CMC dead?

[mach1]

I just checked the results from east coast nats, 4 CMC cars, all mustangs. I guess CMC is only for rednecks in the center of the USA, not the hipsters on the coasts?
I wonder what a COTA national event would bring, probably a field of 20 CMC cars.

[Pranav]

Considering CMC is dead/nonexistent on both coasts this is of no surprise.

[Suck fumes]

If nasa went back to One real national champ race and had it at cota I bet there would be a record number of cars.

[GlennCMC70]

The first Nats had 23.

[dtanker65]

I was in Monterey and attended West nats. The attendance was comparable with a regional event in TX. Spec E30 was a big class, the only CMC car I saw was in TTB and won. ST1-3 was a good sized class. One of the coolest cars I saw was an ex AI Camaro with a 7.0L crate engine putting 650hp to the wheels. The car builder got design help from some of the Nascar teams, it was very well engineered. The car ran in SU. It was great to see a car like one
we are racing able to compete with modified Z06 Corvettes.

[mach1]

I was in Monterey and attended West nats. The attendance was comparable with a regional event in TX. Spec E30 was a big class, the only CMC car I saw was in TTB and won. ST1-3 was a good sized class. One of the coolest cars I saw was an ex AI Camaro with a 7.0L crate engine putting 650hp to the wheels. The car builder got design help from some of the Nascar teams, it was very well engineered. The car ran in SU. It was great to see a car like one
we are racing able to compete with modified Z06 Corvettes.

Nice, any other details on that Camaro? A CMC car would get wasted in TTB in Texas, well in CMC trim. If you got the power up to TTB Power:Weight, slapped on some A7's, you could probably be competitive. Thats what would be so cool about a 98-02 F-Body, pull the restrictor and it would be a super easy dual purpose CMC/TT car.

[GlennCMC70]

Nice, any other details on that Camaro? A CMC car would get wasted in TTB in Texas, well in CMC trim. If you got the power up to TTB Power:Weight, slapped on some A7's, you could probably be competitive. Thats what would be so cool about a 98-02 F-Body, pull the restrictor and it would be a super easy dual purpose CMC/TT car.

35 page thread here. Car is no joke. It ran here a couple times @ Nat's w/ AI/CMC as an AIX car during its early build stages.
May have to register before you can see it.
http://www.frrax.com/rrforum/index.php?showtopic=14181

[mach1]

35 page thread here. Car is no joke. It ran here a couple times @ Nat's w/ AI/CMC as an AIX car during its early build stages.
May have to register before you can see it.
http://www.frrax.com/rrforum/index.php?showtopic=14181

I clicked the link in excitement, then I ran into this :(

The board administrator is no longer accepting any new registrations at the moment.

[GlennCMC70]

http://www.blainefabrication.com/projects/2010_03_12/IMG_3341.JPG
http://blainefab.com/projects/2014-08-11/4-TLGTO%20001.JPG

[dtanker65]

Sorry,
I didn't check tires, the power was up, I want to say 335hp to the wheels. Un-corked LT1/LS1? Way faster than my TTC 2015 Hertz V6/auto Mustang. It had the blistering acceleration of a Spec 944, though it was fun going downhill.

I wanted to evaluate the new Mustang IRS. I would have to defer to Aaron on this matter. The 2015 handled like an overweight Miata to me. It was very forgiving and hard to get into oversteer, but it felt extremely heavy. I would need to weigh the IRS vs a stick axle, but my gut reaction is the solid axle is lighter and more nimble as long as you are used to it's quirks. I have never driven anything other than solid axle though.

[mach1]

http://www.blainefabrication.com/projects/2010_03_12/IMG_3341.JPG
http://blainefab.com/projects/2014-08-11/4-TLGTO%20001.JPG

Thank you!

[Supercharged111]

TTB was a mish mash. IIRC there was a 350Z leading the way until he had an mechanically induced 4 off. I think the 350 was duking it out with that yellow bird though. Considering the gap on the other 2 cars though, it must have been as entertaining as TT. CMC is dead in a lot of places. Problem is most people don't associate these cars with turning in both directions. Another problem is that the majority of the car guys I talk to anywhere are always completely unaware of NASA and local road courses. I just don't get it. These people don't look for anything on their own, just blindly accept what is mass marketed/spoon fed to them so when I mention the possibility of anything but a drag strip I get this blank stare. This class totally makes sense because it's a lot like Spec Miata but with V8s. Regardless of how bad peoples' panties get twisted over RCRs, you can still find turn key CMC race cars for the same entry fee (sometimes less) than a prepped SM.

[Suck fumes]

Sorry,
I didn't check tires, the power was up, I want to say 335hp to the wheels. Un-corked LT1/LS1? Way faster than my TTC 2015 Hertz V6/auto Mustang. It had the blistering acceleration of a Spec 944, though it was fun going downhill.

