How are the new cars remaining in Stock classes going to affect your racing this year

[Chris Barnes]

The new cars will not influence my plans. I will be tickled to be racing alongside them once again in my old station wagon. I just want to be racing again! My car is a '64 Plymouth with a 425 hp engine and a 3995# minimum weight that can run A-B-C/SA. I run C because I could never get it quite light enough for B. I actually went a second under the old index at Mission a couple of years ago but still in either class, the '70-'71 Challengers will kick my butt as surely the DPs. Likewise, I've looked at the tail lights of a couple of big block Mustangs that were almost as old as me. Need I even say that they're all driven be people that I like? Hopeless match ups won't deter me from enjoying myself.

That being said, I would like to see the new cars in a situation where they didn't have to hold anything back. I personally lean towards finding a way to give them their own class at least on a temporary basis. They are exciting cars that should bring attention new blood to our sport. We should welcome them with arms open wide.

Happy Holidays!

Chris Barnes
Wagons of Steel
Stock #6621

[SS Engine Guy]

Originally Posted by Jack Matyas

How many of us have been involved in heads-up races ( new car vs old car ) during eliminations ? Can there be that many I don't know about .................

If it only involved one it was one too many. Underfactored by 10-30 hp is one thing. Being underfactored by 100 -125 hp is another. People will spend 15 k in the winter trying to make up that 10-15 hp. in performance improvements. They won't waste anything trying to make up a couple tenths when they are being outrun by a half second. Most racers aren't in the dark about spending money that is how most can afford to race. ie: disposable income.

[Jack Matyas]

Originally Posted by SS Engine Guy

If it only involved one it was one too many. Underfactored by 10-30 hp is one thing. Being underfactored by 100 -125 hp is another. People will spend 15 k in the winter trying to make up that 10-15 hp. in performance improvements. They won't waste anything trying to make up a couple tenths when they are being outrun by a half second. Most racers aren't in the dark about spending money that is how most can afford to race. ie: disposable income.

SS Engine Guy -- Because I don't know you or even who you are I'll go under the assumption that your business is building engines - that being said you make some valid points in that 100hp is too much to be underfactored .But you need to tell your customers that they should continue development on their engines as no one combination will have a stranglehold on a class forever .When these new cars get caught up with the right HP your customers will be ready to take them on .

On another note - don't blame all of your customers not spending money on new engines or rebuilds as you hit the nail on the head -- they need disposible income and the economy is to blame for that -- not Ford or Chrysler .

[Eric Merryfield]

Originally Posted by Jeff Teuton

I am building a stick shift DP, and plan on running one of the new v10 cars. And I am going to race as much as I can.

I too will be racing as much as I can, with as many of my cars and trucks as I can in stock, superstock and will try my hand in Super Street too....new car or old, they are all fun....

[SS Engine Guy]

Jack I appreciate the reply and I agree. I have been telling my customers not to give up on their programs. So far none have, they just aren't going to spend any money on "go fast" experiments. I do about 2 to 1 SS vs. S engines. So far SS has yet to be affected as much as stock but customers are concerned that they don't want the way underfactored stuff in SS either. Not that they don't like the new cars. They just don't like the new factors and with the latest enhancement of the ahfs they aren't as concerned with going fast which equates somewhat to spending less money on technology and in testing and dyno time which effects my bottom line.

Now for the poor economy. As we know, several factors (actually hundreds) have caused a poor economic outlook. But one that sticks in my mind is bail out money. This is a two edged sword because unemployment is a viscious circle. However, the Big 3 car companies should have never been granted bail out money. I wouldn't qualify and you and most others here wouldn't have a chance at getting a Gov. bailout based solely on the fact that you offered an inferior product or service. This bailout was necessary to avoid a big spike in unemployment. But did it really do anything? The Big 3 still layed off lots of workers and most are still unemployed. That is better than all of their workers. But what about the downturn economic effect...partly caused by other auto unrelated businesses to lay off workers and therefore adding to the unemployment spike. Its a vicious circle. I'm not going in to any more economic opinions as this is not what this thread is about. However, I do think that car companies did have and are still having a negative effect on class racers.. I don't think that you can say its the economy any more than you can say it is the car companies that are partially at fault. And I'm talking dollars and jobs here. Forget the junk hp factors for now. Personally I am glad to have any major manufacturers support in drag racing or any other motorsport. However, not at the expense of other competitors. ie: underfactored experimental race only applications. This is stock class racing not "run what ya brung".


