am able at the moment. That's what this thread is for, afterall!

Required notice...
We wanted to plan far enough ahead of time so people could put this on their calendars now. It's different for a single day event... with planning a weekend (basically 2 to 2 1/2 days worth of activities), we figured it would be better to set it up in advance than to wait.

Events...
This is going to largely be a "driving" event. That's why we selected the location we did. The organizers (including me) visited the area and scouted it out several weeks ago. What we found was a cornucopia of great roads to drive the Z on. You could probably spend a whole week up there and not hit all of them! Of course, we'll only have 2 or 3 days, so we'll be creating route itineraries to help people out.

Besides driving, we know we will have a car show. The location we have reserved includes a couple of large areas for such activities. In fact, the Miata and Subaru clubs already visit every year for similar weekend meets. We haven't finalized what the car show will entail, but we're figuring at least awards for each generation of Z, best of categories (int, ext, paint, etc), and people's choice categories... maybe combine the last two somehow.

I cannot say there will definitely be a Dyno Day until I confirm that we can get a dyno there. So far, I have only been able to find DynaPack dynos (hub dyno) and I don't think we'll have many people that will want to take off their wheel to dyno their car. If we can track down a mobile drum dyno at a reasonable price, it will be there. But I need to confirm that before I can put it as definite thing.

Though we have not had many vendors sign on yet to be at the show, we have had several who have expressed interested in sponsoring the show and would like to contribute to the car show prizes / giveaway pool. I should add, we are just now starting to solicit vendors. We had hoped to get more back from the car clubs first so we could let the vendors know how many clubs/cars to expect. As such, we contacted the clubs first and will begin to really pursue vendors in the coming weeks.

There will be daily prize drawings if we get the vendor sponsorship it seems we are going to get based on initial contacts.

I did not put this down earlier because I need to still confirm it with Fontana Village Resort, but we'd like to have a "Welcome Dinner" for the event, either Thursday or Friday.

Event costs...
Can be broken down to 4 basic things...
Your room - which will be 20% off regular price
Your travel costs - whatever it takes to get you and your Z there
Food - You'd have to eat no matter where you are, so I never consider this an expense
Car Show - If you enter the car show, there will be an entry fee for it.
I realize the room and travel will exclude some people's ability to participate, but then we never expected 100% participation from any club. We would like to see decent representation from the clubs we invited. While we're discussing that....

"no clear club support"
If there is no clear club support, I can only point the finger at the clubs themselves. We have invited 19(!) Z Clubs in the southeast to sponsor the event. The sponsorship fee for each club is a super low $100.

If only 2 people book rooms at the 20% discount, the club is basically breaking even. 3 or more and you come out ahead on overall savings... not to mention the free room program we are offering for getting lots of members to attend... no to mention clubs can buy event t-shirts at a discount. Prices haven't been finalized, but it will likely be $18 or so regular price and closer to $14 for club preorders. This will be for high quality cotton shirts with 6-color screen printing.

Also, we specifically did not "affiliate" with a single club to create the event because we wanted all clubs to have an equal stake in the formation of this event. At this time, I have heard back from about 10 clubs on the list. Two have given verbal commitments, but have to formalize the sponsorship at their meetings. Several more have expressed interest. Only 2 out of the 10 indicated not being able to participate (as a club... some of their members may still attend). We are still waiting formal responses from many since the club requests only went out about a week ago. If we get 8 or 9 clubs to sign on, we'll be very happy. Of course, we'll post the clubs here as they agree to sponsor!

no clear... ZCCA backing...
No, there's not... and that has more to do with my lack of familiarity with soliciting such backing. Adam (or anyone else), if you want to send me some information on how to solicit ZCCA support, I'd be happy to pursue it. As long as ZCCA backing does not conflict with the basic premise of the event (getting to really drive your Z), I think it can only be a good thing that will pay some long term benefits. If anyone has the information on making this a ZCCA event, send it to me here

Club Sponsorship Deadline...
Adam (and other club reps), we have extended this deadline to November 10th to allow clubs more time to meet and discuss. Unfortunately, we cannot stretch it out much farther because we really must finalize the room block size with our host resort. Hopefully, the extra 3 weeks is enough time for everyone.

I'd like to add that we want this event to be successful so we'll work with all the clubs as best we can to ensure everyone participates that really wants to participate.


<whew> sorry that was soooo long, but I think Adam expressed some legitimate concerns and I wanted to be sure to address them as best I could.

As always, if there is further questions, on any of the information I posted, please post it here or contact me directly!

mcduck

it is if you obey the speed limit.

Also, the Tail of the Dragon website is very good about monitoring police activity in the area and posting it to keep you aware.

The event is not condoning speeding on any of the roads, that is entirely at the driver's risk.

I will add that on many of the roads we scouted a few weeks ago, I'd be shocked if you could break the speed limit! On the Dragon itself, there were times I thought I was going to be able to touch the back of the car with the front of my car because the curves were so tight.

MY350Z.COM

iTrader: (2)

i don't see how you can keep within limit when you go to the dragon

publisher

If we don't have a date conflict, Art Singer (associate publisher and graphic designer) will represent Sport Z Magazine at the ZDayZ at Tail of the Dragon. We have a lot of friends in the southeast and we would love to join the fun and say our howdy's in person.

We will put the event date on our home page in early spring and highlight the event in our Spring 2004 issue.

Andy, if your event is as successful as I think it will be, will it become an annual event?

Bob

mcduck

Bob, I've got a secret... I haven't even shared it with the other event planners, but I'll tell you if you keep it hush-hush... okay?

My hope is, if things go well this year, we can make it an annual event and have it be the east coast equivalent of the West Coast Nationals by our third year or sooner!

Another thing I have been pondering is moving the location year to year (still in the southeast, of course)...

Of course, it's easy to dream... for now, I'm trying just to concentrate on putting together a good 1st year event.

BTW, can anyone give me some guidance on seeking ZCCA sanctioning??????

publisher

Andy, I'll talk to Mike Taylor next week after he returns from the National Z Car Convention in NH. Mike will know exactly what to do.

Bob