Don't shoot the messenger, but...

[Ken Killam]

http://www.scca.com/documents/Fastrack/11/11-fastrack-sept.pdf

I'm sure that many of you are already aware of the up and coming changes to your car classing as it may relate to the SCCA GCR. And some may not. To that sum, this issue of Fastrack in particular contains much information on what the future may hold with these proposed 2012 SCCA rule changes.

The link is the whole document, but after the BOD 'intro' page there's the "Club Racing Board" with a long list of AS and other changes.

So what do you think about giving F500 a four-stroke engine?

~FWIW~

​

 

[Richard Broadhead]

That ENTIRE FF/FC 'rewrite' section has ONE intention and one intention ONLY. To make the new RADON FC (a blank sheet of paper new design) which is already homologated, ILLEGAL. Why you say? Because it's the most innovative FC design to come along in over 10 years! "Certain powers that be" don't want this innovative car in FC even though the car has very, very little track/race time to prove or disprove the concepts.

UNLIKE most rule changes submitted to SCCA, NOBODY has laid claim to this one NOR did SCCA publish who submitted the rules change request which is NORMALLY done. It turned in to a real black helo's thing.

4 cycle engine for F500... YES.

As you may know, J. Novak ( a big car maker in F500's) has been working on getting "F600" going with 600 cc MC engines for a couple of years now. Advantage of a 'real' gear box and more power compared to the 'slip clutch' F500's of today. I suspect requesting the rules change to allow 4 cycles in as F500's is an attempt to accomplish the same sort of thing while maintaining the 500 cc limit.

I'm gonna guess if they do this some kind of engine 'managment' will be needed to equalize the competition between the 4 stroke and 2 stroke in F500.

 

[tobybasiliko]

ummm... what's new here? This happens every so often- if you're paying attention to what the SCCA's doing, you can usually see it coming.

It took Conference 2 years to realize the SCCA'd axed G- production, even though the SCCA Production community had known (and squawked) for at least a season.

This is why Conference was formed, those 50- odd years ago. So form a FF class in Conference, and then we have control over the rules.

Yup, it's always a grumpy feeling. No, it shouldn't be any huge surprise- it's how the SCCA rules process goes...

not panicked yet,

t

 

[Ken Killam]

Richard said-"UNLIKE most rule changes submitted to SCCA, NOBODY has laid claim to this one NOR did SCCA publish who submitted the rules change request which is NORMALLY done. It turned in to a real black helo's thing."

The Fastrack (minutes o' the meet) comes out every month and is available on-line in .pdf form to any that want to perform the short navigation through www.scca.com And if one were to go through those every time you're otherwise completely bored, it's fun to see which way the winds blow. The letters to the CRB suggesting rule changes are acknowledged. Some are tossed off right away, with a "thank you for your input." And others are turned what this seems to be as a culminations of many changes so that they are not updating the GCR on the fly.

This change in procedures has just come about over the last few years. It became most evident as whole table of contents were re-evaluated and the document when the complete format of the GCR was changed, and in my use of it, became much easier to get through. Of course there was a small learning curve to re-learn some numbers, BUT is a solid improvement over the previously, and seemingly haphazard, constant re-writing of the book.

I find it interesting how the SCCA has swung in that aspect of their operations. The BOD/CRB are still able to change what they want, when they want in consideration of certain situations for flexibility, but batching them into an annual 'dump' like this is just so 'Conference'. And it still remains that SCCA drivers have the opportunity to work through their respective regions to affect changes just like a 'Conference'.

Come to think of it, it's just about that time of the season for all good ICSCC licensed drivers to lend to that process.

​

JFTR -- I would NEVER suggest that the ICSCC BOD meet every month and release any minutes of those meetings, or any meetings for that matter due to their delicate content. If I want a manuscript of the semi-annual minutes I will SIMPLY find my local EBR, of course.

 

[Richard Broadhead]

...... The letters to the CRB suggesting rule changes are acknowledged. Some are tossed off right away, with a "thank you for your input." And others are turned.......

Ken,

There is generally (almost ALWAYS) a public acknowledgement of WHERE the change is coming from. i.e. Person, persons, group, organization. In this case the FF/FC rewrite/reorganization was done by a Person, persons, group or organization BUT NOT IDENTIFIED. That's whats got people craw.....

UNLIKE ICSCC, a rule change proposal can come from ANYONE who's an SCCA member. That means the rewrite could have been done by a group of Van Diemen engineers, a bunch of Tatuus drivers or, the Mygale management. HECK, maybe I WROTE it just cause I didn't have anything to do last year while I was in a coma!

That is the trouble with SCCA. The driverswho actually race in a given class don't get to decide on their own rules changes. It's at the whem of the FSRAC/CRB/BOD and the BOD doesn't always listen to the CRB either LOL

 

[Ken Killam]

"UNLIKE ICSCC, a rule change proposal can come from ANYONE who's an SCCA member. That means the rewrite could have been done by a group of Van Diemen engineers, a bunch of Tatuus drivers or, the Mygale management. HECK, maybe I WROTE it just cause I didn't have anything to do last year while I was in a coma." --That's funny. One of those "In your dreams, kinda rules.", eh?

It may also be seen as a strength, too. The policy of the membership driving the club is the same philosophy that is essential in every one of the clubs in the Conference. CSCC, TC, SCCBC, IRDC, NWMS, etc all have their very own set of bylaws. The SCCA is only one club.

And the process is not really too unlike ICSCC, Richard. And the possibility of a much larger variety of input is expected in SCCA as they are a 'Conference' of regional localities with membership in the Sports Car Club of America. So everybody's a member, and because of that it's only fair that everybody has input.

<to the crowd>
ICSCC is an "association" of independently operated clubs. Sometimes people around here don't 'get' that. And so, ICSCC operates differently than other race sanctioning bodies in that the organizational policy and procedures only recognize the documented members as drivers. Once upon a time, the PPM provided for the formation of a Race Official's Division that would attempt to function as an advisory committee to the Exec Board, in the hopes that it might fill the gap between driving, and the other operating considerations of a championship series as according to those same set of regulations.
<thank you>

Control is not a simple assumption.​

 

[tobybasiliko]

One of my favorite rules request EVER from the SCCA-
it was a couple of years ago, in Production:

Requested: Remove your heads from your a**es
Responded: Incompatible with class philosophy.

STILL makes me giggle...

t

 

[Ken Killam]

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