Of COURSE it's virtual vintage racing. What people like about vintage racing
is that it's convivial--which SCCA never ever is, and there's people to race
because the spectrum of cars is so great in any group. Except for a few
classes, the typical modern race is not wheel to wheel. In my DSR car I
probably had five good races in more than a hundred times on track. In my
vintage car I have someone to slug it out with every time I get on track--or
I get myself moved up a group or two.
I know there are people out there parading around in pukka vintage cars, but
not many. Even in the prewar classes the guys up front are turning times
that would have made them world champions in the day. I doubt they really
are better than Fangio.
There's a lot of polite fiction in vintage racing, like racing at eight
tenths. I'm sure there are people doing that, but I don't know any of them.
Most people are pretty serious about keeping their car in the spirit of
vintage racing, but that doesn't mean risking burning alive, or having
wheels fall off, or having no roll cage (quite legal in many groups). Nor
does it mean making 90 horsepower from a two litre tractor motor or racing
on hard, old fashioned rubber unless you are forced to.
We run steel cranks, Carillo rods, and pistons better than anything
available before 1990. Anything remotely allowable--it's in there. Peyote
used to have a plywood floor, some 2 by 4 braces, and a beer keg for a gas
tank. And it used to run in the middle of the pack. It's got no business
being competitive with Listers and Devin SSs. But what the heck, it's fun.
More fun than any other kind of racing I've done. I sold my Radical because
I wasn't racing it enough--any time there was a conflict I'd do the vintage
race.
There's a line, but it's fuzzy. We all kind of know where it is. It's like
pornography--you know it when you see it.
the tire debate is about that line. No one is jumping on the idea of running
50 series tires. We'd all be happy having Comp TAs back, or any decent 70 or
60 series radial that would fit. It would also be nice to only need one set
of tires and one front end setup, but that won't happen for me--I gotta have
my Monterey fix every year. I doubt that there is any way to get Steve Earle
to change his mind on tires. And the truth is, he's pretty much right.
I've thought seriously about switching permanently to Dunlops and learning
to be fast on them, but they really just aren't as much fun as tires you can
push more. and this is definately all about fun.
-----Original Message-----
From: Editorgary@aol.com
To: Bill Babcock; MGVR@yahoogroups.com; fot@autox.team.net
Sent: 9/15/2005 9:17 PM
Subject: Re: [MGVR] Tire
The apparent condundrum this poses is intriguing -- seems as if everyone
hates the few tires that are totally pukka for the really picky vintage
race groups, and those groups insist that the tires they're specifying
are the one ones that produce racing "just like it was in ze olt dayz"
as B.S. would say.
Who's to be believed? Are we just making up a sort of virtual vintage
racing by setting rules that suit us, neither really competitive within
basic limitations a la SCCA, nor really vintage as in the way race
driving was when the cars were new?
That's a zen question -- it requires no response.
Cheers
Gary
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