If the car had been slightly higher or lower, farther down the track, farther up the track, whatever, a husband and father would be back with his family today after a fun weekend at the races. Instead, the sport now faces even more vituperation from the jackals of the media and legal worlds. In exchange for standing out in the sun, wind, rain, heat, cold, damp, whatever, we get, if we're lucky, a free lunch, and maybe dogs on the barby plus liquid refreshment on Saturday evening. Come Sunday morning, we get to do it all over again, after which it's a drive home so as to be at work Monday to earn the money and vacation time to get to that next race. They're bigger than we like to admit.
Vacation is eaten up a day or two at a time, driving to and from races.
For a major event like the SCCA Runoffs or a Grand Prix, we have to plan a year or more in advance. Motel rates are invariably jacked up for events of this sort, often with a multi-day minimum stay. A cheap Grand Prix for a marshal might come to a grand or more. Room sharing can cut costs, but even so, it's not cheap. And then there's the constant give and take of keeping our homelife in order.