IFCA Series News

Pre-Season testing for Season 11, Feb 5th, has hit a minor setback.  We asked the "Big Three" to give us what they thought were cars that best represented the breed.  They agreed.  But as we began testing them and hitting the tracks for the schedule we discovered some unusual results we didn't expect.  Results that could be easily explained by the old tried and true conspiracy method of fooling the magazine guys or the public, by claiming the car you offered was an average example.  But, manufacturers are well known for spiking a car or two so they can get some good press.   I'm not saying that happened here, but it is hard to explain why certain cars are suddenly punching way above their weight.  Our best guess is that this isn't something the manufacturers were aware of, and probably happened at the Division level.  The Ford guys seem to have done a very good job at car prep before handing them over to us is all I'm saying.  Rather than risk insult and asking them to provide a different car, we decided to let the GM boys in particular tune their cars up a bit.  For reasons unknown all the GM products were somewhat down on power.  So it's a mystery.  Maybe the Ford guys fiddled with the carbs or who knows, but the GM guys didn't look happy either way.

So, because of this, testing continues.  Each of the 12 cars will be tested at each of the 5 tracks which is a total lap count well north of 300laps.  Due to this extra scrutiny and testing, the cars will be closer in performance and will need a revised and more narrow points handicap scale.  

Word to the wise, if you try one of the fastest high handicap cars, and find you can't turn any faster a lap than you do in a mid-level or slower car, go with the slower car.  Makes no sense to go with the faster car if you can't drive it faster.  You would only be giving points away.  Better is to go with a car that might give you points instead.  That is, if you are the same speed in either car.  

If I were a Bronze driver, I'd do the experiment myself.  If it turned out I was about the same or even slightly faster in the faster car, I'd look for the next fastest car that gives me points every round rather than takes them away.

Testing should be a wrap by tomorrow.

Happy Holidays!

Having a team format is always fun, on paper, but in practice, it tends to dissolve rather quickly for a variety of reasons. Much of the reason for this is the difficulty in simply creating the teams themselves.  

Typically you'll team up with guys you like and this will generate unequal teams that are either super superior or woefully uncompetitive and not much else in-between.  Then there is the issue that has to do with leadership or initiative.  Some guys, even fast guys don't want to be the leader of a team, and some guys can't decide what team to join.  So a large percentage of drivers are either left out or in limbo and try to relegate themselves to just driving as a single.

Here at the IFCA because we have "been there and done that" we are going to try to take these problems out of the equation and out of the hands of the drivers, by assigning drivers to teams based on their car selection and total number of drivers.  A team has to consist of not less than 3 drivers but not more than 6.  No team will be allowed more than 1 previous champion or Gold driver, or alien level driver.  Conversely, no team will be allowed to have all Bronze level drivers either.  

Team names will also be assigned by the IFCA.  We've found in the past that names do seem to matter.  Some people like to be silly and use dumb names like the "pink porcupines" or some such thing, and while this can be funny, it can also take the desire to participate away.  No one really wants to be on a team with a dumb or rude name for very long is our point.

So, our aim is to have more equal teams with actual racing team names that drivers can proudly identify with just as they do their cars of choice.  We feel that by doing this in this way we can for perhaps the first time, create brand loyalty, team equality, a sense of belonging and purpose, create racing reputations, true rivalry, and ultimately fair and fun competition.

Although we won't enforce a specific livery requirement other than having a race number, we are going to offer a team livery bonus of 1pt to each driver if everyone on a team uses essentially the same team livery. You can make them different colors as long as the basic design remains the same.

Our hope is to begin to build familiar team structures that everyone can identify with and want to compete for in a cohesive way.  So that all drivers can be a part of something positive that can help improve the racing at all skill levels.  It's similar to the idea of brand loyalty, race on Sunday (or Saturday in our case), and sell on Monday.  This was the motto of both Trans-Am, NASCAR, and the NHRA back in the day.  It worked then and should work just as well now, in a simulated way.

Testing for Season 11 Feb 5th is now complete.  The following changes were made to these cars:

1970 Camaro added 5hp, up from 510hp to 515hp
1969 Firebird added 5hp, up from 515hp to 520hp
1966 Nova added 10hp, up from 525hp to 535hp
1969 Camaro added 5hp, up from 535hp to 540hp
1965 Mustang added 5hp, up from 440hp to 445hp

These were the only changes made from the Season 10 car list.  The track schedule will be published Jan 8th.

