What's wrong with Stock?

[Carguy49]

Originally Posted by Mark Yacavone

I think we pretty much know what's wrong.
Time to start a thread about how to fix it.
I'd do that myself, but I haven't wrapped my brain all the way around this.
This is not gonna be easy.
This deal has been five years in the making.

I suggest make it pithy ..Hit the high points first.

No complex formulas..Dial over , dial under , move a class up , down ,add this % , take away this %, etc .etc, They won't pay attention to that stuff , nor will most here .

Keep it relatively simple, practical, and workable.


Go...

Mark, here is an idea. The quickest runs by the factory cars at Indy were - FS/A @ 8.646 and FS/B @ 8.849. So we know what the cars are capable of. Make the indexes starting the next time they run - FS/A @ 9.75 and FS/B @ 10.00 and implement the AHFS for all cars. That should level the playing field and make most races happy, at least for a little while. Just my 2 cents, but hey you gotta start somewhere.

[Mark Yacavone]

Originally Posted by Carguy49

Mark, here is an idea. The quickest runs by the factory cars at Indy were - FS/A @ 8.646 and FS/B @ 8.849. So we know what the cars are capable of. Make the indexes starting the next time they run - FS/A @ 9.75 and FS/B @ 10.00 and implement the AHFS for all cars. That should level the playing field and make most races happy, at least for a little while. Just my 2 cents, but hey you gotta start somewhere.

Ron, I was thinking of something along those lines for FS, but that's really just an Indy deal at this time. Lower the indexes and they'll still qualify at Indy but it won't look so blatant anyway.
Better off to leave the indexes alone, and put the AHFS in affect
It's very hard to analyze the data from Indy because FS cars aren't subject to hp penalties.

Right now, I'm more concerned about guys with good running traditional cars like Scott Burton's being covered by 4 tenths in the eliminator by an FX car.

[Carguy49]

Originally Posted by Mark Yacavone

Ron, I was thinking of something along those lines for FS, but that's really just an Indy deal at this time. Lower the indexes and they'll still qualify at Indy but it won't look so blatant anyway.
Better off to leave the indexes alone, and put the AHFS in affect
It's very hard to analyze the data from Indy because FS cars aren't subject to hp penalties.

Right now, I'm more concerned about guys with good running traditional cars like Scott Burton's being covered by 4 tenths in the eliminator by an FX car.

Mark, I see what you are saying. Problem being, with leaving the index alone, then the cars aren't going to be run all out anymore. At least, by lowering the index, the cars won't run 1.4 or 1.5 under anymore. They should be about .8 to 1.1 under, hopefully

I totally agree with you about the deal of traditional stockers, such as, Scott Burton's Firebird being outrun with ease. I am sure that is why he left Indy. Can't bring a knife to a gun fight.

As I have said all along, I like the new cars (definitely fun to watch run), but where should they be put. I keep hearing FX and I like the way that sounds. Takes me back to the sixties and SOHC Mustangs, altered wheelbase Coronets and such. Ah the good old days.

Maybe put them in their own eliminator. But like you said, there aren't enough of them nationwide to make that work either. Just more food for thought.

[Nick Heath]

Mark, I think you have a lot of great ideas!

The idea of having all "FX" cars in a separate eliminator is nice, but aside from Indy, how often are the "FX" cars preventing others from making the field? How often are there enough of them to make a quality show?

I think that NHRA wants to grow the FSS into something bigger, maybe even a professional or semi-professional category outside of Stock. The catch is, the FSS needs to be heads up, or with a limited number of categories (e.g. FS/A and FS/B) to put on the best show.
If we have FS/A, FS/B, FS/C, FS/D, FS/E, FS/F... for every factory combination and run them together like Comp Eliminator, would that really appeal to the masses? We would end up with Luke Ubelhor beating Chris Holbrook or a 352 CJ with a stick beating Bruno Massel...

I say, keep the FS/A and FS/B categories in Stock and run them like a SS Modified class, where the AHFS triggers an index reduction rather than HP addition.
Then maybe you have A/FX, B/FX, C/FX, D/FX for today's A/SA, C/SA, etc. combinations. But I guarantee you there would still be complaining when a factory combination that hasn't been touched (e.g. a stick combination) goes -1.40 under, even though it's in an FX class!

I'm still of the belief that if the HP ratings were correct from the start, 75% of the problem would be gone (how you get them correct is an entirely different discussion...).
Case in point - after Indy, the aforementioned B/SA COPO is now a natural BB/SA COPO. That particular combination will never again beat up on an older car in A/SA or B/SA. Could Chevrolet come out with another "FX" combination @ 380hp that runs B/SA next year? Absolutely, but doesn't that just prove that the entire system is flawed, far beyond the factory cars?

Forgive me for going off topic here, but look at any of Bob Shaw's combinations over the years, the 350 Chevy trucks, Larry Hill's truck with a stick, the fleet of 302 Ford 2bbls, the Dodge Dakotas from the early 00s, the LS1s and LT1s...
All of those guys deserve all of the credit they've ever gotten for going fast - but you can't convince me that those combinations didn't benefit from being in the class guide at their OEM HP rating.
Just like if I built a 352 Cobra Jet tomorrow, I would benefit from it being in the class guide at the so called 285hp "OEM" HP rating.