Originally Posted by JWL-NASA
Gentlemen-
I'm truly sorry that this issue has caused so much stress and strain. I can assure you that the technical inspections at the National Championships will be conducted in the same rational and reasonable manner that we’ve done inspections in every other class in NASA for years and years. We’re not going to publish an absolute set of guidelines that will subject a car to scrutiny as this would effectively undermine the entire process as folks would know how to fly under the radar and those with less than pure motives would certainly exploit this strategy. We will enforce the rules to the best of our ability and we will turn to the CMC leadership as we conduct the inspections to ensure that they are done in the best possible manner. We will also do our best to minimize the pain of the inspection, but you should be prepared to pull a valve cover, header, manifold, or head, or other part if we request that you do so. Our goal is not to find cheaters and “bust” them, but rather to prove to all interested parties that the competitors in the event are running legally and honestly.
So, the sky is not falling and the camel’s nose and ass are both still well outside the tent. As Tony said, show up with a legal car and you have nothing to worry about aside from putting on your best drive to win a championship that can be defended as legitimate because proper scrutiny was applied to ensure your car was indeed legal and your championship genuine.
Thanks and feel free to e-mail me as well offline for further discussion.
-JWL