Season 11 Master Car List here:
https://ifca.forumotion.com/t6737-trans-am-master-car-list#138969

GTDon2 wrote:Testing for Season 11 Feb 5th is now complete.  The following changes were made to these cars:

1970 Camaro added 5hp, up from 510hp to 515hp
1969 Firebird added 5hp, up from 515hp to 520hp
1966 Nova added 10hp, up from 525hp to 535hp
1969 Camaro added 5hp, up from 535hp to 540hp
1965 Mustang added 5hp, up from 440hp to 445hp

These were the only changes made from the Season 10 car list.  The track schedule will be published Jan 8th.

Season 11 Master Car List here:
https://ifca.forumotion.com/t6737-trans-am-master-car-list#138969

Thanks to some eagle-eyed IFCA Patrons some errors were found in the handicap scale and have since been corrected. Be sure to refresh your page to see the changes.

Fantastic racing for such a small field!  In this particular field, of the cars that finished, the car that was expected to win did win.  The Cougar and the 1970 Camaro are practically dead even at this track with a very slight edge to the Cougar.  But when Sox DNF'd the Cougar that left the 70 Camaro to check out and collect the fastest lap bonus.  

We would expect a faster driver driving the 70 Camaro to beat a slower driver driving the Cougar all things being equal.   That is, if the handicap scale is to be relied upon this is what should happen. 

Eries was about .3 faster than the field in his 70 Camaro which is one of the high handicap cars (-.90).  He has to give up nearly a whole point every race.  So, with the fastest lap bonus he would have scored 33.1pts.  

Because of the pole position point, Jimbo in his Cuda was able to tie STAFFY in his 69 Mustang even though STAFFY finished 2nd on the podium, both earning 32.5pts, a mere .6pts behind the winner. Due to Jimbo's higher rating he would have been placed ahead of STAFFY in a tie.

The story is this, only run a high handicapped car if you know you can pad your points by collecting some bonuses with it.  If you aren't that confident and don't want the pressure of trying to get the pole or fastest lap or track lap record or fastest practice lap, or some combination, better pass on it and stay in your own lane with something less demanding.

There were 4 GM cars, 3 FoMoCo cars and 1 MOPAR.  GM took the top spot, Ford #2, and MOPAR #3.  There were no teams in this practice round.

And beware, don't judge everything by this one practice at this one track.  The cars need development time and you have to judge for yourself which car will do well at all the tracks for YOU.  Even the most dominant and highest handicap car the Cougar, was superior at just 2 of the 5 tracks.   If a car dominates at 2 tracks and is equal at the other 3 then that's going to be your high handicap car.  But the point is each track basically has a different dominant car.  You have to marry that with which tracks you drive well at to benefit from your car selection.

Observationally, it was great to see these legendary Trans Am cars go at it and be relatively very equal.  This is going to be some close hard racing.

After talking to everyone last night, it was nearly unanimous that we provide a Bronze level build for Season 11.  This was brought up because of the fairly large gap between the two skill levels in the Vintage class for Season 11.  To properly do this, only the Silver level drivers will need to change their tire compound from race to sport.  The Bronze build will remain race compound.  

This is a hefty P.I. downgrade but still gives the Silver drivers around a .3sec marginal advantage over the Bronze drivers on race tires, which is much closer than the nearly 2.0sec advantage it was.  So watch out Silver+ drivers, it's no longer a cakewalk over the Bronze boys!

GTDon2 wrote:After talking to everyone last night, it was nearly unanimous that we provide a Bronze level build for Season 11.  This was brought up because of the fairly large gap between the two skill levels in the Vintage class for Season 11.  To properly do this, only the Silver level drivers will need to change their tire compound from race to sport.  The Bronze build will remain race compound.  

This is a hefty P.I. downgrade but still gives the Silver drivers around a .3sec marginal advantage over the Bronze drivers on race tires, which is much closer than the nearly 2.0sec advantage it was.  So watch out Silver+ drivers, it's no longer a cakewalk over the Bronze boys!

