The Tangled Web of the US National Championships

[garyshell]

I wouldn't call the best part of 10 years "collapsing like a house of cards". They weren't real healthy but they sure did hang around for a bit.

They inherited what they had from USAC, ran for sixteen years, with Indy, which they sued to get into, and seven years later ceases to exist?

The USAC series ran for forty some years.

That is a collapse.

Bob is a purist..he only wants it his way....and the world don't work that way...

Outside of attacking me, on a thread about racing history, can you give any proof for your rhetoric?

Would your dismissive attitude regarding Starter's statement that a ten year run hardly counts as a collapse suffice as an example that you only want it your way? BTW it's not the first time.

Gary

[D-Type]

Gantlemen stop now!

We don't wnt this to degenerate into a squabble. If you really feel you must carry it on please do so by PMs

[Mark in Oshawa]

I just stated the fact that Bob's view is the only one he wants to see, and it is for a formula libre almost of ideas and of course, it sounds great in theory, but it has never survived economically. The old Can AM was living proof of that.....

[D-Type]

I just stated the fact that Bob's view is the only one he wants to see, and it is for a formula libre almost of ideas and of course, it sounds great in theory, but it has never survived economically. The old Can AM was living proof of that.....

That may be what you meant when you wrote it, but it came across as a personal criticism.

[Mark in Oshawa]

That may be what you meant when you wrote it, but it came across as a personal criticism.

It is, and it isn't. Bob and I have disagree and agreed. I agree with Bob's notion that ideally everyone would run what they have and the rulesmakers would quit trying to keep everyone even. Where I am however going to annoy him is I understand that in today's world, this isn't happening. It is pretty much the reality if one car wins every race in a year, the interest in a series drops. It is THAT simple....and hence all the rules tinkering and various ways of handicapping. There isn't a promotor on the planet that wants to see week after week one team just kicking the snot out of everyone else.....and with some of these juggernaut teams in some series, that could go on for years.

The old Can AM I believe is the closed to what Bob's ideal was, and for all that nostalga and love people had for the series, it economically didn't survive, and there was no competitive balance....now there a lot of reasons for it, and Bob would be the first to point out that SCCA couldn't run a pi$$ up in a Brewery and he would be right, but I have always believed that with factory McLaren's winning week after week, year after year, it eventually killed a lot of interest off. Then when they left, Penske brought that 917-10 and 917-30 and they owned everyone...which just destroyed the series. They were great cars and a great spectacle....but people just gave up on it...

[Mark in Oshawa]

That may be what you meant when you wrote it, but it came across as a personal criticism.

It is, and it isn't. Bob and I have disagree and agreed. I agree with Bob's notion that ideally everyone would run what they have and the rulesmakers would quit trying to keep everyone even. Where I am however going to annoy him is I understand that in today's world, this isn't happening. It is pretty much the reality if one car wins every race in a year, the interest in a series drops. It is THAT simple....and hence all the rules tinkering and various ways of handicapping. There isn't a promotor on the planet that wants to see week after week one team just kicking the snot out of everyone else.....and with some of these juggernaut teams in some series, that could go on for years.

The old Can AM I believe is close to what Bob's ideal was, and for all that nostalga and love people had for the series, it economically didn't survive, and there was no competitive balance....now there a lot of reasons for it, and Bob would be the first to point out that SCCA couldn't run a pi$$ up in a Brewery and he would be right, but I have always believed that with factory McLaren's winning week after week, year after year, it eventually killed a lot of interest off. Then when they left, Penske brought that 917-10 and 917-30 and they owned everyone...which just destroyed the series. They were great cars and a great spectacle....but people just gave up on it...

[beachbum]

It is, and it isn't. Bob and I have disagree and agreed. I agree with Bob's notion that ideally everyone would run what they have and the rulesmakers would quit trying to keep everyone even. Where I am however going to annoy him is I understand that in today's world, this isn't happening. It is pretty much the reality if one car wins every race in a year, the interest in a series drops. It is THAT simple....and hence all the rules tinkering and various ways of handicapping. There isn't a promotor on the planet that wants to see week after week one team just kicking the snot out of everyone else.....and with some of these juggernaut teams in some series, that could go on for years.

The old Can AM I believe is close to what Bob's ideal was, and for all that nostalga and love people had for the series, it economically didn't survive, and there was no competitive balance....now there a lot of reasons for it, and Bob would be the first to point out that SCCA couldn't run a pi$$ up in a Brewery and he would be right, but I have always believed that with factory McLaren's winning week after week, year after year, it eventually killed a lot of interest off. Then when they left, Penske brought that 917-10 and 917-30 and they owned everyone...which just destroyed the series. They were great cars and a great spectacle....but people just gave up on it...

The original Can-Am demonstrated both the best and worst of open rules. The rules allowed cars like the Shadow Mk1 with its tiny wheels, the King Cobra, the Chaparrals, and finally the Porsches. Lots of diverse ideas and interesting technology. If you were into car technology, it was a golden era. But the downsides were huge as most of the time the series was dominated by one car, in the early years mostly by very conventional McLarens. Mechanical breakdowns were frequent and often the races became almost demonstration runs. Costs escalated until the series didn't make sense to anyone.

