SCCAForums.com

OwenRiehle:

Seriously, why bother?  The SPAC has spent years doing their best to not have to make any really tough decisions. 

Just to clarify, the A and C in SPAC stand for Advisory Committee.  They only advise.  The SEB makes the decisions.

Whether you're for the proposals or against them, please write your comments to the SEB.  Posted here, they play absolutely no role in the decision process.  seb@scca.com.  It'd be helpful to include your SCCA member number.

Mike
 

OwenRiehle:

CamaroFS34:

Jazzie604:

I wonder why there is no   "DSP NEEDS TO BE FIXED! SEND A LETTER!"   thread?

That was last year's bitchfest, and when "move all 3-series BMWs from DSP to BSP" was put out for member comment, it was shot down.

It was last years bitchfest, but it wasn't shot down!  They said we need to evaluate the impact of wide 15" tires on the class dyanimc, so wait and see.

It wasn't shot down the year before either (but was a bitchfest), when they needed to evaluate the turbo rule change.  Wait and see.

I was being somewhat facetious with my post. It was more to point out that the "DSP needs to be fixed" thing has already been played out, and that there is a lot more handwringing going on than just BSP. It's just that BSP is just the most vocal issue right now, with a lot of misinformation and "sky-is-falling" arguments being thrown out there.

Did you know that AWD or turbo cars by themselves are the devil? The Evos and the STis, being AWD and turbo, therefore, must be the Archdukes of Hell. "Stompy" is just a euphemism for Beezlebub, and Andrew Lieber? Hell, his car "setup" techniques are the work of Lucifer himself. We won't even get into what kind of deal Tom Berry struck up with Satan in order to get that 1.4 second win.

---

Karen Kraus
2005 SCCA SEDiv FS Champion
2007 SCCA DSL National Champion
2008 SCCA ProSolo L1 Champion

BSPC5:

Lot of hand wringing in this thread. One thing everyone should consider is the fact that HPT's surface has influenced the results at nationals quite a bit. If the nats were held on a larger, (dry) concrete surface, BSP would be fine as is with no argument, IMHO. The real issue is slippery asphalt and rain, where the Evo is going to be almost untouchable when set up and driven well. Obviously, at a Pro the AWD is a monster advantage too. Good luck making up the 2-3 tenths per side at the start.

And from the very leading "second survey" after Nats this year, and other anecdotal rumors I keep hearing, all of that could change as early as 2009 (Personally, I think it can't come soon enough, but I digress...)

 

Part of the question here should be " do we class cars by national results or results at Nationals?" 

As someone involved in official classing decisions for over a decade, I can tell you that the former is more true than the later.  *All* national results are looked at, and sometimes even regional results when there are key match-ups and good first-hand (like on the AC/SEB itself) knowledge of the circumstances involved.  But, like any data usage, it comes down to interpretation.  Obvious disparities are obvious. Only a truly open mind can find the real trends and sort out the course/condition dependencies, driver influences, and prep differences.  Do we really have any truly open minds on the rulesmaking committees with the knowledge and passion to sort through the limited data, and the courage to follow-through with appropriate classings?

--Andy "stirring the pot"

 

OwenRiehle:

CamaroFS34:

Jazzie604:

I wonder why there is no   "DSP NEEDS TO BE FIXED! SEND A LETTER!"   thread?

That was last year's bitchfest, and when "move all 3-series BMWs from DSP to BSP" was put out for member comment, it was shot down.

It was last years bitchfest, but it wasn't shot down!  They said we need to evaluate the impact of wide 15" tires on the class dyanimc, so wait and see.

It wasn't shot down the year before either (but was a bitchfest), when they needed to evaluate the turbo rule change.  Wait and see.

Don't even think it...the discussion wasn't shot down the year before that (but was officially entering it's second year of bitchfest) , when it was stated that the rules changes to cam phasing, COULD change the results, but we really needed to wait and see before messing everything up with something as big as a class change.

The year before that it was stated that the results might be a fluke.  We should wait and see, then evaluate and MAYBE make changes.

And when, the year before that, a small group of very knowledgeable people seriously asked how in the heck did the BMWs get into DSP after the big shakeup to the "all dominant" X-1/9, the subject was politely changed.  They distracted everyone by bitching about neons instead.  HA! suckers.

 

Seriously, why bother?  The SPAC has spent years doing their best to not have to make any really tough decisions.  When is someone going to wake and realize that there has been so many updates to rules,  new cars, strange frankenhybrids developed, and actual performance development of both cars and parts that the current classing structure is ....COMPLETELY......UTTERLY.....BROKEN.   Take every car listed in the back, throw them up in the air and redo the whole section.  Better yet, treat it like motorcycle manufactur's do.  Every 2 years there are adjustments, and every 4 there is a complete redo.