With the paddock and garages buzzing both with excitement and some frustration for Season 11, the IFCA has stepped in to address some issues and make things just a little fairer.  Teams from Chevrolet and Dodge were unhappy with their testing and felt that the BoP for the Fords was OP.  With wild accusations of cheating being thrown at Ford even before testing the Chevy teams, in particular, were very unhappy with Ford and threatened to pull out of the series entirely if something wasn't done or an investigation wasn't launched.

It seems that the Chevy guys may have been right.  Not about the cheating, but that their cars were lacking competitive performance in some cases.

With the changes as noted above for Season 11 Feb 5th, we had to refine or fine-tune the handicap scale as well as make an attempt to bring a couple of cars closer to the pack.  Yes, this will make your final selection slightly more challenging whether you are a Bronze or Silver+ driver.  But, it will also make all the cars a bit more equal too.

You'll note on the Master Car list for Season 11 the Challenger lost 100bs down to 2700lbs min.  The Nova also lost 100lbs and -5hp.  And the 1969 Camaro lost 100lbs but gained 20hp up to 560hp max.

This is enough of an increase in performance for these cars to be a real threat to the faster cars so be sure to check them out.  These changes forced us to re-work the handicap scale because some cars react better than others when downgrading the tire compound to Sport tires for the Silver drivers.

We also took into account the relative ease or lack of ease that a car can be driven and who is driving them.  Some cars can be fast but only when a Gold level driver drives them for example.  This is why there are some differences in the car handicap points from Bronze to Silver in the same car.  We felt that a faster driver should not be given the same car handicap as a slower driver.  These aren't big points changes but they could make a difference. 

This is the final update for the cars in Season 11.  We do not anticipate any further changes.

Good luck!

Hello race fans. OneShot reporting, in race news yesterday I attended my first SimRacing
night with PapaCreech. i was placed in the second lobby. The race was three 12lap
races, at hockenheimring short. I started the 1st race in 2nd place on random grid order.
At the start of the race i was knocked off track by BadDog and came back on track in 11th. I race my way back up to 3rd place finish, Boo won the race. 2nd race grid is the finish of the 1st race. So I start 3rd. On the 1st lap i go off track a little in the rain and come back on in 5th. I drive all the way back to the leader, making some amazing race moves. I pace Boo on lap 10 to take the WIN in race two, Awesome. Last race is field is inverted so i start in 12th place, rain has stopped. I dust three cars on the launch and don't look back, I make a mid pack pace right between two cars. With some of the most fantastic moves I have ever made I'm in 2nd place in two laps and in my sites is BadDog. My Revenge is at hand. I push Dog hard in back section, just off the back straight. I come out along side of him going into the left turn
carousel, at this point I take my revenge. I F***ing drive the outside right around him and say good-bye, he's pissed right tight. I set ferocious pace and finish in 1st place again. So lets look back, that was the 1st race from 11th too 3rd. the 3rd race was 12th too 1st. What makes this story so awesome for me is, in the lobby Carrs called out AAR. I kind of blow it off.
Saying to Carrs, ya I'm part of the original AAR. Yes they are fast. I of course meant GtDon.
When i crossed the finish line for my 2nd win. I never felt more proud to be a member of
All American Racing. Thank you Don for taking me under your wing so long ago, I represented
us hard. Go AAR and the founder GtDon.

jason\"1shot" wrote:Hello race fans. OneShot reporting, in race news yesterday I attended my first SimRacing
night with PapaCreech. i was placed in the second lobby. The race was three 12lap
races, at hockenheimring short. I started the 1st race in 2nd place on random grid order.
At the start of the race i was knocked off track by BadDog and came back on track in 11th. I race my way back up to 3rd place finish, Boo won the race. 2nd race grid is the finish of the 1st race. So I start 3rd. On the 1st lap i go off track a little in the rain and come back on in 5th. I drive all the way back to the leader, making some amazing race moves. I pace Boo on lap 10 to take the WIN in race two, Awesome. Last race is field is inverted so i start in 12th place, rain has stopped. I dust three cars on the launch and don't look back, I make a mid pack pace right between two cars. With some of the most fantastic moves I have ever made I'm in 2nd place in two laps and in my sites is BadDog. My Revenge is at hand. I push Dog hard in back section, just off the back straight. I come out along side of him going into the left turn
carousel, at this point I take my revenge. I F***ing drive the outside right around him and say good-bye, he's pissed right tight. I set ferocious pace and finish in 1st place again. So lets look back, that was the 1st race from 11th too 3rd. the 3rd race was 12th too 1st. What makes this story so awesome for me is, in the lobby Carrs called out AAR. I kind of blow it off.
Saying to Carrs, ya I'm part of the original AAR. Yes they are fast. I of course meant GtDon.
When i crossed the finish line for my 2nd win. I never felt more proud to be a member of
All American Racing. Thank you Don for taking me under your wing so long ago, I represented
us hard. Go AAR and the founder GtDon.

