I agree with Alan. CM in a Pro Solo is a lot of fun, on essentially any
likely Pro Course.
In the East and Midwest, the most fun years for CM were roughly 93 - 95 or
so. Lots of cars with lots of current and former National Champs running in
the class at many of the events. Talk about intense . . . but with none of
the "stock" worries regarding whether the other guy had a "cheater" car, or
had picked the best brand of car. We knew that nobody was cheating and that
any of us had as much chance as anyone else at setting the car up "the
best" and/or driving "the best". Great handling cars which love quick
transitions and have plenty of power (with autox gearing) to get some
wheelspin out of most corners. Starts? Rev the engine to somewhere between
3K and 6K and get off the clutch in a big hurry when the last yellow comes
on. Get enough wheelspin to keep from bogging the engine and go for one
heck of a ride as the tires hook up. Challenge runs are even more fun since
CM usually has to play catchup. Nothing like beating somebody back to the
finish who had a 3 second head start on a 22 second course. Must look neat
for the onlookers!
One slight disagreement with Alan regarding the challenge: Mod/Prep cars
are at a disadvantage for the first challenge runs on cool days (don't even
think about when it changes to rain) due to cold race tires. However, when
I've done well in the Challenge I always told myself that every run could
and should be faster due to more tire heat.
Dick Rasmussen
CM Formula Ford
At 11:07 AM 12/31/01 -0800, Alan Dahl wrote:
>In my opinion the main reason you don't get a lot of Prep/Mod cars at
>Pros is that, at least here on the west coast, it's difficult to get
>enough cars to show up to meet the 5 cars/class minimum. If that number
>was relaxed to 3 cars/class for Prep/Mod you'd probably see better
>attendance.
>
>As to the people who say that mod cars are no fun at Pros I say "hooey".
>If you have a good competitive class it's a lot of fun. Back in '97 Josh
>Sirota and I campaigned his Formula Ford in C mod against Gary
>Richardson and Ren and Shauna Marinus at all the west coast Pros and
>Tours and we had a blast! It was tons of fun since we all were so
>competitive against each other and you never knew who was going to win
>until it was all over.
>
>With respect to speed I guess no one who's complained has every done the
>Wendover Pro. At the '97 event I got the FF into _4th_ gear which starts
>at 72mph. Wheee!
>
>When it comes to the challenge Mod cars have a *huge* advantage at the
>start. At the '97 Atwater Pro I watched George Douganis red-light
>against me before my lights had even started counting down. Sure makes
>it easier to know whether you have to push the lights or not.
>
>If I know that if we could once again get a group of C mod drivers
>together like we had in '97 there's no other class at a Pro I'd like to
>run, sure the Miata is fun but it doesn't compare to the kick you get
>ripping away from the start in a Formula Ford :-).
>
>- Alan Dahl
>
>--------------
>Alan Dahl home:
>adahl@eskimo.com
>Federal Way, WA, USA work: Alan.Dahl@PSS.boeing.com
>http://www.eskimo.com/~adahl ICQ 52688023
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