--On Tuesday, December 30, 2003 8:42 AM -0700 CHARLES J VOBORIL
<cvoboril@msn.com> wrote:
> "There are those who would love to run FF2000" is evidenced by Josh in
> this discussion.
> Sample of one yesterday, I admit.
Wow, a massive discussion that I just caught up on.
Chuck, Josh is an existing nationally competitive autocrosser, a past
national champion in CM. When he (or any member of the group of people
you're choosing him to represent) selects a car, he evaluates the classing
structure, his own driving talent, and interests to select something that
will be fun for him and in which he can win. If the FF2000 is that car, he
will select it. If not, then he'll choose something else. He has only
professed that the concept of a GCR-legal FF2000 holds interest for him,
but if it's not competitive anywhere, it's not like he's not going to
participate in Solo II.
You seem to agree that crossover from club racing or kart racing has been
proven over and over again to be a dream. People don't cross over, for the
most part. People select the sport in which they are interested and choose
vehicles and classes appropriate for that sport. Classing the FF2000
competitively is simply not going to increase the numbers of Solo II
participants. It *may* increase the number of Modified participants at the
expense of other categories, and we could evaluate whether that is a
worthwhile goal.
The only crossover concept that is at all relevant is crossover of the
vehicle. When designing or restructuring a class, we must ensure that
there is a reasonable supply of vehicles for competitors choosing that
class. If it were difficult to acquire or keep a CM car today then this
might be cause for squeezing the FF2000 into CM, but it isn't.
On the other hand, some of the extant BM proposals point out the lack of
growth in that class, the nature of the vehicles (overweight DSRs and
bastardized Atlantics), and suggest that vehicle accessibility might be an
issue there. If so, then work on that, not on undermining one of the very
tenets of the most successful Modified class we have -- true GCR
conformance.
Regardless of whether an overweight FF2000 without wings has the
appropriate performance parameters for CM, it's a poor fit. It is my
opinion that there would be little to no benefit and several potential
downsides. It has been an interesting academic exercise, but it's time to
move on.
Of course, it is the class in which I have participated for ten seasons, so
I may be more biased than I am knowledgeable and wise. I'll leave that for
all of you to decide.
Mark
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