I hope the List doesn't mind if I weigh in on this issue. BTW, I'm really
glad that this has come up; it seems much more strategically "on target"
than much of what I've seen in the few months I've been on-List.
I compete (if that's what the kids are calling it these days) only
occassionally here in San Diego. That's to say that I'm not a competive
driver, and I don't have a competitive car. But I'd LIKE to be, and I
really enjoy autocross (especially here in San Diego) when I DO
participate.
My perspective is that my previous sport was competitive-level sport
shooting. That's a sport that IS at the Olympic level, yet what sport
shooting faces is declining participation as both the participants age (and
the youngsters find other sports) and the legislative environment becomes
more and more hostile. In the nations most similar to ours, though without
our Constitution (the oldest in the world, BTW), England and Australia
recently have banned ALL private ownership of firearms.
Whether or not anyone reading this thinks this is a good or bad idea, let's
not see it happen with "sports" cars. For example, if Australia can ban
using cell phones while a car is moving, and make it illegal for a child to
ride in the front seats, and are in the process of banning private
ownership of cats -- yes, cats --, someone could surely think of banning
such distracting driving features as manual shifters.
So it seems to me, that IF the strategy of Solo II is to keep and even
increase participation, and to encourage technological improvements in
automobiles, and to keep "sports" cars street legal, then the current rules
surely make this difficult.
For example, even with a better "nut holding the wheel", my Mustang SVO
(1986) is not competitive prepared to either FS or ESP when it's faced with
late model Camaros with "racing" (wink) tires. That's not the Camaro
drivers' fault -- they chose a car with a superior suspension, and the
Hoosiers are Solo II legal. And I CHOSE to "run what I brung" and to use
street tires, so I'm not complaining about that.
But when you have rules that allow full roll cages for chassis stiffness,
but preclude common three-point strut bars for Mustangs (for the record,
these won't fit on my car anyway, so this is not sour grapes); when I can
add an expensive torque arm suspension with Panhard rod but can't have an
alternator that puts out less than stock output; when I can run a
free-flowing exhaust from cylinder head to exhaust tip (I know, with the
standard cat) but can't relocate my alternator; when I can remove my a/c
system in its entirety but can't bypass a failed heater core; when I can
enable wider tires and wheels by adding fender flares, but can't remove the
factory trim; when I can run a bigger intercooler but can't have a block
deck incidentally milled more than .010"; when I can run water injection
for more power but can't have my battery in the passenger compartment; it
seems to me that this IS the "slippery slope" I hear so much about.
Personally I have no problem with SVTs competing as stock cars. I've seen
Honda CRXs run the same times as fully prepped Corvettes, and that's more
impressive to me than the thickness of the wallet it takes to compete the
latest Mustang Cobra with Kumhos on it.
If we want more participation, and we think that can only be accomplished
by making it affordable, then I'd like to see ways that a used $2,000
Mustang can be prepped on street tires to compete with brand new $40,000
cars with "racing" tires. THAT would increase participation.
Just my two cents worth. I know I've stuck my neck WAY out here, and hope
you all will take my comments as the constructive suggestions they're
intended to be.
Thanks for listening.
Richard Nichols
San Diego, CA USA
rnichol1@san.rr.com
86 Ford Mustang SVO (61B) - 1C
(The Thinking Man's Mustang)
72 Ford Pinto 2.0 (62B) - 3J
(Over Three Million Served)
Rich Fletcher, Chair, SCAC, said:
> Since 1986, we've had a lot of good ideas that have been eclipsed by
> technological and production line changes. The idea of a "pure" stock
car
> is one of them. Every quarter(year) it seems we get a new tweak. This
> quarter it's the Mustang Cobra SVT. Plenty of numbers (3,000/yr.)
> according to Ford, but with all these extra goodies when compared to its
> older F-Stock Mustang stable mates, is it really "stock"? My opinion is
> that this is an evolving game, and the tighter we try to make our grip on
> stock, the more cars will slip through it. So, it's always going to be a
> tough call, and people like Charlie are needed to question where we're
> going. It's healthy and worthwhile to ponder. Look, I can't guarantee
> anyone that the Type-R will remain in G-Stock, or move to D-Stock, but
> wouldn't put money on it going to a street prepared class. If it was
1982,
> sure it would. But the whole concept of Street Prepared has evolved way
> beyond where it was ten or fifteen years ago, and so has Stock. Over the
> years, the SEB and SCAC have done a good job of trying to balance what
the
> membership wants to do with "Stock" against what has traditionally been
> done. It's like continually reengineering a Microslop program that has
to
> be backwards compatible with a 286 computer. We've tried one size fits
all
> concepts- to only mediocre effect. Not everybody is going to be happy
with
> the status quo. So, just like Microslop, we've got development bugs.
> Unlike Microslop, we can't bully the manufacturers within our market into
> seeing the world through our windows. We can't tell Ford, Acura, or
anyone
> else to play the game our way and make the cars "Stock". Charlie's
stock
> is stock paradigm might have worked if it could have been implemented in
> the 1980s- AND, if Street Prepared had not evolved since then. Today,
> however, we'd disenfranchise a lot of car owners. Among them, people
with
> the Neon ACR, the Type R, the BMW M-anything, any Porsche with M030 sport
> suspension, and on and on. I would love to go back and find a way to
> reengineer the status quo, but that isn't going to happen- not with the
> kinds of cars that are being produced today, and not with the way in
which
> some of these cars are being produced. (Shortened production runs to
> maximize profits, or staunch red ink, or out-sourcing through
> SLP/SVT/Mugen/M/YouNameIt collaborations or "special options".) The line
> between Stock and what one might consider Street Prepared is blurring.
> Charlie and others are right to question what's going on. We're being
> forced to make tougher calls than we had to in the past with respect to
> what constitutes a modern "stock" sports car.
>
> Thus, the question of "What is Stock?" could be answered differently in
> each succeeding year. Even the seemingly tranquil island of C-Stock -a
> class made up of true "sports cars" of recent vintage- is contested
within
> the membership. It too will change as cars like the Miata 1.6 are
> eventually moved into it, having outlived their competitive life in
> B-Stock. And with all the other classes, even if we change nothing, the
> cars will change and with them the nature of Stock. That's my personal
take
> on it.
>
> Rich Fletcher
> Chair, SCAC
>
> PS- my spell checker suggests G-String to replace G-Stock...
>
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