Feb Fastrack

[lateapex911]

Chris Albin is on our calls. He has an ITB Golf. Peter Keane was on the CRB, he's moved to the ITAC now. Bob Dowie, chair of the CRB is on all our calls as well.

Regarding the MR2, here's the history, cliff notes style.
Back in the day, none of us were on board, they classed it in ITA. Not sure if quantum physics or grain alcohol was used. That's all water under the bridge now.
We (the ITAC ) got numerous requests, and debated many aspects of the car for a move to B.
We moved it to B.
Sidebar: The Process, in an early incantation, used 30% for 4 valve cars. That was amended to 25%, but 30% is/was used when evidence dictates it is needed. Certain 4 valve cars make 30% gains over stock.
There was some confusion on one con call and 30% was used erroneously.

That resulted in the car racing at that weight for the last season or so.

We recommended a new weight on the MR2, and other cars using the same engine, based on 25%.
The CRb rejected that, they feel that we classed it at 30% only a year ago, and see no reason to change it.

The majority position within the ITAC is that it should be corrected. A minority thinks it's fine. The CRB feels it's fine.

We have new evidence and will try again.

[RSTPerformance]

"Regarding the MR2, here's the history, cliff notes style.
Back in the day, none of us were on board, they classed it in ITA. Not sure if quantum physics or grain alcohol was used. That's all water under the bridge now"

Correction Jake... When the MR2 was classed it was at the front of the field in Northeast anyway. It was NOT a class killer but it was classed somewhat OK... The CRB/ITAC really started screwing things up after that when they destroyed what was ITA and classed a ton of cars in ITA that were much faster than a typical ITA car but slower than ITS. Instead of fixing the gap between ITS and ITA we stalled, classed cars wrong (even had restrictors) and then added ITR which is not much different (yet) than ITS... Now we are have the gap between the new ITA and the old ITB... ITB will be destroyed by the ITAC and CRB over the next 3 years because no consistancy will be used to figure out how to class cars correctly. 3 years from now ITB cars will get reclassed into a non existant ITC bringing the class back from the dead in a new form and maybe we will actually have 5 good classes of racing...

Time will tell!

Raymond "Sadly the Audi will be to slow for ITB and to Fast for ITC and the 80's era of Audi's slowly die off and will be out of our lives for good!" Blethen

[Andy Bettencourt]

Correction Jake... When the MR2 was classed it was at the front of the field in Northeast anyway. It was NOT a class killer but it was classed somewhat OK...

Correction: It LOOKED LIKE it was classed 'ok' because ITA wasn't yet popular enough to have the likes of Mechanic Shop North, Kessler Engineering, SBMS and Flatout building high budget machines.

[StephenB]

Correction: It LOOKED LIKE it was classed 'ok' because ITA wasn't yet popular enough to have the likes of Mechanic Shop North, Kessler Engineering, SBMS and Flatout building high budget machines.

Newbi. ... honestly

[RSTPerformance]

Correction: It LOOKED LIKE it was classed 'ok' because ITA wasn't yet popular enough to have the likes of Mechanic Shop North, Kessler Engineering, SBMS and Flatout building high budget machines.

If any of those cars were classed then, then I stand corrected. From my memory when the newer cars were classed and those very good teams built those cars the class changed and a new class was born that replaced the old ITA (the one that even saw RX-7's near the front!). It really doesn't matter but I don't think you can blame the CRB that originally classed the MR2, they did a better job than the current ITAC or CRB has done with the car/class.

The current CRB and ITAC needs to stop playing the political crap by blaming things on past memebers, you are the current members class the cars right and forget about the past.

Honestly I hope that in 3 - 5 years SCCA will have things figured out and/or another option opens up in the Northeast. Until then I will try not to get sucked back in and just have fun racing and going back to the days when it was just fun being out on the track!

Raymond "bye Coco" Blethen

[lateapex911]

ITA changed, IMO, when the CRX was classed. I'm not sure that there even WAS an ITAC back then. It is known to have an artificially low HP rating, and it was a winner right out of the box. That was 92 or 93 or so. The bar was raised. After that, we in new England saw some top notch efforts. And some clearly illegal efforts. (a certain car driven by a funny man's son, perhaps?)

At the time, there was no changing of weights allowed. So, in order to keep ITA from becoming a one car class, other cars were added at the CRX level. Then the ECu issue reared it's head, and 'chips' were allowed, then ECus in the stock boxes. That raised the CRX game even further. (and not just the CRX).

All this occurred before the 'current' ITACs watch.

Then Darin, and Andy, and some others joined. I sent a proposal to then chair Rick Pocock to allow weight changes, with a structured review system. Rick left, and Darin took over, and a system of classing cars, and adjusting weights was pushed through. One of the first changes was a reevaluation of the CRX, taking into account the stock hp issue, and the increased performance available to it via post classification rules changes. And other cars got the same attention. (Also for similar reasons)

That action sought to restore class equity to the greatest degree possible, while avoiding competition based weight adjustments. The changes were made based on empirical factors. It was NOT rewards weight.

Raymond, if the system hadn't been created, where do you think we'd be today?! you speak of ITA changing drastically, and, to a point, you're right, the bar has been raised. BUT, without the new Process being instituted, where would we be today? Well, obviously, ITA would be faster. The CRX would never have gotten a correction, and cars entering the class would have done so at levels comparable to that. So, ITA would clearly be even faster.

I don't see where anyone here is blaming the past. The MR2 was classed before our time, and the CRX et al were added before our time. The whole system wouldn't exist if the past problems didn't exist. I'm not blaming anyone, it just is what it is. But it's important to know how, and why we got where we are. Or we are destined to repeat the mistakes of the past.

