I'll start by saying that I'm just a local competitior, and I am fully aware
that my opinions aren't all that relevant to the national solo crowd. No
need to tell me that. That said, I feel like I need to say something about
the path that solo has taken in the short few years that I've been doing it.
I think that the "national" crowd, through past and proposed rule changes,
are slowly but surely creating a completely different sport with little
regard or similarity to autocross on a local, grassroots level.
Let's start with what's already happened. Take this recent stock class
alignment, for example. Having 4 classes dedicated solely to new, expensive,
low production sports cars, and one more dedicated to expensive, limited
production sporty coupes/sedans may work fine at nationals. It's downright
silly for a local club. The fastest stock class that that we will probably
make a full class in at one of our events this year is DS. I don't even
think we could fill DS if the WRXen weren't selling so well up here in New
England. I could probably win my club's SS annual points title just by
showing up and completing one run in an eligible SS car.
Yet on the national level people are saying we need even more classes at the
top! To the point of speeding up GS and HS even further, or even eliminating
HS entirely. HS is probably our best-subscribed stock class at this point!
It seems like 99% of all cars on the road are in HS now. The cream of HS
includes some pretty quick cars, cars that seem designed to be autocrossed -
Mini Coopers, BMW 318s, Civic Sis, GTIs. I think it's very odd that some
cars considered to be sports cars by the majority of the public would end up
in the slowest of *9* stock classes.
The prevailing attitude toward SM and STS - I've seen these classes fought
as unnecessary by a lot of people on these lists, saying that we have too
many classes already - well, that's precisely why we need these classes so
badly! The class structure has become so segmented in the interest of the
nationals crowd, that most local clubs can never fill any P or M class, and
even national events other than the big one in Topeka find it hard. SM and
STS give people a place to build a car to much more logical rules than SP, P
or M (to an autocross outsider), and more importantly, they allow people to
race heads-up against their friends, which would otherwise be impossible
given the segmentation of the other classes. Go to any smaller local event,
and I'd bet the two largest classes in attendance are almost universally SM
and STS.
Moving on to some of the items in recent discussion, like limiting stock to
new cars and OEM parts. I can't begin to say how bad this would be for local
clubs. There are probably more cars over 10 years old at our events than
under. To tell someone in a 10 year old stock car that he has to go home
because his car is too old is horribly insulting, and every time that
happens, you'd probably lose that driver for life. Similarly, to do the same
to someone who has replaced the blown shocks on his stock car with non-OEM
models would be unfair as well. Of the group of people who may actually be
interested in autocross, very few would actually use 100% OEM parts to
replace common wear items, without advance knowledge of a rule that requires
them to. The *ONLY* person that a strict "stock is stock" rule or a
limitation on older cars serves is the person who is well versed in the
world of autocross, and is already buying cars new for the purpose of
autocrossing them. This is hardly the person who the rules need to help - if
you can afford to buy a new car every time you want to make an adjustment,
then you can certainly afford to make a couple tweaks with parts instead.
$3000 shocks may be out of line, and maybe something could be done about
that, but try buying a whole brand-new car for $3000! Meanwhile, that guy
you sent home for using non-OEM parts has to make the choice whether to
spend a bunch of money either making his stock car stock legal, turning it
into an SP/STS car, or just stay at home and give up on those autocross
jerks who told him he couldn't run as is. Guess which one will happen most
often?
Another issue (although less pressing) is the speed I keep hearing about at
big events. It seems to me that if you are going over 50-55 you aren't
autocrossing anymore. The guidleine that is quoted so often is "normal
highway speeds". I know that's vague, but highway limits were 55 for years,
and still are in many areas. I don't want to have to use 3rd gear at an
autocross. If I wanted to try to kill myself, I would have gone road racing.
Like I said, I know I am just a local guy, and as such I don't really
understand how the rules work on a national level. There's no need to apply
anything I've said to what you do at nationals. I'm sure these rules work
fine for what you are doing. But they are far removed from what autocross is
to me. I see it as a friendly, grassroots, amateur sport where folks can
test out the handling of their cars, learn about driving, have some fun
competition with friends, and generally have a good time in, above all, a
safe, controlled, and *friendly* evironment. We can still do that using the
SCCA rules, but many signs point to the day when we won't be able to. I
don't expect to have any impact on the SCCA national rules, I understand
that their true purpose lies somewhere other than with the local club. And I
know that local clubs or regions are not bound to those rules. But it still
happens that way - the majority of local clubs use those rules because
people want some sort of uniformity when they go to different clubs' events.
So we will always use some sort of national standard rules. I guess what I'm
saying is that maybe there should be slightly different rules and classing
for national events as opposed to local events - sort of a "tournament" and
"casual" ruleset, with fewer classes and fewer limitations locally. This
way, the comparatively small number of national-level competitors could have
their OEM shock rules, their age limits on stock cars, and maybe even devote
all 9 stock classes each to one individual $30k+ sports car, all without
harming we local competitors, who would not be served well by those sorts of
rules. For the overwhelmingly vast majority of people who participate in
autocross events, they are a casual, fun way to spend a weekend day, not a
hypercompetitive event. Please don't let that hypercompetitive viewpoint
destroy my and many others' fun weekends.
Josh Brockman
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