THSCC Forums

With only one event remaining there are some close battles:

http://www.thscc.com/autocross/events/standings.html

Pending a final audit, several class champions have already been crowned. Others will have to wait until Sanford.

GS is currently the closest battle, with Mary E and Donna in a dead heat going into the final event!

Sorry the page takes so long to load.

Scott

Do you have the top dog points available anywhere? Is the format for calculating those the same as calculating the regular classes?

-Tom

I don't know what the formula is. I'm pretty sure that whoever decides on the "Top Gun" award uses an "ass kisser" multiplier in the equation.

Scott

Scott, The standings show me as a non-member but I am a member. Just want to make sure that something isnt messed up.
Thanks

_________________
'88 bmw 535is
'98 honda civic ex

About the "top gun" trophy - if it uses the same points system as the class trophy awards, I have 11 points on you, Tom. (yes, I probably like spreadsheets as much as Mike Whitney )

But I still don't feel like a better driver than you (close, maybe) so I'm up for whatever the people in charge decide...



(and I'm not going to kiss any ass )

I calculated the TOPGUN and Dishman trophy points last year and the points system I used was the same as the regular season points. Including dropped events.

Only the Top ten get awarded points in each category. Top ten pax for Topgun. Top ten raw times for Dishman cup.

Shawn

ps. I should have put those new tires on 1 event earlier and I might have been a challenge to you guys.

I have a suggestion to change the scoring on the larger PAXed classes. In TIRE class we have had over 25 cars at almost every event this season. Most of the guys are coming out just for fun every weekend or looking to improve thier driving and novices coming into open classes. I think we should extend the graduated scoring out to 10th place in TIRE. The reason is a midpack guy might have a good weekend and make it inside the top ten, a good drive for them and overall if there are 20 to 30 cars running for the weekend. Essentially now only the top 5 get any real points. With so many cars this is too heavily weighted to the top cars and drivers. I just think a guy who finishes 10th in a class of 25 or 30 cars has done a pretty good job and should be compensated more than one point. Which as it is now is the same as 6th and on up.

_________________
2006 Civic Si - #24 HS for 2015

2005 GMC Sierra
1991 318is Garage Ornament

I agree with Rob, and so do some others. There has been talk of scoring the PRO and TIRE classes similarly to the night event, where you get compared to the best time in the class rather than the graduated system. Currently there is a big penalty for being 0.001 slower than first place.

Scott

Good point Rob,

I also think we should consider and discuss splitting the TIR class into stock TIR and non-stock TIR. This solves some other problems with the TIR class as well (and creates some other problems which I'm sure we will hear about )

_________________
Mike Whitney
whit32@gmail.com, 919-454-5445
V10, V8, V8t, I6, I6, V6, F4t, I4, I4, I4, I4, I2, 1, 1

When you say stock TIR and non-stock TIR, do you mean "people using the tires that came with the car" and "people using Azeni / some other Max Performance tire?"

No, we mean:

SS-Tire, AS-Tire... HS-Tire

and

Everything else-Tire. Bring an A-Mod car on street tiers, and have at it.

Scott

Even better than splitting the class would be to have a list of spec tires to run. Certainly now that the STS tire war is in full force we can come up with two or three that come in a variety of sizes and have similar performance. Get colony to give our guys a good deal on them, and that would help solve some of the disparity now seen. Alot of the guys are using super high performance tires but I don't think that's enough reason to split the class up. Some of the newer cars like the SRT4 I saw at the dealer with KD-W's stock or the EVO and STi with thier sticky tires stock. It wouldn't be right to basically penalize a new autoxer for buying an EVO and then stick him into a tougher class because he bought a nice car. I was perfectly fine on Goodyear RS-A's earlier in the year granted I did run 60psi in them sometimes. Where would we draw the line then, Treadwear isn't a good measure and neither is perception especially if I can get 2nds and 3rds on Goodyear tires. I think getting colony(or another THSCC sponsor) to give the TIRE guys a deal helps the class work better as it makes autox even that more affordable. Of course guidelines for getting the deal would need to be set. Like only THSCC members, TIR competitors only, run a sponsor sticker on the car at the events, etc. After running the full season this year in the current TIR class I had alot of fun running against all the other different drivers and types of cars, it pretty competative and alot of fun.

