|
||||||||||
|
||||||||||
19 Jan 2010, 20:18 (Ref:2615893) | #26 | ||
Race Official
Veteran
Join Date: Jan 2003
Posts: 18,831
|
Quote:
|
||
|
19 Jan 2010, 20:36 (Ref:2615900) | #27 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Jun 2003
Posts: 1,735
|
Wasn't the idea of bringing Grand-Am to Europe floated by Daytona a few ago too?
|
||
|
19 Jan 2010, 20:53 (Ref:2615917) | #28 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,909
|
|||
|
19 Jan 2010, 22:05 (Ref:2615952) | #29 | ||
Race Official
Veteran
Join Date: Oct 2007
Posts: 16,474
|
That is one side effect of stable rules and cars that are almost to sturdy to total, you can buy a used chassis and be relatively competitive. Is this the 7th year of DP's? must be lots of cars sitting in garages in various parts of the country - maybe they can find a home in europe?
|
||
|
19 Jan 2010, 22:37 (Ref:2615969) | #30 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Jan 2007
Posts: 7,334
|
8th year for DPs in general, 7th for the Riley...
|
||
|
19 Jan 2010, 22:54 (Ref:2615982) | #31 | |
Veteran
Join Date: Jan 2004
Posts: 932
|
Over three dozen Rileys alone built so far too, with only a few written-off or retired. AIM did win two races in 2008 with Riley #001.
To be fair, the Dallara win at Montreal wasn't won on the drawing board, but I wouldn't say that SunTrust has been more than half a step behind Ganassi and Gainsco (two confirmed cheaters ). |
|
|
19 Jan 2010, 23:09 (Ref:2615990) | #32 | ||
Race Official
Veteran
Join Date: Jun 2002
Posts: 12,454
|
|||
__________________
Bill Bryson: It is no longer permitted to be stupid and slow. You must choose one or the other. |
19 Jan 2010, 23:11 (Ref:2615991) | #33 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 3,399
|
I spoke at length to Alana France and Dave Spitzer last week and an expansion of Grand-Am to Europe was not mentioned once.
|
||
|
20 Jan 2010, 00:20 (Ref:2616015) | #34 | ||
Race Official
Veteran
Join Date: Oct 2007
Posts: 16,474
|
|||
|
20 Jan 2010, 03:52 (Ref:2616069) | #35 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Dec 2003
Posts: 5,892
|
ACRUK, LMS is NEVER going to thin the LMP ranks just to make room for more GTs, so that method for making room for another series just doesn't fly. Not to mention, there aren't ANY tracks with enough pit stalls, and rated high enough (full FIA Grade 2 standard), to have 75 cars of this spec racing on them all at once. Daytona is an anomaly, and the only tracks I can think of that would be allowed to have 80+ cars based on their lap length are Le Mans (only 55 pit boxes), and the Nordschleife (not cleared to run anything higher than GT2). Sebring is 1.16-1.5 miles shorter than it was in the days when it had 80+car starting grids (it only has 60 pit boxes at present anyway).
I think you'll have to drop that 50-car field for GTs criterion. I haven't heard of a single GT-only race, except, perhaps, for the Spa 24H, drawing that kind of a field any time recently (and that's been with GT1, GT2, AND GT3 cars allowed in the 24-Hour). The GT1 World Championship is limited to 24 cars to allow for one aircraft to take care of travel for the flyaway events, for which SRO is covering the costs. I doubt the BPR, aside from Spa 24H, had much larger GT1 grids than this, so why the complaint? Heck, even with GT1 and GT2 on track, a 30-car field for the 500k/3h FIA GT races was pretty decent. And, of course, the new GT1 races won't be endurance; deal with it. Finally, even combined IMSA GTO/GTU grids would have usually fallen short of your 50-car, GT requirement. |
||
__________________
The only certainty is that nothing is certain. |
20 Jan 2010, 10:10 (Ref:2616186) | #36 | |
Race Official
Veteran
Join Date: Jan 2003
Posts: 18,831
|
||
|
20 Jan 2010, 22:14 (Ref:2616596) | #37 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Oct 2009
Posts: 10,617
|
Exactly, Fire. The FIA GT1 World Championship isn't endurance racing. A 24-car grid isn't bad for a single-class championship (the WRC isn't).
|
||
|
20 Jan 2010, 22:16 (Ref:2616601) | #38 | |
Veteran
Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 10,500
|
I've never understood why NASCAR chose to create such an ugly class of car, was it simply a case of ensuring DP's didn't look as slick as the stock cars?