In the same era as Can-Am you had the Tran-Am. While the rules were more open than most series today, the cars were rather similar. The racing was very good, with different cars having an opportunity to win. The closest thing today are the GT classes in Grand-Am and ALMS.

Today there is F1 and Le Mans. While the rules are pretty restrictive, the costs are still out of line. As a technological exercise F1 is very interesting. But when you look at qualifying, you can almost line up the cars by brand. Red Bull at the front, then McLaren or Ferrari. At the back you find the Lotus and HRT. For the most part, the only passing is in turn 1 and pit lane. The racing IMHO is visually and aurally stunning but the on track action is about as exciting as watching paint dry. Qualifying is more interesting as the race, as often it IS the race.

Le Mans cars are just a bad. Sure the Audi and Peugeots are fun to watch, but take away the factory funding and what do you have? ALMS. 2 maybe 3 P1 cars and only 2 are competitive. Grand-Am may be "spec" cars, but at least the on track competition is strong - and they have more than 2 cars show up for the top class.

If you view racing as a technical exercise, then more open rules make sense. The best engineer wins. But if racing is viewed as a competition to see who is best driver, then "spec" racing often creates the best on track competition. I have a degree in engineering, but I would rather see who is the best driver than who has the best car design.

Personally, I have been following racing a long time, and I don't remember any series as competitive as Indy Car is right now. Even at road courses, the whole field may be covered by 2 seconds with the majority within 1 second. The last practice at Toronto had 22 cars within 1 second of the quickest. Hard to beat that.

[Bob Riebe]

In the same era as Can-Am you had the Tran-Am. While the rules were more open than most series today, the cars were rather similar. The racing was very good, with different cars having an opportunity to win. The closest thing today are the GT classes in Grand-Am and ALMS.

Despite what Mark insists, if one wants to go down this road, the Can-Am is not the desired standard (I never like the sucker Chaparral from the get-go) but the original Trans-Am, is the way sedan-gt racing should be done, and a basis of how rules should be written. Rules have two boundaries between which one can build a car/engine to defeat the competition. No stinking artificial equalization, which destroys the reason motorsports came to exist, show who has the best vehicle.


The Grand-Am and ALMS are only similar in that they use sedans and gt vehicles. Both are pathetic spec. series that give no one without money burning a whole in his/her pocket any reason to compete, unless one has a huge sponsor to pay the bills.

Any sort of spec. racing always boils down to the one who can best afford to cheat the supposed "spirit" of the rules, wins. I.e. Chevy with their homologated but factory only cylinder heads in GT1.
Of course Saleen did manage to win in GT1, but the specs. were changed to right that wrong.,

If Indy Car racing thinks it can survive, much less grow, by hoping it can draw hero driver worshippers, they might as well turn out the lights the party is over as, once the short run curiosity wears off, its new - it is spec. but it is not spec. -farce with collapse on it itself.

[beachbum]

Despite what Mark insists, if one wants to go down this road, the Can-Am is not the desired standard (I never like the sucker Chaparral from the get-go) but the original Trans-Am, is the way sedan-gt racing should be done, and a basis of how rules should be written. Rules have two boundaries between which one can build a car/engine to defeat the competition. No stinking artificial equalization, which destroys the reason motorsports came to exist, show who has the best vehicle.

I had a unique opportunity to hear Mark Donohue speak at a very small SAE meeting when they were running the Javelins in Trans-Am, and was able to speak with him after the meeting. The amount of cheating that was going on in that era was amazing. Acid dipped bodies, oversize fuel cells, special lightweight (and illegal) parts and on and on. Because the rules were pretty lax, even that series was getting out on hand. Mark spoke about the oil pan on the Javelin that cost over $40,000 in development (not counting the cost of many blown engines) in 1970. Dry sump was not allowed, but their pan was effectively a dry sump system in a single "oil pan". He claimed Trans-Am was at least as expensive as Can-Am, and while the factories appeared to pour money into the series, the support wasn't as extensive an many believed.

Based on his comments, I don't think he thought it could last much longer without tighter rules and rules enforcement. Open rules sound good, but they have never built a solid foundation in any racing series.

[Bob Riebe]

I had a unique opportunity to hear Mark Donohue speak at a very small SAE meeting when they were running the Javelins in Trans-Am, and was able to speak with him after the meeting. The amount of cheating that was going on in that era was amazing. Acid dipped bodies, oversize fuel cells, special lightweight (and illegal) parts and on and on. Because the rules were pretty lax, even that series was getting out on hand. Mark spoke about the oil pan on the Javelin that cost over $40,000 in development (not counting the cost of many blown engines) in 1970. Dry sump was not allowed, but their pan was effectively a dry sump system in a single "oil pan". He claimed Trans-Am was at least as expensive as Can-Am, and while the factories appeared to pour money into the series, the support wasn't as extensive an many believed.

Based on his comments, I don't think he thought it could last much longer without tighter rules and rules enforcement. Open rules sound good, but they have never built a solid foundation in any racing series.

It went on for a long time after that, both the series and the cheating.

The rules were not open, but very specific, as Joe Chamberlain found out when he built a CAT II Corvette, took it to inspection and was given a list of items to fix.
Cheating was only complained about by the ones caught.
In the long run it was not the "open" rules that killed the Trans-Am but 110" generic tube-frame cars that neither fans nor factories cared much about.