What's wrong with Stock?

[Run to Rund]

Looking at cost issues, bringing out new engine stuff for 5 year old cars, supercharged cars going against carbureted cars, etc. leads me to think stock might be/become bracket racing with more rules as to the mods you are allowed. Whether you are crafty, careful, or wealthy, more mods or advantages from factory ratings, it all comes down to trying to run fast but not quite too fast. Then, your competitor buys something else and is a bit faster, and everyone has to step up with cam, rockers, brakes, etc. Some combinations are never seen because their factory HP rating was too high compared to other combinations, and NHRA doesn't bother to level that playing field.

So, to level the playing field, keep costs reasonable, and ensure enough cars are in the field, you come down to bracket racing with more rules about what you can modify or change. Is that what you want?

[FS Fan]

Originally Posted by Run to Rund

leads me to think stock might be/become bracket racing with more rules as to the mods you are allowed.

I think there is a strong argument to make that Stock is mostly a bracket race already. It's rather rare that there is a heads up run for an eliminator champion. While this thread was started to express the opinion that new cars are the problem with Stock, I could easily argue that the fifty odd classes are a major problem with Stock. There is very little heads up racing outside of class events. Even at Indy there was 31 Stock class runoffs, 19 were 4 cars or less, only 7 required more than 3 rounds including both FS classes. Those numbers are up since NHRA implemented the combo stick and auto, which I really like.

If someone is trying to "fix" the class how does heads-up racing factor into that?