Well, excuse my French, but that's F'n awesome!  You may well be demonstrating the fine fruits of your IFCA labors to a degree.  I think what can happen (on a fundamental level) is you gain confidence in such a way that your expectation rises.  Meaning that your entire attitude and approach have changed to the point that your main expectation is something like, "How good are they and can they keep up?"  Or, "I hope they can drive as clean as I can."  The point is, you are coming at it from a more positive perspective via your own experience even before you get to the track.  

It's a moment of comparison too, which adds to the positive motivation to perform well.  It's a chance to see what one of our most average drivers can do in a comparable league.  Your results indirectly have something to say about the rest of us here at the IFCA too.  It says that whatever we do here and how ever we do it, it has merit, and a unique benefit found in very few other leagues.  Others may not agree with our formats and often criticize them as not serious enough, or too easy and boring, or too complicated or, not democratic enough, or too narrow in scope, or too wide with options and so on.  The real bottom line is, racing here at the IFCA will build your speed, will make you a better more in control driver, and will instil real confidence wherever you may go.  

So as much as I'd like to take the full credit and compliment as is my tradition as the Benevilent Dictator of the IFCA, the truth is closer to giving the credit to all the other guys you race with in the way we race here.  It's a certain culture, within a hobby, that has some value.  Well done OneShot.

Sorry one shot we had a power outage here around 840 when came back on it was too late to race
Good Job

I do have to agree ifca will make you faster everyone has stepped it up and becoming consistently faster good luck to everyone the last couple races

I want to let everyone know the best way to get the most out of your IFCA Trans Am team.  We don't do teams very often here at the IFCA, but team organization is the bedrock of motorsports.  When done well under the right kind of format, and success comes, team spirit/effort becomes addicting and very fun.  It delivers a sense of sustained purpose to the team members is why.

The key to a good team is full team member participation and organization.  The more structure and leadership you have the better the team will perform.  This means that there are only two forms of governance that will work.  Either by democratic regulation or by an agreed-to dictatorship.  The only form of team management that doesn't work out very well are those that don't have definitive or recognized leaders. 

So as you see your team come together in the next couple of weeks, reach out to your fellow members.  You should suggest some kind of leadership rather than no leadership to organize and guide your team to success.   This means agreeing to participate when possible in team practices, livery creation, race strategy, builds, tunes etc.

I realize that not everyone likes teams or is a good team player, and people like this can easily ignore their team affiliation if they want to in this format, but they do so at their own expense.  Everyone should know that 2 minds are better than 1, and that a group of problem solvers is going to find better solutions faster than a single individual will.

So take advantage of your team's collective hive-mind and partake in their activities and you will become a faster better driver sooner, guaranteed.  

With some perseverance and racing luck, you and your team will be knocking at the door of the championships in manufacturer points, teams points, and/or drivers points.  And then do like Dale Jr., and give all the credit for the wins to everyone but yourself. lol

Good luck!

I've been at this hobby since before FM1 back in 2005 as most of you know.  I started with the PS1 and Gran Turismo 1 back in the late 90s. And over the years I've observed several common patterns among a wide range of driver skill levels when it comes to burnout.  

Burnout is real and the result of two things related to relative success.  Drivers find themselves leveling off at a plateau and no longer see the improvement they once did, or, they never reach the level they think they should and experience very limited success.  In either case drivers become dissatisfied with their results and feel that they simply can't get any better/faster no matter the cars, tracks, builds, or formats. 

And while this is perfectly understandable, the truth is, this is a self-imposed judgment.  What I mean is, drivers such as this are telling themselves "they can't" rather than, "they can."  Which simply means where there is a will there is a way.  But if there is no will, then there is no way.  This means that they are a failed product of their own limited imagination.  The reality is, they need a different strategy and different goals.

