> But yes, the target has to be large enough to be significant.
More than that. The class needs to be able to generate the kinds of numbers
that can justify creating it in the first place.
We have too many classes as it sits. Unless a new class is pulling in LARGE
numbers, it isn't really needed. We don't need any more "3 cars at Tours,
20-ish cars at Nationals" classes.
If one is going to cause all the pain of adding a new class, it had better
be a "15 cars at Tours, 40-ish cars at Nationals" kind of class to justify
it.
>> the class should be deep enough to make bottomfeeding either class
>> a low-percentage option.
> Agree, but how long must the wait be? How many times does it have to do
> that?
Based on my experience, a minimum of 2 years in the best case, and
furthermore, there should be no more than 2 Sup classes in the pipeline at
any one time.
Make numbers 2 years in a row, you're in. Fail to make numbers 2 years in a
row, you're gone. That's the way the current system works, and so far, so
good.
> If you get some "decently-prepped ESP car"
> winning, then the class is challenged to rise to that level.
Not when a class is new.
New classes are fragile things. They totally depend on the good will and
egos of the people who have taken the risk to invest in the class in the
first place. Bottomfeeders trash egos, and trashed egos find someplace else
to play.
Once it gets established, a class develops its own community, and its own
zietgiest. Once that's in place, an attempt at bottomfeeding - and
especially, a SUCESSFUL attempt at bottom feeding - might (would be, in the
SM case today) be taken as a challenge and an opportunity. But not in the
early years.
You'll have to trust me on this one. I've been there.
>> True enough. But the current sup system protects the embryo sup classes
by
>> making them unattractive to all but the people who really "are" members
of
>> the class.
> Seems like working against itself there. You want attractive.
You want "attractive" _to the people and cars you expect to populate your
class_ You do NOT want "attractive" to people who are going to skim the
first couple of easy wins, and then skip town for the next easy target.
If you are foisting another new class on the sport, you want it populated
with the people who believe in the class concept so passionately, so
completely, that they are willing to take the risks and buck the
unattractive aspects of being an early adoptor because they intend to stick
around for a long time. You want settlers, not carpetbaggers and
transients.
But even true believers can be tasked beyond all endurance, and that's
pretty well what bottomfeeders do. They spoil the party by taking a win
away from "one of our own".
>> But at the same time, our performance as a class relative to the rest of
>> the sport and to our own potential was way, way below the curve.
> Says who?
Says everyone who was involved. When you take an ESP or BSP car, throw all
kinds of extra modifications at it that are supposed to make the car go
faster, and then you run slower times than the classes the cars came from
in the first place, it's a fair assumption that you're behind the curve.
> What, for example, is the curve in Prepared
Oooohhh... you don't want to go there, or I'll just wind up pissing Mark
Andy off again. :)
> If you think SM had reached its potential this year,
SM reached, on average, its _minimum acceptable_ potential this year. It
will continue to get much faster with time, of that I have no doubt.
It has gotten strong enough now that an attempt to bottomfeed is unlikely
to succeed. If you like, it's no longer "on the bottom" to be fed upon.
DG
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