What's up with ECRs?

[tlyttle43]

Looking over the 2008 SEDIV schedule, I noticed that the number of ECRs is down substantially from this year - only six races on four weekends, compared to 10 in 9 this year. I also noticed that Atlanta Region has dropped its ECRs, and instead has plain old "enduros" at every event (7 [!] total). Same with CFla, which has no ECRs, but two "CFla enduros". And there are still 4 FES races as well. (And the usual CCPS races, if you want to count them as mini-enduros.)

What's going on? ECR has had a long history and this would seem like a step toward killing it off. I haven't run ECRs for 2 or 3 years, but I ran many in the past and I always thought that it was a good series for the division to support. Are the fields down substantially? I know there have been some concerns in the past about the ECR rules limiting flexibility in race scheduling, but that hasn't held anyone back before now. So, what's the thinking behind these changes?

Are the Atl and CFla enduros still going to be 1.5 hours? Is there going to be a separate series championship for these enduros - particularly Atlanta's, since they now have more races thnan ECR?

Butch (or anyone else who might know) - what's up?


Tom Lyttle

[Butch Kummer]

I'm not sure where you're seeing the Atlanta Region is hosting seven Enduro's, but that number is not accurate. The 2008 schedule is still tentative, but we're planning on doing the same three races we've always done at Road Atlanta (Feb, July and the ARRC by GRM). We're also talking about doing one at Nashville if we can run under the lights and the extra race at Barber (Labor Day) will likely not happen. We originally planned to race on Monday and thus had extra room in the schedule, but we've since decided to keep Monday as a travel day so it (the Barber weekend) will be a "regular" Double SARRC with no "bonus" races.

The format of our Enduro races will be unchanged, but the "label" is still to be determined. Like CFR, we started looking at what we were getting from the ECR series in return for the $30 per car we were paying. When I expressed our concerns at the Mid-Year meeting in late July I believe we finally attracted the attention of the ECR Chair. In the final analysis I expect the ECR series will continue and we'll still be a part of it, but there will be some adminstrative changes that will be pretty much transparent to the competitors.

[Krysd]

I believe you will see a new more user friendly ECR series next year, the new format will probably be a lot less expensive for the Regions and would wind up looking more like the SARRC series with a runoff race somewhere. The Series simply became too expensive for Regions to put on, CFR did the math and realized that they were paying big bucks for two or three drivers from CFR, and that was not fair to the rest of the membership, I am sure Atlanta and Florida have come to the same conclusion. The majority of the drivers competing in ECR, did it for the love of endurance racing and were not even signed up for the money so it only makes sense that a new ECR format would include something like $5.00 per car (cost to the Regions) to cover admistrative costs and to help put on a championship race (rotating between tracks???), no sign up (display the decals), best of six or seven finishes and invitations to those that qualify for the championship, with a requirement that, to be named Champion, the driver must compete at the Championship race. Just some ideas, but any of you that have other ideas, chime in, I would like to have your feedback. I would like to see endurance racing continue at the Divisional level, however we must to make it less of a financial burden for the Regions and more fun for the competitors.

Krys Dean, ECR Chief Steward (south)

[GKR_17]

I'd like to see some administration that follows the rules (both GCR and ECR), timely results and points postings as well. It's time to clean house.

Grafton

[Cobrar05]

Butch, we would like to be able to run our ITO Mustangs in the non-ARRC enduros. ECR is on the fence thinking we might be too fast and I don't really see that. Since I've been sharing my run group with GT1 cars on slicks, I know what too fast really is and we are maybe a couple seconds a lap faster than most of the current enduro cars.

Consider this an official lobby attempt.

[Krysd]

Grafton, could you be a little more specific regarding the GCR and ECR rules that are not being followed? If there are rules that are not being adhered to, file a protest, sometimes that is what it takes to get someones attention.

Timely results are an absolute necessity and one that can be handled at the track (thats the way it should be), I also think that the series needs to simplify the pit stop timing, make the pit stop 5:30 and forget about the transit time, we can better moniter pit lane speeds with a radar gun anyway and it would make the timing and posting chores much easier. All that has to be done is find the pit lap and make certain it is slower than your fastest lap plus 5:30, it could be done on a spread sheet.

Points should be up within 48 hours, there is no excuse for not having points kept up to date.

Cobra, I think you are going to lose this one, the concensus is that the ITO cars are to heavy and to fast, hence the reason for running with the big bore cars. Don't give up, but it doesn't look good for now.

Krys

[Cobrar05]

The ARRC has pulled DOT cars out of the Stock Car/GT1 car package for a reason. They also allow us to race in the enduro.

