SCCA's answer to the HPDE participants

[jumbojimbo]

In a lot of cases - probably most - we can't. And if we position the club strategically assuming we HAVE to accomplish that, we compromise what positive core competencies we do have.

K

When you are at a PDX and someone starts to act interested in jumping from pdx to w2w and they start talking about building a car, the first thing you do is start talking them down. Because we all know that for 95% of people building a car is a mistake. They'll spend a bunch of time and money, the car will be slow and they will burn out.

Maybe it's a little different in NASA where some people do slowly build their car up and maybe it is just as simple as adding $3k worth of safety to it.

It seems to me that NASA is in the position of not saying no, they just go ahead and eat up those newbies and spit them out because they have a steady stream incoming. So what if most burn out and only a few stick around long term, we got there money and filled our fields? And that might not be a bad philosophy. Our "strategy" of weeding the newbies out before they even show up might save a lot of people money but it might not be the best long term strategy.

[lateapex911]

When you are at a PDX and someone starts to act interested in jumping from pdx to w2w and they start talking about building a car, the first thing you do is start talking them down. Because we all know that for 95% of people building a car is a mistake. They'll spend a bunch of time and money, the car will be slow and they will burn out.

Maybe it's a little different in NASA where some people do slowly build their car up and maybe it is just as simple as adding $3k worth of safety to it.

It seems to me that NASA is in the position of not saying no, they just go ahead and eat up those newbies and spit them out because they have a steady stream incoming. So what if most burn out and only a few stick around long term, we got there money and filled our fields? And that might not be a bad philosophy. Our "strategy" of weeding the newbies out before they even show up might save a lot of people money but it might not be the best long term strategy.

I think that, until you really get into racing, and are brutally honest with yourself about the actual competition (YOUR talent winning, vs 'car love'), you don't 'get' classing structure. So NASAs PT class is fine for most. They don't get that it's really not about actual competition, or, that in most cases, competition is rather thin.
Of course, once in, they discover the costs associated (time and money), and then look at SCCA, where the competition (in some classes) is deeper, and they see more time and money.