 O

 

 

 

 

 

Your kidding right. Do you honestly think that an entire restructure would make any difference. There will ALWAYS be a percieved 'top car'.  And every class WILL have a car best suited. All a restructure would do is POSSIBLY change what cars in what classes are the top of the ladder cars to compete in....One or two years later these same discussion will come up and we will start the entire mess over again............................

 

IMO the A/C and SEB does a GREAT job with a thankless job full of trying to keep a group of panicky whiners semi happy............................If a car is blatently outclassing everything else in the class the SEB will do something about it. They just can't make knee jerk decisions

---

BMW 325. SM project.

Goodbye ESP, hello SM.

If you are going to buy wide wheels, buy wide tires and don't be a retard.

Seriously true.  Interesting enough the starter of this thread chose not to run this year because he was afraid he was outclassed in BSP and many people point out Harold Olsen's performance as proof.  But Harold Olsen was 1.2 seconds behind the winning car in both 2005 and 2006. and now he's 1.4 behind the winning car in 2007.  The difference is it was a corvette in 2005.  So it looks like maybe 2 tenths of a difference between Rita's corvette and the BSP Evo driven by Tom Berry.  

On the same thought,  Rita would have won ASP in 2005 and Piccone would have been second,  but those might be anomalous conclusions as the weather may as usual make comparison between run groups unreasonable.

That certainly deflates the case that the EVo is uber competitive in BSP.  Its hard to have much sympathy for people that don't even bother to show up to race.

---

lamoureaux
BSP 2004 STi
Wichita, Ks

thunderbird:

Seriously true.  Interesting enough the starter of this thread chose not to run this year because he was afraid he was outclassed in BSP and many people point out Harold Olsen's performance as proof.  But Harold Olsen was 1.2 seconds behind the winning car in both 2005 and 2006. and now he's 1.4 behind the winning car in 2007.  The difference is it was a corvette in 2005.  So it looks like maybe 2 tenths of a difference between Rita's corvette and the BSP Evo driven by Tom Berry.  

On the same thought,  Rita would have won ASP in 2005 and Piccone would have been second,  but those might be anomalous conclusions as the weather may as usual make comparison between run groups unreasonable.

That certainly deflates the case that the EVo is uber competitive in BSP.  Its hard to have much sympathy for people that don't even bother to show up to race.

So you assume no development or driver improvement occurred in the Olsen camp between 2005 and 2007?  You assume that Harold drove as well in 2005 as he did in 2006 and 2007?  Maybe in 2005 he had a bad year.  Your argument is missing some details. 

Lee ran his M3 in 2006 when he saw the writing on the wall that the car wasn't competitive anymore, based on how far behind the leaders he was in 2006 despite doing some of his best driving.  Compared to barely losing in 2005.  Lee has stated in this thread that he makes the (1150 mile) trek to Topeka to WIN, not to simply compete for a trophy.  If he knows that his car isn't capable of winning, why bother going?  That's the whole point of this classing discussion.

John

 

---

John Vitamvas
stranoparts.com / TeamWTF.org '04 Z06

John V:

Lee ran his M3 in 2006 when he saw the writing on the wall that the car wasn't competitive anymore, based on how far behind the leaders he was in 2006 despite doing some of his best driving.  Compared to barely losing in 2005. 

Lee may have been doing his best driving in 2006, but I honestly don't think the car was at its best either... and I say that having driven the car at the ProSolo Finale that year, which is also when Lee ended up driving Mitch Beranek's lightweight for Sunday morning's runs and in the Challenge round at the Finale.

I think there are a LOT of variables, and unless the classes are running at the same time on the same courses, I don't think you can honestly make a valid comparison -- at any event, for or against a move for any car, much less the rally cars. If they were running at the same time on opposite courses, it's not the same thing as running on the same course. And a driver saying they felt "on" for a run is also very subjective. I felt "on" for my second run at Dixie on Sunday. It was only hundredths faster than my first run, where I mis-shifted into fourth instead of downshifting into second. Maybe my butt-dyno needs to be recalibrated, but I honestly don't know what I did "wrong" on a run that otherwise felt great. My point is that how a driver "feels" about a given set of runs doesn't always mean that the runs actually were as good or bad as they felt.

I wish this thread would just die.

---

Karen Kraus
2005 SCCA SEDiv FS Champion
2007 SCCA DSL National Champion
2008 SCCA ProSolo L1 Champion

I wish this thread had never been started and I wish the SPAC didn't have a request for comments on whether EVo and STi should be bumped up to ASP and I wished that people did their racing on the track and let their right foot do the talking for them.  But this thread was started and there is an open discussion on whether to reclass the Evo and STi,  so I keep coming back to this thread.  No ill will towards anyone,  I may try to use wordsmithing too much, or try to refute someone else's points with information as I see it,  and others have pointed out the fallacies of comparing even cars running in the same class at the same event in the same weather.  Obviously none of us drives our cars to the limits of their potentials every time we hit the track.  I can never truthfully tell if one run or another was the very best I could do.  