I wanted to evaluate the new Mustang IRS. I would have to defer to Aaron on this matter. The 2015 handled like an overweight Miata to me. It was very forgiving and hard to get into oversteer, but it felt extremely heavy. I would need to weigh the IRS vs a stick axle, but my gut reaction is the solid axle is lighter and more nimble as long as you are used to it's quirks. I have never driven anything other than solid axle though.


You have to drive the track package GT on track. It's simply amazing. Feels awkward at first cause the irs makes the car kind of lean in the corners but it hooks. Even if you purposely mash the gas it still hooks. If I had $50k to buy one and turn it into an AI car I am confident no one would come within a second of me. THAT's how good it is.

[BryanL]

I just checked the results from east coast nats, 4 CMC cars, all mustangs. I guess CMC is only for rednecks in the center of the USA, not the hipsters on the coasts?
I wonder what a COTA national event would bring, probably a field of 20 CMC cars.

No surprise that it was all Mustangs! That being said I would certainly be at COTA-yet I don't see how we would get more than 1-2 out of region cars if we were lucky. We would still be able to crack 10 easily. Just don't ever see it happening with the cost of rental for that many days. Of course I have no idea how much the rental costs is at the other tracks but that would be nice to know for comparison. Then you would certainly have your answer as it's all about business and the bottom line of a profit. Sure they might get more entries for other classes but I don't see them having near the overall participation like SCCA has had there. Besides-how many times has SCCA been there?

Maybe we should consider adding another section to our forum for SpecE46 when it takes off.

[mach1]

No surprise that it was all Mustangs!
Good thing a 4th gen didn't show up and whoop everyone like last year at nats.

[BryanL]

Good thing a 4th gen didn't show up and whoop everyone like last year at nats.

By everyone you mean the lone Mustang against 8 F-body's that showed up. Though I didn't think Sammy was really whooped with his podium finish. And no disrespect to Sammy as he is faster than me but if Aaron would have been driving the CMC car then I think we all know it would have been a different outcome.

[Den34]

I would not use attendance at National events as the barometer of CMC health. I would look towards each region and judge it on a region to region basis. CMC is a very budget minded class and it is expensive to go to a National event with a entry fee of $500 to $700 bucks depending on when you sign up, and that does not include fuel to get there or hotel etc etc... To convince a CMC guy to give up 2 or 3 regional events to go to 1 national show can be a tough sell. In the past 4 years Derek Wright, Kent Owens, Tim Bennett, Spencer Caudle and myself have been pretty regular attendees at National events. Last year at Road Atlanta we made up 5 of the 9 entries. We kind of got tired of showing up to these events and not having many guys from other regions showing up. So this year we decided we were not going to go. Had we all went we would have had 8 cars. We decided to go to Hallet instead.

Bob Denton
CMC Midwest

[mach1]

We decided to go to Hallet instead.

How was it?

[Supercharged111]

I would not use attendance at National events as the barometer of CMC health. I would look towards each region and judge it on a region to region basis. CMC is a very budget minded class and it is expensive to go to a National event with a entry fee of $500 to $700 bucks depending on when you sign up, and that does not include fuel to get there or hotel etc etc... To convince a CMC guy to give up 2 or 3 regional events to go to 1 national show can be a tough sell. In the past 4 years Derek Wright, Kent Owens, Tim Bennett, Spencer Caudle and myself have been pretty regular attendees at National events. Last year at Road Atlanta we made up 5 of the 9 entries. We kind of got tired of showing up to these events and not having many guys from other regions showing up. So this year we decided we were not going to go. Had we all went we would have had 8 cars. We decided to go to Hallet instead.

Bob Denton
CMC Midwest

SM can also be considered a budget class. Sure the guys at the front run a new set of tires every weekend, but it's still a cheap car to get into. You can spend a ton of money in any class, no matter how cheap, but the fact of the matter is SM is a nationally known class and most everyone who owns one knows that the class exists regardless of if they just drive to work, autox, HPDE, or race their own Miata. SM exists in both NASA and SCCA. SCCA is better known to the masses, even the ones who don't attend their events. What vectors an HPDE1 guy to any race class? Typically the car he HPDEs will have a bit of sway in his decision, i.e. if he started with a gutless, well-balanced car and he wants to go W2W cheap without converting whatever he's driving, he'll likely be inclined to go with SM or Spec 944. If he's got a little more money and wants a well populated class, perhaps GTS is where he'll go again with a gutless, well-balanced 3 series. Someone who shows up in something fast like a Vette or a GTR will probably be enticed by the ST1/2/3 or STU classes, though here in the RM region those guys tend to go TT and stay there. It seems to me there's a very small pool of people who show up to the track from the get go with any predisposition to this class. They must be convinced very early on. In my experience, a lot of the HPDE guys show up just to have fun and are very passive. There's only ever a few of them that are willing to haul some ass for the whole session, most aren't concerned with progression and are content to stay in HPDE for years and years. I think most of those people are probably making the right decision if they don't have the personality to get side by side and not just hand it over. So to recap and trim it down a bit, there are a lot of HPDE participants who don't become NASA regulars, count them out. A lot more that will stay in HPDE forever with most who do progress beyond that going the TT route as they don't need to get a new prepped car. The few that do go race gravitate toward platforms that are generally associated with taking turns in the first place.