Now if you ask any driver if they want to be faster, 100% will say yes.  But if you ask, do you want to do what it takes to get to the next level, then that figure starts to fall by a large percentage.  People believe their own propaganda that there isn't anything more they can do.  They also don't honestly want to do what it takes. Yes, it takes some work, and some sacrifice to rise to the next level whether you are a Bronze, Silver, or Gold level driver.  The two-fold problem is, you don't want to put in the extra work, and you don't like sub-par performances, i.e. losing all the time. These two things combined with no will to succeed produces burnout over time.  Why?  Because (it seems) no matter what you do, the result is always the same lack of success at this point.

So if you are unwilling to put in that extra effort and are unwilling to try new things to get better, then you are either going to be satisfied staying where you are and watching others around you advance, or you are going to become very negative, discouraged, and burned out.

I can tell you, everyone follows a different idea and method for training or practicing, and yet most everyone believes what they are doing is what it takes to get better.  The truth is, only a few guys put in some extra effort to get better, and these are drivers who tend to have more success which motivates them enough to try harder each week.  So the question becomes, what are they doing that you are not, and am I willing to emulate what they are doing?  Maybe you can't commit as much time, but are you using the same methods as the fast guys?  Also, are you setting your goals too high?  If your goal is too far out of reach, you'll never catch the carrot of success and you will burnout.

So what is the solution?  Lower your expectations, and raise your effort.  

Instead of winning the race as your goal, maybe seek a podium instead.  Instead of seeking a podium, maybe be the fastest at your skill level.  The point is to have lower reachable goals to fertilize your growing success which in turn will motivate you to improve.  Because, only with success will you enjoy what you are doing.  If you feel like you are not being successful, the fun soon vanishes and burnout quickly sets in.

But how does one put in more effort when they think they have put in as much as they can already?  Simple! Do what the fast guys do.  If all you do is mimic the faster drivers' routine, even if you don't do as many laps as they might do, you will see an improvement superior to what you were doing.  How is this possible?  Because whatever you are doing is not only different from that of the faster drivers, it is inferior, or you would be the faster driver others would look to.

You see, some people incorrectly think you need a million laps to get better, and others incorrectly think that a dozen or so laps per day is good enough.  But what do the fast guys actually do?  They do as many high-quality laps as they can do in a session in the neighborhood of around 50laps per day depending on the track.  So here you have a fast guy who is already faster than most, doing way more laps at a higher quality than any lower level driver is doing.   And this becomes the answer to the question, "how are those guys so fast in the same car as me?"  If a lower level driver copied this fast guy method, he will not be as fast as the fast guy still, but he will be faster than he was.  He will gain success and will enjoy what he's doing and eliminate burnout completely.

It really comes down to doing just a few more laps but at a higher level.  You do this by carefully eliminating your mistakes during a lap.  My own method is to begin slow, learn the correct line that loses the least amount of time, then increase my pace gradually.  In this way I become familiar with what the track will allow and what my car can do.  I don't just run laps to run laps.  I don't have that kind of time to waste.  So I have to use my practice time wisely if I am going to benefit from it.  I try to perfect each lap but more importantly get a feel for what a good lap feels like.  It's not as much about repetition as it is about reaching minor goals during a lap.  For example, did I come out of a turn in the best way possible, or did I maintain my average speed through a turn, or did I over brake going into a turn a little too much and so on.

It may appear that I'm sandbagging during a practice session, but I'm really following my method of gradually getting up to speed so I can peak come qualy time.  It doesn't always work that way, but it happens enough that people have commented about why my qualy was so much better than my practice session.  Sand bagger! lol

So don't lose hope out there, and do what the fast guys do, quality over quantity, with a purpose, and we will see you on the podium too.



Good luck!

Recently we've seen a fair increase in interest in our TransAm format and with this added popularity the suggestion that it may be time to initiate a participation limit based on lap times.  The simple solution is to split the field in half and have 2 lobbies.  But in practical terms, as applied to not only the format but our mission statement it doesn't really work as well or generate as much excitement.

The problem is, we will likely have more than 24 drivers this season.  That's great, but whatever number over 24 it is, it is not enough to create a second lobby of 24 drivers or a total of 48.  So we are approaching a kind of in-between limbo figure too big for a single lobby and too small for two lobbies.  

