SCCA Solo D Street discussion

[strat61caster]

Originally Posted by Locust

Kind of shocked the RS did so poorly. I knew it struggled in BS this year but wow. Also expected the Civic Type-R to do better. When we see more development for that car will it get stronger results?

CTR will definitely get faster, no sway bar and 245 tires compared to the Camaro on 275 with the same width wheels. Scroggs didn't get a good launch out of it only 4 runs in it and it was only a few tenths off?

Dampers are a feel and confidence improver, they don't seem to offer massive improvement unless the current dampers are lacking, maybe it'll help the Camaro settle and be more accessible, he certainly showed that it is hard to extract Max performance out of it, he usually put up times a good 1/2s quicker ot more than Stroud locally but it wasn't a magic go fast button for Jonathan

I was also surprised at how 'mid-pack' the RS was, but if none of them were launching it that might be skewing the results. But if you watch one in course it's totally still a fwd economy car.

The test was never going to show A>B>C

[G_Ride]

Originally Posted by Locust

Read it yesterday.

It's interesting results but there's a lot of variables still to this. The FR-S is the only one on two way MCS and then the RS is on Konis. Civic and Camaro still on OEM shocks. I know Mark and Des have said they don't feel the Camaro would get much out of shock and sway bar upgrades but it would certainly gain something, right?

Another thing is familiarity with the cars. Annie drives an STX FR-S and has driven them in STX basically since they came out in 2013, Mark used to drive a twin in STX too (???), and I don't know Justin Moore so not sure what he's driven before.

Kind of shocked the RS did so poorly. I knew it struggled in BS this year but wow. Also expected the Civic Type-R to do better. When we see more development for that car will it get stronger results?

I know Mark has driven twins a few times, but I thought mostly DS prepped twins. Justin Moore is another good driver. He usually drives a well prepped FP 2005 STI. He has driven a 2013 WRX in Street for one season. The RS he's taken out occasionally

[Locust]

Originally Posted by G_Ride

I know Mark has driven twins a few times, but I thought mostly DS prepped twins. Justin Moore is another good driver. He usually drives a well prepped FP 2005 STI. He has driven a 2013 WRX in Street for one season. The RS he's taken out occasionally

He said he used to own a twin years back and it wasn't in DS then so maybe CS then?

What happened to the BS cars that were going to be there? I originally heard they would have an S2K and Vette?

[M0nk3y]

Pallotta drove a CTR at NCAC this weekend and he was not impressed. Said that even with everything turned off completely (VSA), the system will interfere then you try to get the car to rotate. He said it shuts down hard.

He described it as frustrating. He jumped into his ND and went .8 tenths quicker (.2 on PAX) on his only run.

FWIW

[tony_r]

Originally Posted by Locust

What happened to the BS cars that were going to be there? I originally heard they would have an S2K and Vette?

Time availability. I was going to bring the S2k but they wanted to limit the amount of cars because it was a lot of ground to cover. I wanted to throw an ND in the mix, too, because I think S2k to CS would have been a good test.

Dan Bullis was going to bring his Vette, but in the end it was just a bit too far for him to come. We don't have any BS C5's here locally.

[DaWorstPlaya]

I would say the course was high speed sweeper and high speed transition heavy that's why the FRS performed better than normal and the Focus RS appeared much worse. Also the fact that the Focus RS wasn't launched hard which is usually worth 0.5sec. Course design always has an effect on results. Sorry but IMHO, the test course used was not a good indicator of the true performance potential of the cars. The Focus RS is not a DS car.

Also factor the length of the course, which was short. National courses are usually twice as long, which means multiply the time difference by a factor of 2. The courses at Nationals and our local courses generally favor power/acceleration more. This years courses were turn around and flat out acceleration. The west course gave you the illusion of slaloms but if you lined up correctly they were flat out. Kinda changes the picture, IMHO.

[tony_r]

Originally Posted by DaWorstPlaya

I would say the course was high speed sweeper and high speed transition heavy that's why the FRS performed better than normal and the Focus RS appeared much worse. Also the fact that the Focus RS wasn't launched hard which is usually worth 0.5sec. Course design always has an effect on results. Sorry but IMHO, the test course used was not a good indicator of the true performance potential of the cars. The Focus RS is not a DS car.

Also factor the length of the course, which was short. National courses are usually twice as long, which means multiply the time difference by a factor of 2. The courses at Nationals and our local courses generally favor power/acceleration more. This years courses were turn around and flat out acceleration. The west course gave you the illusion of slaloms but if you lined up correctly they were flat out. Kinda changes the picture, IMHO.

This might rustle some jimmies, but I think the twin in DS trim is no better than a top flight ES car. On a few occasions I have swapped over to a DS twin at locals and have either gone slower or marginally faster. So, if one were to consider what else is present in DS (The Camaro, and to a lesser degree the WRX), the Focus RS would fit quite nicely into the mix.