Look at the lap times from recent RA events. I was there in July. The fast ITO car qualified at 1:41.6. The fast ITS group car qualified at 1:42.8. ITO cars would be front of the pack cars(top 10), but is that what you meant by too fast?

[seckerich]

The biggest problem you will face is the top speed difference. The closing rate of a viper on a ITC car is not safe regardless of lap times. There was big resistance to allowing ITR for the same reason. The ARRC last year with TCC in with ITS was enough to make me say "never again". Not worth the risk to the car or driver. Get the numbers up where you can have big bore and small bore enduros and you might have a chance. Many things will have to change this year for the ECR or similar to continue. Too good a concept to die, just needs fixing--real bad.

[Butch Kummer]

When comparing lap times you cannot go by a single event because you don't know who was there to represent each class. The "ultimate" ITO car is probably a Viper or a TCC car, and those cars are capable of 2:04's at VIR and 1:32's (or better) at Road Atlanta. And as Steve says, comparing the fastest ITO cars to the fastest ITS cars is not the issue - it's the comparison of fastest to slowest that you need to consider. Adding ITO to the ECR would signifcantly widen that gap. It's not that much of a problem at Road Atlanta because we have multiple overtaking opportunities per lap (and yes, we still get complaints). Put the same mix on the track at Roebling and you'd have a mess!

When ECR first got started AS (American Sedan) was one of the classes allowed to run but was dropped due to lack of participation. Concentrate on building the ITO numbers in the sprint races before starting a movement to add ITO to all the Enduros.

Oh - and we pulled the ITO (& TCC) cars out of the Big Bore group at the ARRC by GRM because we have the flexibility to do that since it's a Restricted Regional. At regular regionals you'll likely be back in with the Ground-Pounders.

[GKR_17]

Grafton, could you be a little more specific regarding the GCR and ECR rules that are not being followed? If there are rules that are not being adhered to, file a protest, sometimes that is what it takes to get someones attention.

Timely results are an absolute necessity and one that can be handled at the track (thats the way it should be), I also think that the series needs to simplify the pit stop timing, make the pit stop 5:30 and forget about the transit time, we can better moniter pit lane speeds with a radar gun anyway and it would make the timing and posting chores much easier. All that has to be done is find the pit lap and make certain it is slower than your fastest lap plus 5:30, it could be done on a spread sheet.

Points should be up within 48 hours, there is no excuse for not having points kept up to date.

Cobra, I think you are going to lose this one, the concensus is that the ITO cars are to heavy and to fast, hence the reason for running with the big bore cars. Don't give up, but it doesn't look good for now.
[/b]

Krys,

I think you should be very familiar with the most recent rule debacle. As you're aware, the administrator attempted to change the pit timing requirement after the June Homestead events. That decision was protested, and you upheld the protest. Once the corrected results were posted over two months later it was clear that your ruling was not followed. After admitting fault, the administrator then went to the committee who retroactively rewrote the rule, even though that is strictly prohibited in GCR 3.5.5. It seems they think ECR 3.1 allows them to do anything they want. If you want another example, look at the Sebring event from late last season. Instead of owning up to a mistake (which was also protested), the committee again writes a new rule (ECR 7.7) to justify their own incompetence.

Posting of results improved this season, but that's not saying much. Again, look at Homestead; it took a call to a BoD member to get provisional results posted over two weeks after the event. There was a protest involved so, understandably, more time was required to get the final results out. But over two months after the ruling? That is ridiculous. The newest (as of 10/25) final results for those events are still not posted today.

Then there are the points, no official points were posted for this entire season until early last week. And they still haven't been updated to reflect the dubious ruling from last Thursday.

As for your pit timing suggestion, how is that any better than the current rule (prior to the 10/25 retroactive rewrite)? The only difference is you use 30 seconds for all tracks instead of an arbitrary (but published) number based on the length of pit lane. The rest of the procedure is unchanged.

Historically, the ECR series has required a pit stop of 5 minutes. This rule was changed a few years ago once we starting using transponders and could enforce it with lap times (this was a huge improvement). The pit traverse time at Homestead was not flawed; the 15 second traverse time is roughly half of the actual pit lane traverse time of 29 seconds, since the scoring line is midway down pit lane. The flaw in the current method is it accounts for you taking pit lane twice in the same lap, once at the speed limit (the traverse time) and once at race speed (included in the best lap time). At most tracks, the pit lane section is taken very quickly on the actual racing surface, but this is less true at Homestead due to the slow turn entering that straight. Usually, the pit-in or pit-out lap is sufficiently slower to negate this error, however it is theoretically possible to fall short of the required timing even after stopping for 5 minutes and obeying the pit speed limit. There is no easy fix for this without adding an additional timing line. I would suggest that the already arbitrary traverse requirement be reduced to account for this error, and then back up the speed limit with radar guns if needed (and include that in the rules).