Some might say, make two 12 man lobbies then.  But small lobbies have never been the goal because they aren't as fun and go against the mission to help slower drivers compete head to head with the fast drivers.  A B-lobby condemns all the slower drivers to a 2nd class status that they can never escape from.

Then there is the logistical time and effort of a two lobby system essentially creating 2 separate races with 2 of everything including twice as much time to manage and report.  Frankly, I just don't have the time to do two lobbies.

So, rather than having 2 smaller lobbies, or maybe one full and one nearly empty depending on who shows up that weekend; and rather than scrambling to juggle grids fairly (which never works out), we are going to take a page from real racing for the solution.

In many real racing organizations or events, they demand that you be within a certain competitive percentage of the leaders.  The trick is to get the right percentage that will allow the most possible drivers.  In our case, we are limited to 24 drivers.  So we want a figure that barely allows 24 drivers to get in. The number we came up with is 103.25%
  
That is, you have to be within 103.25% of the fastest practice lap time to grid.  Currently, that would require you to post a time no slower than 1:08.909.  Anything slower doesn't make the race.

With the current number of drivers everyone would make the race.

At least two drivers have asked for me to review or smooth out the handicap differences for the cars now that we all have a better idea of where they stand.  And I agree, a little bit of fine-tuning the car handicap can only help.  The goal is to offset any unequal cars and at the same time not create unequal cars via the handicap.

The handicap scale isn't meant to be the deciding performance factor and isn't meant to take precedence over the car's P.I. either.  It's just meant to act as an extra layer of equality between cars that will always be slightly unequal depending on the track schedule.

So it's a little tricky and somewhat subjective to get precisely right each season.  Hopefully this most recent fine-tuning will create the intended result and allow for more strategic racing and greater fairness.

Season 11 Master Car List:

https://ifca.forumotion.com/t6737-trans-am-master-car-list#138969

In case you didn't read it over in the Season 11 thread,  https://ifca.forumotion.com/t6764-season-11-feb-5th#139084
  we've added available points to the Team Championship so that there is a little more for team members to fight for.  It should still be understood that the focus is primarily the Drivers Championship and that the Team and Manufacturer Championships are somewhat secondary.

The reason for having a Team and Manufacturer Championship is to offer more than one area of competition that everyone can take part in regardless of skill level.  Doing so adds dimension to the format that mirrors the real series.  In this way, everyone has reason to contribute and to strive to do better.  Team leaders are going to want to help team members do their part to contribute to the overall success of the team and to a lesser degree the manufacturer.

"The team points table will be based on a 1 to 1 podium point system same as the manufacturer's but with the addition of any accumulated bonus points such as fastest practice laps, pole position, breaking the track lap record, and fastest race lap, and, half-point bonus for finishing between 4th and 8th."  


Based on the poll results we are discontinuing the Builder Bonus program.


Good luck!

Please double-check which team you are with.  We've had several replacements and changes.  Your main concern is to have a matching livery to your team come race day.

https://ifca.forumotion.com/t6763-ifca-trans-am-racing-teams#139041


new team composition:

	GM
	Hendrick Motorsports
	Driver	Rating	Skill Level	Car
1	DinoGrumps	1998.574	Silver	1970 Chevrolet Camaro
2	JDM Kevin72	1975.999	Silver	1969 Pontiac Firebird
3	EZT TomCat7	1959.989	Bronze	1969 Chevrolet Camaro
	Chip Ganassi Racing
	Driver	Rating	Skill Level	Car
1	OiCafe	1970.999	Silver	1969 Pontiac Firebird
2	WritesCode4Food	1966.999	Bronze	1969 Chevrolet Camaro
3	TypicalWinner77	1965.999	Bronze	1969 Chevrolet Camaro

#GetSome lol

As most of you know by now the IFCA is always out in front of the curve when it comes to setting up the next season. We've learned over the years that you need to be about 2 seasons ahead to have enough time to properly get things in order.  At the moment we are working on Season 13 even though Season 12 has yet to begin.

Many of you have expressed a desire to run either the old Trans Am cars or the newer Trans Am cars depending on your personal likes and dislikes.  Some don't like the older cars but some do, and some don't really like the newer cars but others really do.  Our solution to this dilemma?  Why not have both?