....you are the current members class the cars right and forget about the past.

Really, Raymond, we're trying to class the cars correctly.

We recommended to the CRB that the MR2 be corrected to a weight that is in line with the 25% standard, (we used the wrong math when it was reclassed) and it was rejected. We recommended that it's sister, the AE86 be moved to ITB at the process weight which also uses a 25% factor. On that car, they moved it, but added 95 pounds.

Why? I can't tell you.


What I CAN tell you is that the car makes 112 stock crank. That's 95 at the wheels. General consensus has the built power around 110 at the wheels, or, converted, 126 crank. I have never seen any evidence that supports the below numbers.

25% predicts 140 crank, or 119 wheel
30% predicts 145 crank, or 123 wheel.

The ITAC has bent over backwards trying to create methods that are consistent, rigorous, documentable, fair, robust, repeatable and transparent. It's safe to say that many of us are frustrated with the fact that the hard lifting has been done, but the fruit isn't forthcoming.

[cjb25hs]

What I CAN tell you is that the car makes 112 stock crank. That's 95 at the wheels. General consensus has the built power around 110 at the wheels, or, converted, 126 crank. I have never seen any evidence that supports the below numbers.

25% predicts 140 crank, or 119 wheel
30% predicts 145 crank, or 123 wheel.

The ITAC has bent over backwards trying to create methods that are consistent, rigorous, documentable, fair, robust, repeatable and transparent. It's safe to say that many of us are frustrated with the fact that the hard lifting has been done, but the fruit isn't forthcoming.

The neon is kinda of the same way. The SOHC motor responds to higher IT build HP gains then the DOHC. But the DOHC car gets the 200lb weight penalty. The weights for the neons should be closer to 2400 SOHC and 2500 DOHC. NASA only puts a 50 lb difference on the cars at 2500 SOHC and 2550 DOHC when spec neon still existed.

[Charlie Broring]

ITA changed, IMO, when the CRX was classed. I'm not sure that there even WAS an ITAC back then. It is known to have an artificially low HP rating, and it was a winner right out of the box. That was 92 or 93 or so. The bar was raised.

I think this is currently happening in ITB with the VW MK3 and the 1955cc Honda's. The MR2 would be a class winner in the old ITB racing against 2002's and A2 Golfs but possibly an underdog against the newly classed faster ITB front runners. The CRB sees a problem but they don't fully understand it and they appear to lack confidence in the ITAC recommendations. Mixed and conflicting rules are the result.

In a perfect world the ITAC and CRB would communicate and work together. A slight adjustment would be made in the classification process in ITB. The resulting adjustments would be well received by the IT community. Competition would be well balanced in all classes. Everybody would be so happy...

[Knestis]

Over a couple of months last spring and early summer, the ITAC was told by representatives of the CRB, that...

1. There was no way that a big pile of cars were going to get "run through the process" because the promise that the (not so) Great Realignment was a one-time-only deal was crucial to getting it done in the first place

2. We should prepare a comprehensive "re-do" of ITB as a pilot of our processes and practices - spent a lot of a couple weekends and burned up other members' time digging up data on THAT one, lemme tell ya.

3. That ANY after-the-fact changes to race weights of cars was verboten by the ITCS, beyond the very limited window provided by the verbiage added during the (ns)GR.

K

[quadzjr]

What I CAN tell you is that the car makes 112 stock crank. That's 95 at the wheels. General consensus has the built power around 110 at the wheels, or, converted, 126 crank. I have never seen any evidence that supports the below numbers.

25% predicts 140 crank, or 119 wheel
30% predicts 145 crank, or 123 wheel.

The ITAC has bent over backwards trying to create methods that are consistent, rigorous, documentable, fair, robust, repeatable and transparent. It's safe to say that many of us are frustrated with the fact that the hard lifting has been done, but the fruit isn't forthcoming.

I am compiling data right now to hopefully help the ITAC convince the CRB that the large port toyota 4AGE will not make those gains, in IT legal prep. They expect that in the 25 years the car has been raced NOBODY spent the money to try to make the power in there racecar?

There isn't a single Race engine builder that can get 30% with an IT legal motor 4AGE LARGE PORT motor that came in the mk1 MR2. Our 92 civic ITB car puts down mower power the wheels with an 800 dollar rebuild than my multiple thousand dollar MR2 build.

Hell you can buy a TRD header for the car it gain a whopping 0 hp!

[Knestis]

...There was some confusion on one con call and 30% was used erroneously.

That resulted in the car racing at that weight for the last season or so.

We recommended a new weight on the MR2, and other cars using the same engine, based on 25%.
The CRb rejected that, they feel that we classed it at 30% only a year ago, and see no reason to change it. ...

We have new evidence and will try again.

Jeebus.

If there's room for something called "Errors and Omissions," one would think that "We were dumbasses and used the wrong number by mistake in a committee call in April 2008, and would like to fix it" would qualify.

We started making noise about that mistake inside the ITAC literally 20+ months ago.

But as far as "new evidence" goes, there's no provision to consider it. If there is, someone explain how and why, and based on whose decision.

In public, for the membership.

K

[JeffYoung]

There is not a "public" one. There is something we have been quoted in a CRB "operations manual" of some sort that allows E&O corrections. But I agree, there is nothing in the present ITCS that would allow it.

[jjjanos]

There is not a "public" one. There is something we have been quoted in a CRB "operations manual" of some sort that allows E&O corrections. But I agree, there is nothing in the present ITCS that would allow it.

And isthat operations manual public? IIf not, it damn well should and needs to be.