That said, I really don't care what the rule is, just enforce it strictly and evenly. Letting some off after the fact because the rule didn't seem right isn't fair to those that followed the rule in the first place.

Grafton

[Cobrar05]

The biggest problem you will face is the top speed difference. The closing rate of a viper on a ITC car is not safe regardless of lap times. There was big resistance to allowing ITR for the same reason. The ARRC last year with TCC in with ITS was enough to make me say "never again". Not worth the risk to the car or driver. [/b]

I understand this. I feel this. At VIR last weekend I was running 2:20's in my second race at that track and was sharing the course with GT1 cars running upwards of 1:50. It was enough to make me say "never again". In my situation, though, never again would mean leaving the SCCA if I wanted to race my Mustang.

[JeffYoung]

Cobra, I saw your last post and it made me think a bit.

Being 20-30 seconds a lap off the pace is sometimes the order of the day in a run group, especially with a newer driver like yourself. When I first started out, I was running 2:35 in an S car and the leaders were at 2:15. It scared me when they went by. But I realized as I got faster that the issue was ME, not the grouping.

Just looking at the rough specs on your car, I would think it is 2:10 capable if not better. You'll get there, it takes time and work and it stinks at first as the fast guys go by, well, fastly.

But I would generally say that an AS or ITO/E or GT car is probably not a good fit with the ECR series where, at VIR, the times for run group cars range from about 2:15 to 2:40. You put a car capable of low 2:00s in there and you are looking at an over 30 second a lap differential, and as Steve E. indicates differences in straightaway speed on the order of magnitude of 50 mph. That's just not safe.

[iambhooper]

After having a sick ITC car during Saturday's ECR at VIR, I can attest to the danger presented by the speed difference between the front running cars and my car that had carb issues and was 30 seconds a lap slower. I have been in large run groups, been in test days with GT3 Porsche's, but this was dangerous to both myself and the other competitors on the track.

As long as I drive in ITC I don't really need to see any cars faster than an ITS or SRF.

hoop

[Cobrar05]

Cobra, I saw your last post and it made me think a bit.

Being 20-30 seconds a lap off the pace is sometimes the order of the day in a run group, especially with a newer driver like yourself. When I first started out, I was running 2:35 in an S car and the leaders were at 2:15. It scared me when they went by. But I realized as I got faster that the issue was ME, not the grouping.

Just looking at the rough specs on your car, I would think it is 2:10 capable if not better. You'll get there, it takes time and work and it stinks at first as the fast guys go by, well, fastly.

But I would generally say that an AS or ITO/E or GT car is probably not a good fit with the ECR series where, at VIR, the times for run group cars range from about 2:15 to 2:40. You put a car capable of low 2:00s in there and you are looking at an over 30 second a lap differential, and as Steve E. indicates differences in straightaway speed on the order of magnitude of 50 mph. That's just not safe.
[/b]

Jeff, I appreciate your comments and your thoughts. I think you are giving too much credit to my "R" though. Good T1 Corvettes are running 2:09/2:10. The good AS cars are 2:14/2:16 cars. I ran 20's in my first go round at VIR in May on very used tires and a T1 interior in the car. I expected to see 17's or 18's this weekend with some more experience, the interior out, new BFG's and a new shock package. But only 6 laps on Saturday sort of killed all of that. I had only just started to figure out the new setup and get back to 20 when the checker flew on my race shortened by 30%. I got 13 laps all weekend.

I think maybe if Alex Caffe were still driving my car, it might could do a 10. We will see, but I think mid teens is about the best this car can be expected to do. Its not as fast as a T1 Corvette.

I have a grand am cup driver co-driving with me at the ARRC and so, we will see what a real driver can do with the car.

[jjjanos]

The biggest problem you will face is the top speed difference. The closing rate of a viper on a ITC car is not safe regardless of lap times.[/b]

Red herring. They put both out for closed-wheel warm ups. There also seems to be no problem at the longer enduros with having extremely fast cars out there with ITC.

2006 13 Hour: ITE cars Pontiac Firebird, Porsche 944, BMW Z3 versus ITC CRX

Speed differentials on fastest lap:
Firebird +18MPH or 33.5 SpL
944 +19MPH or 34.3 SpL
Z3 +17MPH or 31 SpL

That's getting lapped every 4th lap on a 3.27 mile circuit.

