Don't everybody drop your coffee, but I'm on Bill's side.

I don't think it's terribly practical to institute regular teardowns or tech inspections, but we can still discourage cheating by making the penalties harsh. There have to be some way of taking into account mitigating factors. Things like car champaigned than a year (verified by log book entries), rentals, and similar things. Yes, they can be loop holes, but they have a short life. In the case of rentals you penalize the car owner or entrant if the entrant is the renter and has been renting the car for more than a year.

I agree with the person who mentioned cams, compression, displacement, throttle bodies, illegal gearbox ratios, and similar items as being up for draconian penalties. Any cheating that has been covered up or attempts made to cover it up should be draconian as well. It indicates clearly the car owner knew it was illegal and was doing it anyway.

Penalties for gross violations? One year suspension, loss of points, large fine, tied to an ant hill.... Cheaters suck.

I also agree about not being harsh when it's a matter of interpreting the rule book. That muddies things. I'd be happier if the COA would consider mitigating circumstances regarding harsh penalties. If someone makes a well founded case for their interpretation, even though it's wrong, the penalties should be much lower.

All this requires judgement on the part of various people. Does this invalidate the process? I hope not.

Again, I agree with Bill. The only way to stop this is really harsh penalties.


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George Roffe
Houston, TX
84 944 ITS car under construction
92 ITS Sentra SE-R occasionally borrowed
http://www.nissport.com