[AllZWay]

I would not use attendance at National events as the barometer of CMC health. I would look towards each region and judge it on a region to region basis. CMC is a very budget minded class and it is expensive to go to a National event with a entry fee of $500 to $700 bucks depending on when you sign up, and that does not include fuel to get there or hotel etc etc... To convince a CMC guy to give up 2 or 3 regional events to go to 1 national show can be a tough sell. In the past 4 years Derek Wright, Kent Owens, Tim Bennett, Spencer Caudle and myself have been pretty regular attendees at National events. Last year at Road Atlanta we made up 5 of the 9 entries. We kind of got tired of showing up to these events and not having many guys from other regions showing up. So this year we decided we were not going to go. Had we all went we would have had 8 cars. We decided to go to Hallet instead.

Bob Denton
CMC Midwest

I think Bob has nailed it. It just cost entirely too much to go a national event when you consider travel, entry fee, tires, brakes... etc.. for a entire week just to race a few cars. Hallett has traditionally had way more than Nats each year.

[Fbody383]

I think Bob has nailed it. It just cost entirely too much to go a national event when you consider travel, entry fee, tires, brakes... etc.. for a entire week just to race a few cars. Hallett has traditionally had way more than Nats each year. Speaking of Nats... have 2016 locations been announced?

We should literally just have CMC nats at Hallett.

[Suck fumes]

Plus having a split nat champ event takes away the lure to want to drive across country. Because even if you win you are still not a "national champion" until you win the mx5 race which is another week you have to take off. I really hope they go back to ONE event.

[jeffburch]

The first Nats had 23.


24 actually.

jb

[BADVENM]

We were the CMC trimmed car in PTB. It was the one of a few classes we could cross over too. We were heavily outgunned horsepower-wise as a start which resulted in us being about 6-7 seconds slower compared to the other 3 PTB cars. Nonetheless we finished on the podium in 3rd and had a great time at an iconic track. We really didn't care which group we were in, it was more about driving that track. Our fastest lap was a 1:48.161, interested in comparing that to production cars I found that we're about a second faster than a Ford Focus ST per http://fastestlaps.com/tracks/laguna_seca.html

The other half of Team Incidental Contact and myself wrote down a list of "must do" tracks the last weekend. We also broke them down by distance and time to get there. Given we drove to Laguna Seca (about 25.5 hours from western Kansas) our radius is pretty big and comes close to Daytona and parts of New York state. Your results may and will likely vary.

Maybe we (Rocky Mountain, Texas, Midwest who seem to compose the most CMC cars collectively) could work together and strive to get a large turnout at either a west coast or east coast event. We also were working with a few NASA Texas folks in high places to try and get NASA and Toyo to recognize Hallett as a place for a national championship event for CMC/AI, etc. Not sure how it went over but we at least got a conversation going.

Maybe we could start a poll as to which tracks you would attend for either a west coast or east coast national championship event. Probably better thing is to wait til the tracks are announced then see how many would go. Our mistake was thinking 4 cars would surely make the west coast seeing there are two California regions. Had we known there's basically no CMC or AI on the west coast anymore and hadn't already submitted our leave slips for peak leave season at work we would have gone to the east coast event instead. If we plan or attempt to plan/coordinate when the tracks are announced we could avoid that part next year.

[GlennCMC70]

24 actually.

jb

It was a test to see if you were still around.

[Supercharged111]

So perhaps collectively we could decide on an event to consider for nats next year? Maybe agree on it here or on the under-utilized CMC forum? I can ping my guys and post their thoughts be it the east, west, or Hallett event. I'm personally in favor of the Hallett event, but then again it's the only long distance event I do so I'm probably biased. I prioritize turnout over a top-notch venue too. I can't swing Hallett plus nats, and I know I'm not the only one. We're kind of unique because 3 regions largely comprise our entire population. Still need to call Thede and talk about the conversation he had at Laguna Seca.

[BADVENM]

Now that I think of it, I'm not sure why I care so much about having a large CMC turnout at a national championship event. I swore I'd never go to another one after attending two or three of them and only having selective rules in the CMC rulebook enforced and others ignored or blown off as "doesn't give a performance advantage".