_________________
2006 Civic Si - #24 HS for 2015

2005 GMC Sierra
1991 318is Garage Ornament

Now I get to use the saying, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". Splitting TIR into sub-classes will bring on a scoring nightmare. We will nearly double the classes. And for what purpose? So everyone gets a trophy?

What was the original intent of TIR?

To force a Miata on Falkens to run in the open class because those are the tires they drive on everyday is not fair. To force a TIR competitor to buy a specific tire to run is worse than open class. Are you going to force the Miata driver to buy Toyos to run in TIR class? So you are right back to having to buy extra rims, tires and changing tires for the events. What have you solved? Actually, you have made the TIR class an exclusive class for people with money. In open class, you can run any DOT approved tire (slicks in MOD and P).

If you want to level the playing field (which is an effort in futility) create your PAX for TIR class. Say for every gradient of 10 in tread wear you subtract .005 from the class PAX. A competitor on 140 will have a straight ES PAX of .806, a competitor on 200 tread wear would have .776 PAX. But it comes down to this, the TIR competitors have to spend time developing and administering this beast. How bad do you want it?

_________________
Jim Pastorius
2008 Silverado VortecMax
1992 Camaro CMC#92
2002 BMW R1150R

2009 3rd Place CMC Mid-Atlantic Championship
2009 CMC Hyperfest Winner

I agree with Jim on the futility of trying to further level the field. We already have NOV, TIR and PRO in an attempt to make more people feel good and have a competitive class to run. At the end of the day, the better drivers with the better cars and tires are still going to win. Period.

We can add more classes to make it more "fair". Then you'll have 2-3 people per class. Like DM - few people is much less fun - trust me. One or two trophies and the best driver and car will probably still win it every time. And you'll occasionally get bumped in with tougher classes.

We can adjust TIR and PRO to have a different scoring. But then you really need to adjust all the other classes to score the same. A .001 loss is no different or more painful in TIR or PRO than it is in CS. Just because a class has 25 drivers doesn't mean that the mid-pack guy who gets 10th is a superior driver - could be the last 15 weren't very good (speaking generically - not this particular group of drivers, of course ). Same with a class with 5 drivers. Yeah the 5th driver may not be good and still gets 5th place points - BUT maybe he is hugely competitive and would still have been 5th if there were 25 drivers in the class. A scoring system cannot adjust for the mix of drivers in a class that changes over time. IMHO, an imperfect but CONSISTENT scoring system is better than having one-off systems that fit particular classes.

You may ask why I give a rat's rear about all this since I over in the mod world? I'm hoping next year I will be somewhere in open stock class. From my current (outside) perspective, it's not as broken as it must look from within. Most classes have enough people so you can actually compete in your own class not only at each event, but across the whole season. You actually have reasonable enough paxes that you can put your car in TIR if you don't want to spend much money, in open class if you want to spend more money and use tires, and the PRO class if you want to spend even more money and are talented. And, in most of the classes you could even prep your car to the limit and still not be required to trailer it to the event!

My advice is to leave it as is - no system is perfect, but at least you have multiple options open to you and it's clear what you need to do if you want to finish higher in your class.

My $.02 worth...

I don't know how many of you noticed me drifting and doing pendulum turns on the first few runs at the last night event, but anyway, I was running on Bridgestone RE92's. Switched to the Falken Azeni for the second half, and dropped two seconds.

Falken Azenis treadwear = 200
Bridgestone RE92 treadwear = 160

Need I say more?

My OPINION is that the current rules are fine and dandy. If you really want to win, you'll spend the money on car prep and do your time, and maybe you'll get there. If you don't want to (or can't) spend the money, then don't expect to win - and if you do well, be happy. Where do we draw the line? I know my car isn't as well-prepared as Tom Hoppe's, so maybe we should factor in a "not fully-prepared" correction factor, so I can beat him. And maybe all the other classes would like that, too. Not driving the fastest car in your class? Just multiply by X, and tada! You win!

Okay, enough sarcasm...