I for one would like to race at E-town. Poor decisions by the organiser that have driven away or made illegal long standing established cars has ruled that out. I'm not pulling my car to an event that, because of alienating the core group, sounds more like bracket night at the local track, where the rules sure seem to have been manipulated to control the outcome. The comments have nothing to do with one event being better or overtaking another. If someone thinks that, then they haven't paid much attention during their years involved with this type of racing. The thing that grinds me is, I would like to go there, it's just not going to happen because of "rules soup"
Hey guys....I towed the 9 hours with my son as co pilot and we had a blast hangin out with Wayne"never late with the L88",Dave Dude"k" and his dad,Joel"getxoutotheway",the Spetzmans,Jay de"bog"le and all the rest of the FAST crew. Saturday was a let down because of the amount of other participants that made for long waits in the lanes and few passes. ...........but the BBQ and laughs with the Lombardis(jr and sr.),Peter Germani and Ty Taccone more than made up for that! Exchanging ideas with Jim Mino and getting my trophy time slip for the year set the weekend over the top. Bill claims that next year will be 2 days for muscle cars only...FAST,factory stock. I say kill the politics.........LETS RACE!
All due respect, but there has been a lot of past politics involved with the race you only recently started to attend. If the politics were killed over the years, the Stanton race and even the F/S part of the Martin race would be a regular bracket event and you would not have even cared. Sorry......but it's the truth. :beer
pure stock Clifford, We could go on about the issue of what constitutes a "Muscle Car" for several hours. The 1955-1975 cutoff dates seem reasonable to most of us ONLY because that's the cars we remember and/or have have seen articles on. I tend to think my '57 Ford, which has run over 102 mph, or Brians '58 Merc @ 100 mph, or the '57 'Vette running mid to low 13's, is a muscle car. :laugh: I'm just as sure that somebody who had a '49 Olds in 1949, or a '55 Chrysler 300, or a '56 Cadillac with the dual quad Eldorado engine, or one of the early Plymouth Fury's, or even a '40 Buick Century, thought he had a "muscle car." :Smarty: So please don't tell me that I don't have a muscle car because you (or Gonzo, or some 12 year old magazine writer) decided that it isn't. :af: If you want to call the race a "slightly modified, but don't go too quick" Chevy/Mopar race for East Coast racers, fine. Just don't expect to see very many actual pure stockers from the Midwest show up. Won't happen. And, no, I don't have anything against E town, I've raced there and have friends in Jersey. If they decide to have an actual "pure Stock" race, and allow OLD :error: cars, I might show up.
There wasn't anything else goin' on in early November so we thought...what the heck,lets go to Etown. As a rookie,I'm sure there's lots that I missed at the onset that set the path for what is now becoming highly recognized racing in Michigan(Martin and Stanton).You're right about the bracket race thing too! It probably took several hard stands on certain issues to come up with the rules and format that are used today. The Etown race sucked compared to the Mich. races but I still believe that Bill wants to improve the event and attract more cars. JJ and Pete told me what happened previously so it was no surprise. It may get better and it may not but if its the only gig goin' on and the weather forecast is good........I'm in.
Good attitude Bruno.. Pegleg: You USED TO have friends in Jersey.........not anymore! :laugh: :laugh: I have family all around there (Philly, Bunghamton, Cape Cod, Wilmington, Wells, Vt.) and have wanted to go make one of these races as well for many years, just hasn't happened. Will NOT tow over the Pennsylvania mountains that late in the year, though. Have had serious wrecks and slides on both I-80 and the Turnpike over the years. Imagine I-90 would be even more risky. Guess it'll have to be a summer race if there's no conflicts and to repeat John's view, a 2 day event. Too far otherwise. Definitely not interested in bracket racing anymore.
Joisey Dave, Hey baby, are youse tellin' me dat my Joisey buddies ain't gonna like me no moh? Mebbee Springsteen'll bring da boiz to come down and adjust my attitude, 'er sumpin. I'd better shut up or I'll wind up in the East River wearing cement shoes. :Brow:
As stated before I have had nothing but good interatction with Gonzo and am not piling on to him. But to answer a few questions previously asked. The 12 to 1 compression item makes my Judge illegal out east. Everyone knows what compression is in it as it was in a magazine dyno test. So I would not expect to put Gonzo in a bad position by showing up with it. I personally could deal with being moved forward to FAST for hitting 11's. Certianly would not be my favorite item by any means though. And as some state, don't build them to their maximum and you could fly at both events. For me my car is over three quarters of a point off being maxed. I have several cc's left in the head, bore and stroke available yet by PS/FS rules. This leads to the worse item for me. If I go out east I would want to take advantage of the late seanson air and the notoriously fast track to hit personal bests. That is not an option in my prefered car. This coming season I will not be able to attend as I have committed to three events already and that is all I can do and be fair to my family. I would like to hit the '08 event. Hopefully that will give time for some rule changes or I will bring something else I suppose. Or maybe Gonzo can just adjust the breadth of years legal and admend the compression rule to allow for people who meet legal PS/FS compression ratios higher than 12.0 to 1 to also be legal in NJ. Those two small items would allow all current PS/FS racers to participate while not harming/excluding his current cars. I hope though we can all get on the same page soon so all the bad feelings can go away like they have with other groups. Merry Christmas, Mark
Gonzo needs a class for the Midwest Pure Stockers if the rules wont adjust. It still would need to be a 2 day event for people to make a drive. Nothing like bringing a topic back from the dead. LOL............. Jim
Jim: I just read through the recent edition of MCE. Great dyno session on the LS6. Those were really impressive numbers you laid down!:TU:
I'll second that Jim! Between your 70 LS6 and Larry Weymouth's 71 ,it was like watching Godzilla vs Rodan. Congrats on the great pictures in the new Mike Mueller Book!:TU: Rich C.
Thanks guys!! I'm humbled about it all. What I would like out of all this is just to have more people come out and enjoy their cars at the events we so cherish. As we have said so many times on this board, its the people that that are involved making this so much fun. :TU: It gets better each year. I expect this year to be no different. Jim:TU:
Just saw the magazine (the PR/Communications folks sit just down the hall from me; they get all the good magazines). Well done, and congratulations to "Merc Expert" Brian Stefina for the honorable mention (pg 74); Also had an editorial where Paul Zazarine picked his favorite muscle car as a 70 GSX (pg 16). Big day for V8Buick, eh? K
