just as a point of information, i thought i'd pass along
some mention of how the Alfa Romeo Owners Club handles
their competition code. Their classes are named with
letters, A through G or some such. they do not have
separate classes for modifieds and prepareds; they instead
use a subtly different approach. they've assigned base
points to each model Alfa that they have competition experience
with, and then matched ranges of point values with the lettered
classes. each common (or uncommon) modification for which there
is experience (changing cams, overbores, changing sway bars,
changing shocks, removing catalytic converters, changing tire
and wheel size) is assigned an additional point value. when
a car has been modified, you add the modification points to
the base points, and then use the total points to determine
the new class.
the modification point values were computed in a rather tedious
fashion, by taking data from previous years autocrosses and
time trials and figuring out what differences the mods probably
had on performance. if the initial data on mods is weak, then
the point system will be fairly weak. i'd imagine that bob doesn't
have access to enough information to really do such a system
other than with a lot of guesswork, but i thought i'd pass this
along as an example of a different approach.
richard
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