Since I started racing, custom races have never timed out. Until last night.
Official races won't add more people once the time is up, and won't start without a minimum number of people. That makes sense to me, though I think they should officially cancel once the time is up.
But unofficial races never have, and that also makes sense. If you just want to do a long race with anyone who shows up, you could set it for a 1 minute delay, and if it takes 30 minutes for someone to join, the race would start soon after someone else joined the race.
Last night, I set up a 100 lap race on Docks. I think I put a 20 minute wait, but I can't remember for sure.
The race never happened, and this morning I had an event saying "Race Docks timed out. Click here to join a new race."
I'm not seeing any advantage in this (apparent) change. It just means we get less racing in. The biggest effect will be on racers trying to get their 250 wins. In the past, you could set up a race with no extra wait time and it would run as soon as someone joined the race. Now, (assuming I understand the change correctly) if you do that, if nobody joins in the first minute, the race will cancel.