[fykcha]

Originally Posted by M0nk3y

Pallotta drove a CTR at NCAC this weekend and he was not impressed. Said that even with everything turned off completely (VSA), the system will interfere then you try to get the car to rotate. He said it shuts down hard.

He described it as frustrating. He jumped into his ND and went .8 tenths quicker (.2 on PAX) on his only run.

FWIW

I think the long and short of it was that they didn't actually fully switch off the VSA on the car, there's "off" and a fully off setting.

[race2win]

Originally Posted by DaWorstPlaya

I would say the course was high speed sweeper and high speed transition heavy that's why the FRS performed better than normal and the Focus RS appeared much worse. Also the fact that the Focus RS wasn't launched hard which is usually worth 0.5sec. Course design always has an effect on results. Sorry but IMHO, the test course used was not a good indicator of the true performance potential of the cars. The Focus RS is not a DS car.

Also factor the length of the course, which was short. National courses are usually twice as long, which means multiply the time difference by a factor of 2. The courses at Nationals and our local courses generally favor power/acceleration more. This years courses were turn around and flat out acceleration. The west course gave you the illusion of slaloms but if you lined up correctly they were flat out. Kinda changes the picture, IMHO.

Before this test I would have absolutely agreed that the Twins were outgunned in DS. After driving Jonathan's car, I'm not so sure. Even though the course was short, put a transitional element less than 100' from the start and add one cone to each slalom...and I guarantee the FRS would be the fastest car in this test.


I now firmly believe that if I had a Twin on the East course I could have gone faster than I did in the Camaro.

[tony_r]

Originally Posted by race2win

Before this test I would have absolutely agreed that the Twins were outgunned in DS. After driving Jonathan's car, I'm not so sure. Even though the course was short, put a transitional element less than 100' from the start and add one cone to each slalom...and I guarantee the FRS would be the fastest car in this test.


I now firmly believe that if I had a Twin on the East course I could have gone faster than I did in the Camaro.

Therein lies the problem. You really need to build a specific course for the car to give it a shot. Packwood was a really good example of this, tight offsets to relatively open sweepers, to another transitional section into the finish. Basically any runway-style course, like the current condition of El Toro, is where the Twin will really shine.

Speaking specifically about the East course, it was balanced enough that I don't think the Twin would really have been that much faster. There were 4 sweeper/turn around areas of the course that it got killed by either the Camaro or WRX. The opening slalom and exit of the slalom after the showcase were practically the only places where it clearly had a large advantage.

[race2win]

Originally Posted by tony_r

Therein lies the problem. You really need to build a specific course for the car to give it a shot. Packwood was a really good example of this, tight offsets to relatively open sweepers, to another transitional section into the finish. Basically any runway-style course, like the current condition of El Toro, is where the Twin will really shine.

Speaking specifically about the East course, it was balanced enough that I don't think the Twin would really have been that much faster. There were 4 sweeper/turn around areas of the course that it got killed by either the Camaro or WRX. The opening slalom and exit of the slalom after the showcase were practically the only places where it clearly had a large advantage.

Yes, the Packwood Pro courses were perfect for a Twin, no doubt. After our test I read criticism saying it was too much of a "power" course, yet I got damn close to my Camaro times and I'm convinced there was more in it.


The reason I mention the East Course is because in the tight first slalom, the 2nd slalom and the pinched left-hander following, and the finish section a Twin would eat up. According to the data from our test the FR-S and Camaro were within hundredths on sweepers, so the only place the Camaro has the edge is pulling off the showcase and the uphill section after the 2nd slalom, the rest is a wash IMO.


Point is, the talk of the Twins having no chance in DS trim just isn't true, yes some course dependency exists, but you don't need a Packwood Pro course to win IMO.

[chucky12012]

Originally Posted by race2win

Before this test I would have absolutely agreed that the Twins were outgunned in DS. After driving Jonathan's car, I'm not so sure. Even though the course was short, put a transitional element less than 100' from the start and add one cone to each slalom...and I guarantee the FRS would be the fastest car in this test.


I now firmly believe that if I had a Twin on the East course I could have gone faster than I did in the Camaro.

Just a note, since I had the fastest twin on the east course, I compared my data against CS champ Dan, Tyler and Andy, and it was a rare occasion where I squeezed just about everything out of the car (polar opposite to west where I can tell you I left at least 1.5s out there). There was not another second left out there for my car on the east.

Also a bit of a statement to say that we could have raw timed CS in a DS trim twin.

[Locust]

Sidenote to discussion: Does anyone know if there are more people picking up Camaros to run DS next year?

[imnotsureaboutbrz]

Originally Posted by Locust

Sidenote to discussion: Does anyone know if there are more people picking up Camaros to run DS next year?

nope... but I'm hoping SEB answers my Letter favorably so I can run my '17 BRZ in DS