I am torn on this idea.

From the point of view of the SCCA as a whole and in the near-term, eliminating all distinctions between National and Regional makes a lot of sense. Hold races and they all count. The most popular 24 classes one year go to the big event the next. Tough cookies to the classes that don't make the show.

From a personal perspective, I worry about cost and prep proliferation. From a completely pragmatic point of view, cost containment is purely up to the individuals competing. Anyone can spend whatever they like.

However...

I think SM is an omen. There are always people with more money to spend and are more clever.

Here is a story that echoes in my mind (from Race Tech magazine, December/January 2004):

"The pioneer who introduced carbon fibre monocoques and semi-automatic gearshifts to Formula One, [John] Barnard first considered an involvement in touring cars a couple of years ago.

He even caused a stir by attending a BTCC technical meeting. 'It really was an unfair contest,' recalls one person present that day. 'From the sort of questions he was asking, and the naive answers he was getting, you could see immediately that if he had got involved with the series he would have taken everything to a new - and not necessarily welcome- level.'"

The point of the above is that while we may think we are really clever, and the few folks willing to spend big $$$ in IT are a rare and unique breed, the fact is there are folks with far bigger budgets out there and far more clever (if it's true in BTCC it's most certainly true in IT) than the vast majority of regional racers. I fear that what we have seen in SM would be recreated in IT - much bigger budgets and much more extreme prep levels.

Look, I could easily be wrong. But I am VERY circumspect about considering moving IT to a National class. It could easily ruin a good thing.

In an effort to offer a solution, I'd suggest IT+ along the lines of Kirk's MT2 proposal. No requirement for 5 year old cars and set a "dead duck" date where they are no longer elligible. More like the Speed Touring Cars of 5 or so years ago. Kirk, if you have the MT2 proposal on your computer, could you please forward it to me? I can't seem to find it. Anyway, IMHO, this would be a much better type of class for National racing.