A VOTE FOR TIME BASED CLASSES

[mazmad]

A bun fight in Spec Miata in the US on the weekend.

The 9 top finishers were protested, result being the top 6 were penalised for illegal builds.
(Sounds like it is a matter of interpretation of murky regs, as always).

[zossy1]

We will have to agree to disagree CD - I respect your view and I really am excited about the success of the MX5 cup this year, but I still yearn for rules to build a car to.

The cheaters were caught, after all ;) And the SM rule book does encourage creative interpretation at times. I guess it comes from my time in karts.

[david_syd_au]

Rule 1: Mazda MX-5/Roadster/Miata chassis
Rule 2: Mazda piston engine.
Start building :-)

[Guran]

You forgot one David ....

Rule 3: Have fun!

[StillIC]

I vote for budget based classes. It's the only way to, ultimately, avoid the 'most money wins' result.

It works in Finland where they have Folkracing, but there there is only one class: the ~$1000 class.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folkrace

I propose there might be multiple classes, say AU$5000, AU$10000, AU$20000 etc.

And before anyone mentions how impracticle it is to prove/police what you have spent, Folkrace rules state that you have to sell your car at the class price, if an offer to buy is put forward by a competitor. This almost ensures that competitors will not spend more than the limit.

[greenltd]

I saw that on Top Gear, looks like great fun. I actually thought the sell rule was a straight swap, in any case great rule to things simple and fair.

[david_syd_au]

The idea of price based classes with an enforced sale on demand does sound fair, but although I know roughly how many $ have gone into my MX-5, that takes no account for the huge amount of my own time I have put into the car. There is no way I would risk having to sell my car and effectively give away all my time & effort.
It might work for <$1000 bangers, but not so for well developed MX-5s with up to 10s of thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours invested.

Mazmad's original point was that the sort of problems that happen with classes regulated through technical specifications can be avoided by using time based classes, as is done for the Wakefield and Winton 300 races, and has been very successfully used for the MX-6 Cup series in NSW this year.

The point I made was that the car regulation rule book for the MX-5 Cup effectively consisted of 2 lines.
The result, if it is an MX-5, you can race it, and be competitive against other people who can do similar lap times.
Simples!

[StillIC]

The idea of price based classes with an enforced sale on demand does sound fair, but although I know roughly how many $ have gone into my MX-5, that takes no account for the huge amount of my own time I have put into the car. There is no way I would risk having to sell my car and effectively give away all my time & effort.

So you'll be in the $30k class then David ;) And after one event you get the opportunity to buy it back!

My point is, if you value your time then add that to the value of your car and run in the appropriate $ class. That way you can't lose (financially).

[manga_blue]

I love the idea of time based classing. The smaller the rule book the bigger the fun factor. One of the joys of competing in the CAMS supersprints was getting the opportunity to do over cars that cost 10 times the money with 3 or 4 times the power. That would feel so much better if they were in the same class.

[StillIC]

I love the idea of time based classing.

But who are you competing against? If faster cars are in a different class, you can't go too quick for fear of being bumped up a class and being at the back of a quicker class (losing). So you're better off just running at the front of your own class, trying not to go too fast. Seems like the result is something akin to regularity racing. Interesting for some, but not for me.

Or do you simply go for outright speed and the win in the fastest class...back to most $ wins. Again, not for me.

[lightyear]

If 2 cars do the same time, and one car has twice the hp, how would the lesser hp car ever overtake? You would catch up under brakes, get held up around the corner, and repeat. And if you did get around, you would get passed on the next straight.

[david_syd_au]

If 2 cars do the same time, and one car has twice the hp, how would the lesser hp car ever overtake? You would catch up under brakes, get held up around the corner, and repeat. And if you did get around, you would get passed on the next straight.

Not such an issue in an event for a single vehicle type, as you don't have the disparity of the power/handling balance as in mixed vehicle events.

[zossy1]

Not such an issue in an event for a single vehicle type, as you don't have the disparity of the power/handling balance as in mixed vehicle events.

Come now David - you were a victim of this exact issue a few months back!

But granted... you still won your own class that day

[david_syd_au]

Not such an issue in an event for a single vehicle type, as you don't have the disparity of the power/handling balance as in mixed vehicle events.

Come now David - you were a victim of this exact issue a few months back!

But granted... you still won your own class that day

Sure, the people in the faster classes would leave me for dead down the straights, but the difference with those in my own time-based class was not so great, which is the point.
BTW, don't expect me to be so easy to beat down the straights at the Nov round. wink!

[gslender]

Why not just add weight when you win, like they do with horses. The person with a 500HP car ends up getting 300KG added to their car !