As far as on topic goes,  I wrote a letter to SPAC requesting a tweener class with the noncompetitive ASP cars grouped with Evo and STi and good luck to BSP with its remnants.  I still haven't received a log number,  so,  I return to the forum to continue the discussion.  I hope others,  except maybe not Lee ;-)  have had bettter luck getting letters into SPAC for their perview.

 

---

lamoureaux
BSP 2004 STi
Wichita, Ks

Look up your division's SPAC member on scca.com and e-mail them a copy of your letter so they can post it on the SPAC message board.  Their e-mail addresses are posted.  From what I was told, you only receive a log number with a new issue.  When responding to a request for member comment, at most you'll get an acknowledgment.

---

Dave Heinig

07 GXP Z0K (Thanks Rob!)

So the April Fastrack put the 335/328 and 135/128 in BSP.  Anybody think that affects this debate?

---

Dave Heinig

07 GXP Z0K (Thanks Rob!)

DaveH:

So the April Fastrack put the 335/328 and 135/128 in BSP.  Anybody think that affects this debate?

Not really...who's going to spend the big money to be a guinea pig and try it, particularly given the porkiness of both the 3 and 1 series?

At least, with the current expensive cars in class (prepped Evo or STi), you know you have the best platform...and, those models have each been out long enough that used examples are starting to really come down in price, enabling more to be built on "average" Solo II budgets...so, why bother with a very pricey, overweight, new BMW?

---

In slow, out fast.
In fast, out backwards.

We are talking SP here and it is a known things that money was never an issue there. If you add the money that BMW pays (I hope they still do) for winning with their cars, it makes perfect sense to get one of the new toys and make them pretty fast!!

Also, I was told that there are people out there with money...

Fedja

---

95 AWD #34 SM or ESP
"Let boost be with you...
...and bring some timing too!"
http://www.geocities.com/esp_er

DaveH:

Look up your division's SPAC member on scca.com and e-mail them a copy of your letter so they can post it on the SPAC message board.  Their e-mail addresses are posted.  From what I was told, you only receive a log number with a new issue.  When responding to a request for member comment, at most you'll get an acknowledgment.

Just an FYI - I sent my letter (email) to the SEB yesterday around 12:00am, and this came back about an hour later:

Your comments have been logged 08-154 for Evo/Sti from BSP to ASP comments and sent to the SEB.

Thanks for your input!

Fedja J.:

We are talking SP here and it is a known things that money was never an issue there. If you add the money that BMW pays (I hope they still do) for winning with their cars, it makes perfect sense to get one of the new toys and make them pretty fast!!

Also, I was told that there are people out there with money...

Fedja

No BMW money as of last year... boo...

---

Mike Shields
1993 BMW 325is | 92/192 DSP

Mike Shields:

No BMW money as of last year... boo...

Sorry to hear that Champ!! At least it was good while it lasted!!!

 

Fedja

---

95 AWD #34 SM or ESP
"Let boost be with you...
...and bring some timing too!"
http://www.geocities.com/esp_er

AStockVette:

Just an FYI - I sent my letter (email) to the SEB yesterday around 12:00am, and this came back about an hour later:

Your comments have been logged 08-154 for Evo/Sti from BSP to ASP comments and sent to the SEB.

Thanks for your input!

Brian Harmer

Solo Technical Assistant

 

"Breathtaking.  I shall call him Mini-Doug!" 

--Dr Evil.

 

AStockVette:

DaveH:

Look up your division's SPAC member on scca.com and e-mail them a copy of your letter so they can post it on the SPAC message board.  Their e-mail addresses are posted.  From what I was told, you only receive a log number with a new issue.  When responding to a request for member comment, at most you'll get an acknowledgment.

Just an FYI - I sent my letter (email) to the SEB yesterday around 12:00am, and this came back about an hour later:

Your comments have been logged 08-154 for Evo/Sti from BSP to ASP comments and sent to the SEB.

Thanks for your input!

Brian Harmer

Solo Technical Assistant

 

Hmm... So somebody BS'd me.  Looks like I need to keep e-mailing my letter. 

---

Dave Heinig

07 GXP Z0K (Thanks Rob!)

DaveH:

So the April Fastrack put the 335/328 and 135/128 in BSP.  Anybody think that affects this debate?

I thought that might happen. Makes me even more curious why the Sol GXP and Sky Redline remain in A/SP. Hopefully this will be address in the upcoming round of SAC/SEB meetings.

 

edit; Found out today (03-22-08) that the Sol GXP and Sky Redline move to B/SP will be considered in April.

---

Bob Buxbaum
Lee's Summit, Mo.

Yeah....

Time to prep the M3 for FP... 

---

Lee
FStock Shelby GT