Since you asked...
-----Original Message-----
From: Jeff Cashmore
>"The latest Fastrack clarified that the ESP guys all asked to stay
>within that letter designation"
>
>There was a similar debate going on awhile back on the wheel to wheel
>list regarding road racing classes. It was proposed that E-H Production
>be renamed to P1-P4 (or something like that) to make the classes easier
>to understand, especially to new people. Background as I understand it:
>A-D Prod were hurting on participation numbers and were combined into
>the GT 1-5 classes so they don't exist anymore, at least on a National
>level. Don't know what year it happened (Rocky?). There was a lot of
>disagreement to the new naming proposal, mostly out of a sense of
>history in the record books. Was this the same thing that happend with
>ESP or did they just not want to buy new graphics? Seems it would have
>made a lot of sense to have FS cars move on to FSP and not ESP.
>--
>Jeff Cashmore
>http://www.execpc.com/~cashmo/wai.html = Wisconsin Autocrossers Inc
>homepage
>
Your statement of what happened to A-D Production is accurate at a very
simplistic level, which for this purpose serves us just fine. GT1-4 were
invented in 1980 and GT5 came in in 1983. AP ceased after the 1978 season,
BP after 1980, CP lasted to 1982 and DP to 1983 as they were "consolidated"
into the GT classes. The original plan was to consolidate all the Prod
classes into GT, but by the time it got down past DP, the Prod drivers
finally got smart enough to figure out what was up and yelled loud enough to
put a stop to it.
Indeed, as the driver of a G Production car on the roadrace side, I was
among those shouting very loudly this year NOT to change the class
designations, since the purpose for doing so was basically just because it
was possible to do so.
The tie to SCCA history was a very strong argument.
Now I would suggest that in SOME Solo II classes a similar tie exists, where
it does not for other classes. Moving Miatas en masse from CS to BS raised
no great outcry. When my EP class got jigged about and we in the roadsters
became DP, it was no big deal. But just imagine what a hullaballoo you'd
create if you decided to rename CP to BP or any other P! Even AP! ESP and FS
are similarly unique in their categories. The ponycars are so distinctly
different from the rest of the cars that compete in Solo II -- and so
obviously in their own popular world while incompatible with cars of the
other classes (for the most part), they have thus developed very specific
class identities with which the SEB and/or BoD tinkers only at their own
peril.
It is not just graphics. It is an identity thing. Way back in the early '70s
when the class designations were originally invented, it probably did not
matter much what they were. Stock, for example, basically had five classes
for "sports cars" which then meant the spread from the exotics such as
Ferraris and Lotii down through the Porsches, Corvettes, Triumphs, Fiats and
MGs, then two more (HS did not show up until 1978) for the American big iron
and the compact sedans -- the Mustang/Camaro/Firebirds and the
Pintos/Vegas/Corollas/510s, etc. You must realize that in 1972 or
thereabouts, an E Stock Spitfire could often beat an F Stock Mustang just
because the F Stockers were so relatively big and clumsy (and the courses of
the day also tighter). So it was a reasonable progression ladder.
Guess what? The F Stockers got more sophisticated. SP was invented and the
ESPs enjoyed the same sophistication. Result, they got faster than the ES,
DS, etc. cars, and sometimes even the AS-BS cars. The ladder no longer was a
reasonable progression, which is why the bump rule looks so strange today.
But by now when you spoke of ponycars, Stock meant FS, SP meant ESP, Prep
meant CP.
And I suspect, evermore shall it be.
--Rocky
|