It turns out that within the Trans Am realm there is just such a format called Group 6 12a racing.  It allows the old to mix with the new and everything in between.

So, as a trial run, we will take 2 of the cars we've been working on for this class of racing and use them this Saturday.  It will be just for fun, no points, no ratings. One car will be from the old school variety and one from the new school.  The track will be Road America.  

The cars will be the 65 Shelby Cobra vs the 08 Dodge Viper.  The builds will be posted this week for everyone who wants to have a go on Saturday 7pm EST.  So keep an eye out on this thread.

GTDon2 wrote:As most of you know by now the IFCA is always out in front of the curve when it comes to setting up the next season. We've learned over the years that you need to be about 2 seasons ahead to have enough time to properly get things in order.  At the moment we are working on Season 13 even though Season 12 has yet to begin.

Many of you have expressed a desire to run either the old Trans Am cars or the newer Trans Am cars depending on your personal likes and dislikes.  Some don't like the older cars but some do, and some don't really like the newer cars but others really do.  Our solution to this dilemma?  Why not have both?

It turns out that within the Trans Am realm there is just such a format called Group 6 12a racing.  It allows the old to mix with the new and everything in between.

So, as a trial run, we will take 2 of the cars we've been working on for this class of racing and use them this Saturday.  It will be just for fun, no points, no ratings. One car will be from the old school variety and one from the new school.  The track will be Road America.  

The cars will be the 65 Shelby Cobra vs the 08 Dodge Viper.  The builds will be posted this week for everyone who wants to have a go on Saturday 7pm EST.  So keep an eye out on this thread.

When legends clash.  There is a thin line that connects the Cobra to the Viper and his name is Shelby, Carol Shelby.  Shelby invented the legendary A/C Cobra 427 and would later offer his insights to Dodge on the way forward with their legendary Viper project.  In fact, the Viper was inspired by the Cobra concept to begin with.  

So which car are you down with all things being equal?  That's okay, you won't have to say, because on Saturday everyone will take to the wheel of both cars for our off-season fun run.  There will be 2 races, 10laps each, and 1 pit @ Road America.  Whichever car you decide to drive in the first race means that you'll have to drive the other car in the second race.

Of course, this isn't a totally fictitious "what if?" scenario as you know.  Thanks to the Trans-Am class group structure of Group 6 and 12 these two cars do compete against each other in real life on rare occasions.  It's something that the drivers put together after seeing how close the lap times were between certain groups of older cars vs newer cars.

Silver	Bronze	Silver	Bronze
2008 Dodge Viper SRT10 ACR	2008 Dodge Viper SRT10 ACR	1965 Shelby Cobra 427 S/C	1965 Shelby Cobra 427 S/C
P.I. S750	P.I. S766	P.I. S734	P.I. S750
600hp/560tq	600hp/560tq	474hp/558tq	474hp/558tq
3428lbs	3428lbs	1960lbs	1960lbs
1/4 mile 11.754	1/4 mile 11.651	1/4 mile 11.716	1/4 mile 11.630
top speed 180.2mph	top speed 180.2mph	top speed 184.7mph	top speed 184.7mph
Race brakes	Race brakes	Race airfilter	Race airfilter
Race anti-roll bars	Race anti-roll bars	Race intake	Race intake
Race roll cage	Race roll cage	Race exhaust	Race exhaust
Race transmission	Race transmission	Race valves	Race valves
Race differential	Race differential	Race engine block	Race engine block
Stock tire compound	Race tire compound	Race pistons	Race pistons
Heaviest wheels	Heaviest wheels	Race flywheel	Race flywheel
Forza front downforce	Forza front downforce	Race brakes	Race brakes
Stock rear wing	Stock rear wing	Race suspension	Race suspension
		Race anti-roll bars	Race anti-roll bars
		Race weight reduction	Race weight reduction
		Race clutch	Race clutch
		Race transmission	Race transmission
		Race driveline	Race driveline
		Race differential	Race differential
		Sport tire compound	Race  tire compound
		Widest tires	Widest tires
		Lightest wheels	Lightest wheels
		Forza downforce F/R	Forza downforce F/R

If you don't have the time to build and tune the cars, they are shared as Silver and Bronze.