After having a sick ITC car during Saturday's ECR at VIR, I can attest to the danger presented by the speed difference between the front running cars and my car that had carb issues and was 30 seconds a lap slower. I have been in large run groups, been in test days with GT3 Porsche's, but this was dangerous to both myself and the other competitors on the track.[/b]

Coward. Do it for 12 or 13 Hours. After my stint, I don't know how to drive the track looking out the windshield. My turn in points are based on what I see in my mirrors.

[seckerich]

Red herring. They put both out for closed-wheel warm ups. There also seems to be no problem at the longer enduros with having extremely fast cars out there with ITC.
.
2006 13 Hour: ITE cars Pontiac Firebird, Porsche 944, BMW Z3 versus ITC CRX

Speed differentials on fastest lap:
Firebird +18MPH or 33.5 SpL
944 +19MPH or 34.3 SpL
Z3 +17MPH or 31 SpL

That's getting lapped every 4th lap on a 3.27 mile circuit.
Coward. Do it for 12 or 13 Hours. After my stint, I don't know how to drive the track looking out the windshield. My turn in points are based on what I see in my mirrors.
[/b]

Put a 165+ Viper out with ITC and it is just plain asking for trouble. 13 hour is not SCCA regional weekend.

I understand this. I feel this. At VIR last weekend I was running 2:20's in my second race at that track and was sharing the course with GT1 cars running upwards of 1:50. It was enough to make me say "never again". In my situation, though, never again would mean leaving the SCCA if I wanted to race my Mustang.
[/b]

I have an ITO Twin Turbo RX7 so I understand what you mean. I knew that when I got the car. We all make decisions on cars. If you buy a car and then look where to race it sometimes happens. Some weekends and tracks are more even than others. Just because you are not up to speed does not mean other ITO cars are not much faster. Look at the GRM challenge times and realize the Archer car would fit ITO. Good luck with the enduro wish--just don't get upset when it is shot down as unrealistic.

[jjjanos]

Put a 165+ Viper out with ITC and it is just plain asking for trouble. 13 hour is not SCCA regional weekend.[/b]

We're talking about enduros, not an SCCA regional sprint. Now, if what you've got is a sprint with nothing more than an enduro facade, then I might agree, but frankly, it shouldn't be a problem - it's called situational awareness. Such groupings are done to open-wheel on a regular basis - Continentals with Vees - and the consequences of contact are far worse there than in fendered cars.

Would I like it? Nope. Could I live with it? Yep.

[JeffYoung]

Continentals v. Vees...now that is a red herring....why? Car counts. Those cars rarely encounter each other.

Jjanos, an ECR is BUSY. Last weekend, in the ECR, I was within 10-20 yards of cars front and back at all times. The closing speeds on the straights in my S car were high enough with the slower B and C cars to make corner entry hairy. Add another 20 mph (what an AS or ITO car could do on the straights) and you are asking for a mess.

[seckerich]

We're talking about enduros, not an SCCA regional sprint. Now, if what you've got is a sprint with nothing more than an enduro facade, then I might agree, but frankly, it shouldn't be a problem - it's called situational awareness. Such groupings are done to open-wheel on a regular basis - Continentals with Vees - and the consequences of contact are far worse there than in fendered cars.

Would I like it? Nope. Could I live with it? Yep.
[/b]

Most of the enduros are running sprint times the whole race. As a driver I could live with the speed differential. As a race chair I will not under any condition. I would love to be able to run my ITO RX7 but realize it would not be safe. Might fly at a track like Kershaw, but never at VIR or Roebling.

[Cobrar05]

Put a 165+ Viper out with ITC and it is just plain asking for trouble. 13 hour is not SCCA regional weekend.
I have an ITO Twin Turbo RX7 so I understand what you mean. I knew that when I got the car. We all make decisions on cars. If you buy a car and then look where to race it sometimes happens. Some weekends and tracks are more even than others. Just because you are not up to speed does not mean other ITO cars are not much faster. Look at the GRM challenge times and realize the Archer car would fit ITO. Good luck with the enduro wish--just don't get upset when it is shot down as unrealistic.
[/b]

I see all this Viper stuff, but I see no one offering up Vipers and Corvettes for enduros and 13 hour races.
With BP a national SCCA class, maybe the Vipers and Corvettes and World Challenge cars should be classed their anyway.

I just wanted to point out that I don't see an invasion of Vipers coming to a race track near you. I saw Zero at VIR last weekend, Zero at my last NASA race at Roebling, Zero at NASA at Barber, 1 bp Viper at my last SCCA Road Atlanta race.

Street stock Mustangs I see. Vipers I dont.

I will add a photo for visual.