If second generation DP's look like a 962, or even a Salleen, they'd win over a great many new fans. |
|
|
20 Jan 2010, 22:26 (Ref:2616603) | #39 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,909
|
i dunno fire...haha i think i jus remember the good olld days of the fia gt when we had mclarens porsches, lotus etc...long races, lots of cars
dont get me wrong im still gona go to the fia gts, i jus think its a shame they have restricted the entry, although i can understand why |
||
|
20 Jan 2010, 22:31 (Ref:2616606) | #40 | |||
Veteran
Join Date: Jan 2007
Posts: 7,334
|
Quote:
Here's an early sketch of what the Fabcar was going to look like: Not that bad, eh? But then there were a number of bad accidents at the beginning of the decade, especially in Open Wheel Racing, but also Sportscars (Alboretto) and NASCAR (Earnhard) and they decided to make the cars super-safe and mandated green-houses that were big enough to allow for helmet-removal while the driver was still in car. At this point, I think, they didn't know what they would end up with and even with the current chassis-dimension better looking cars would have been possible. The greenhouse is not significantly bigger than on a GT-car, in fact the DPs are a good deal lower than the Grand Am GT-cars. Their idea was "Less GTP, more GT40" - and on a car with basically a GT-body the greenhouse dimensions would not have looked out of place. The Doran and the Fabcar (and the Chase) were somewhat built in that spirit and are actually quite nice looking. But then came along Riley (a company with a corporate history of ugly cars) and ran everyone else into the ground, and here we are today. In my opinion, the frantic racing really makes up for the somewhat different aesthetics, but I can understand those that disagree. And only very few LMPs are beauty queens either. Those who say that there has been no good looking Proto in the last 20 years are pretty much right - except for some late 962s and the 90s GT1-cars. |
|||
|
21 Jan 2010, 21:46 (Ref:2617183) | #41 | |
Race Official
Veteran
Join Date: Jan 2003
Posts: 18,831
|
I am convinced GrandAm would have much more fans if the cars looked better (something like the Fabcar). Not to like GrandAm because the green house is ugly sounds absurd but it isn't. Other series (touring cars, single seaters) are mainly about the drivers and racing itself but in GT's and sportscars the cars are much more important. In GT's and sportscars there's more emotion involved.
I think for Europeans the involvement of NASCAR isn't a big reason for disliking GrandAm. Here in Europe Formula 1 is the evil empire. @Speed-King: The cars could even look worse |
|
|
21 Jan 2010, 22:01 (Ref:2617188) | #42 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,909
|
i like the look of the cars...theyre different and i like different lol...especailly like the riley
|
||
|
21 Jan 2010, 23:16 (Ref:2617225) | #43 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Dec 2008
Posts: 2,299
|
I would argue that a majority of the modern LMP's are beauty queens... and engineering marvels, something the DP's will NEVER be even if they do become better looking. I prefer the look of the Pug, Lola, and Lola Aston coupes, plus the Porsche RS Spyder, Acura ARX-01b, & Zyteks to most of the F1 cars over the past 10 years. The DP's are too low tech for European fans to appreciate IMHO.
|
||
|
22 Jan 2010, 01:25 (Ref:2617275) | #44 | |||
Veteran
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 2,025
|
Quote:
You mentioned the Acura and RS Spyder as a beautiful car, and that triggered a thought in my mind. I reckon the ARX-01 and RS Spyder are contestants for most beautiful race cars ever! Those two, along with the Audi R8 make for three LMP cars amongst the most beautiful cars ever IMO. But heck, the Lolas from B05/40 on, the Bentley EXP Speed 8, Dallara, the Zyteks, Ascari A410... the list goes on for beautiful LMPs. Chris |
|||
__________________
Member: Ecurie Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch. EFR & Greg Pickett fan. |
22 Jan 2010, 17:06 (Ref:2617639) | #45 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 10,500
|
Quote:
The problem with DP's is every car is ugly, IMO. |
||
|
24 Jan 2010, 00:40 (Ref:2618332) | #46 | ||||
Racer
Join Date: Jul 2007
Posts: 361
|
Quote:
Quote:
I can think of a lot of LMP900 and 675 cars that were quite attractive though... |
||||
__________________
have a nice diurnal anomaly... |
24 Jan 2010, 01:24 (Ref:2618342) | #47 | ||
Veteran
Join Date: Jul 2005
Posts: 2,980
|
Appreciate this might be a touch OT but if the criteria re a DP are that the helmet can be removed within cockpit dimensions how do they cope with the GTs - there sure as hell isn't the headroom in any of those cars to take a helmet off - and why should they be considered differently to the prototypes?
|
||
|
24 Jan 2010, 14:22 (Ref:2618582) | #48 | |||||
Veteran
Join Date: Apr 2009
Posts: 1,525
|
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
|
|||||
__________________
*jingle* The New York Mets have a new left fielder... Duda, Duda “It's fine that F1 goes all over the world, but we must not exaggerate by going to race in deserts or where there is no culture for racing," di Montezemolo continued |
25 Jan 2010, 14:27 (Ref:2619141) | #49 | ||
Racer
Join Date: Aug 2009
Posts: 393
|
Maybe the Grand-am cars would have a little space on the VdeV championship.... But I´m sure that we won´t see those cars in Europe
|
||
|
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
GrandAm Engines | Edmonton | Sportscar & GT Racing | 20 | 2 Nov 2004 03:55 |
GrandAm series | Edmonton | Sportscar & GT Racing | 9 | 5 Jul 2003 19:47 |
GrandAm Future | Edmonton | Sportscar & GT Racing | 39 | 3 Jul 2003 16:00 |
GrandAm Gts | Edmonton | Sportscar & GT Racing | 6 | 9 Jun 2003 08:52 |
USRRC/GrandAM | Edmonton | Sportscar & GT Racing | 2 | 12 May 2003 19:11 |