Looking at the results in various classes, I'm curious what folks who
ran thought of the statement Jean Kinser relayed from BSP that "south
course was car, north course was driver." I went home thinking both
courses were "car" to some extent, but fooling with some of the numbers
at <http://ponycar.net/Solo2.asp> has me reconsidering that opinion.
The main thing that I thought affected the south course was the tight
turns followed by long straights. In C Stock where I ran, this tended
to favor the MR2 a little as that car can pivot, hook up, and GO
somewhat more than the Miata can. I had a few observers tell me that
the several top MR2's were visibly faster than the Miatas in these
sections. Despite this apparent disadvantage, Andy Hollis was leading
overall in our (uhh, his :) car through the first two runs 2nd day and
finished 0.48 sec out of 1st. Likewise, the Corvettes should have had
an advantage on the south course, yet the RX7 TT's held on. Can anyone
point to a class that had a clear car-biased trend on the south course?
The north course had a few more transitional elements but still
required the ability to accelerate hard out of tight corners (and the
brainpower not to go in too fast! :) In addition, having three 180
degree turns placed emphasis on steady state g-forces. I heard several
people call this more of a "driver" course, yet I didn't see a whole
lot of reshuffling in results as classes went from one course to the
other. Did both courses favor the same type of car, or were both more
or less car neutral? I haven't seen enough evidence to conclude one or
the other, but my gut feeling is neither was really biased.
What's the consensus here? Should the courses be more "equalized"
among different types of car, or were this year's courses more
equalized than they looked at first glance? I want to mention this in
my evaluation form, so I'd appreciate hearing some more viewpoints
first.
BTW everyone deserves a round of applause for making the largest BY FAR
Nats ever go off so smoothly. I hope the banquet ticket issues will be
fixed next year, and I'm sure there were other glitches, but an event
growing 15+ percent in one year could have had lots more trouble than
it did.
Cheers,
Craig Blome
CS #2 Licensed Professional Tire Warmer :)
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