Now on in-sight into what my customers are willing to do:

-- start another santioning body
-- run heads up runs light and possibly illegal (which I certainly don't agree with)
-- run another association and to hell with the extra traveling
-- change their combos to SS/mod
-- all kinds of other goofy but not impossible stunts

You all know what kinds of ideas racers can come up with benchracing....haha

[Chad Rhodes]

Originally Posted by SS Engine Guy

Jack I appreciate the reply and I agree. I have been telling my customers not to give up on their programs. So far none have, they just aren't going to spend any money on "go fast" experiments. I do about 2 to 1 SS vs. S engines. So far SS has yet to be affected as much as stock but customers are concerned that they don't want the way underfactored stuff in SS either. Not that they don't like the new cars. They just don't like the new factors and with the latest enhancement of the ahfs they aren't as concerned with going fast which equates somewhat to spending less money on technology and in testing and dyno time which effects my bottom line.

Now for the poor economy. As we know, several factors (actually hundreds) have caused a poor economic outlook. But one that sticks in my mind is bail out money. This is a two edged sword because unemployment is a viscious circle. However, the Big 3 car companies should have never been granted bail out money. I wouldn't qualify and you and most others here wouldn't have a chance at getting a Gov. bailout based solely on the fact that you offered an inferior product or service. This bailout was necessary to avoid a big spike in unemployment. But did it really do anything? The Big 3 still layed off lots of workers and most are still unemployed. That is better than all of their workers. But what about the downturn economic effect...partly caused by other auto unrelated businesses to lay off workers and therefore adding to the unemployment spike. Its a vicious circle. I'm not going in to any more economic opinions as this is not what this thread is about. However, I do think that car companies did have and are still having a negative effect on class racers.. I don't think that you can say its the economy any more than you can say it is the car companies that are partially at fault. And I'm talking dollars and jobs here. Forget the junk hp factors for now. Personally I am glad to have any major manufacturers support in drag racing or any other motorsport. However, not at the expense of other competitors. ie: underfactored experimental race only applications. This is stock class racing not "run what ya brung".


Now on in-sight into what my customers are willing to do:

-- start another santioning body
-- run heads up runs light and possibly illegal (which I certainly don't agree with)
-- run another association and to hell with the extra traveling
-- change their combos to SS/mod
-- all kinds of other goofy but not impossible stunts

You all know what kinds of ideas racers can come up with benchracing....haha

wait till some of your stocker customers start ordering SS motors "but without the belt drive, crank trigger, and fancy intake". lol

[Jack Matyas]

Originally Posted by SS Engine Guy

Now on in-sight into what my customers are willing to do:

-- start another santioning body
-- run heads up runs light and possibly illegal (which I certainly don't agree with)
-- run another association and to hell with the extra traveling
-- change their combos to SS/mod
-- all kinds of other goofy but not impossible stunts

You all know what kinds of ideas racers can come up with benchracing....haha

Start a new body -- its been tried - and they failed .
Run light - not in this division --they weigh every heads-up
another association - the other association has done even less than the NHRA with this problem - they're just sitting on their hands .
Change combos - really not that bad of an idea - we've got some real hitters in this division that run SS/MOD cars
And lastly --- Goofy - he resides here also ..........

[Greg Hill]

For someone who raced a lot before 2009 and not much in 2009 and 2010. In 2008 I ran 6 Nationals, 8 divisonals and 3 opens plus combo races that I could make. I raced almost every weekend from April till the end of October. There were two reasons I cut back on racing. First I had a really bad hip and second I thought it was wrong for NHRA to put these new cars in stock. Well I got my hip fixed and I'm ready to go but I still won't race much with NHRA until there are changes made. If no changes happen I probably will do something else.

It's just patently unfair for cars that have relatively honest hp factors to have to run against these bogus cars that are as much as 100-125 hp under rated. If some of you think that's crying you can kiss my ***. To me it's standing up for what's right and fair and what you believe in. Why doesn't NHRA let me run a fast burn motor in my car ar 285 hp. Jeff I would gladly run you heads up in the same class with that deal. As long as the four guys that are in charge at NHRA are getting money from Ford and Chrysler nothing will probably change. What I do with my racing operation is my way of saying to NHRA that I don't agree with how you are running our organization.

[Ed Wright]

Jack, the running light has been mentioned before, to push them further under in an attempt to bring them in line sooner. If the light car lost anyway, so what? Can you loose twice? We all have to weigh around here too.

[Jack Matyas]

Originally Posted by Ed Wright

Jack, the running light has been mentioned before, to push them further under in an attempt to bring them in line sooner. If the light car lost anyway, so what? Can you loose twice? We all have to weigh around here too.

Guess I should have said more on this subject Ed -- to make a difference one would have to be a few hundred pounds light and I'm sure if one were caught this light there would be officials to deal with - it is cheating no matter what -- suppose the other guy redlights or something - talk about being redfaced .Great idea but not recommended as it could backfire ...............