A break from the rules and a question answered!

So this morning while reading a Time Attack competitors Facebook page where he was getting some flak regarding his times and subsequently decided to make a new post regarding why he races obviously feeling somewhat compelled to directly address his critics I was messaged and asked why I Time Attack given how much crap I stir up and my vocal disdain for the rules and where the sport lies currently.

After thinking about it for a second I figured it might be something vaguely interesting to put down on paper so to speak!

I attended my first TA event in I believe 04 that was held at the then California Speedway as part of a huge event involving the JGTC field, a friend of mines shop was running an Evo and I'd to a small degree assisted with it's participation, from there I also went to one other event later that year at Streets of Willows and really enjoyed the concept.

At this point TA was really new to the US and I continued on with my focus which at the time was working as part of a Grand AM ST effort to quell my racing fix, In 06 when the guys working for me and I had enough of being a part of someone else's business and branched out we built a car for the NASA 25hr, we didn't exactly have a stellar event although I maintain to this day other than build and approach I'd do it all over again!

Following our less than spectacular event at the 25hr TA was building up a decent head of steam in the US and the Grand AM team I was working with was winding up so the guys and I decided to put on some sticky tires and turn up the boost from endurance mode and have a crack at TA. This was the season opener for RTA at Buttonwillow in 07, I think we came 2nd overall but more importantly we had a blast and I saw a very viable opportunity that would benefit the business!

The viable opportunity was not only we go out and have some fun racing but we could use the car as a fantastic R&D and overall learning experience, from my personal standpoint at this time I wanted to develop engine packages so pushing the component limits in a event format that promoted high HP made a lot of sense, what I never saw coming was wealth of knowledge we would gain in the overall package encompassing chassis, braking and Aero. What we have learned and continue to learn cannot be measured in dollars!

I'm extremely thankful for the knowledge we have learned and certainly wouldn't change very much if anything at all if I rolled the clock back (I've learnt as much from our fuck ups as I have from our successes that's for sure) I've also been truly blessed to work with and glean knowledge from some very good people along away, Marshall Pruett, Gary Sheehan, Andrew Brilliant, Christian Rado, Scott Stanwood, Chris Harrington (really do miss and think of you all the time brother, RIP) and Jeff Westphal to name just a few (it would be a really long list)

Something changed along the way, partly due to our success and possibly as I got older not really to sure but I really started to enjoy helping others nearly as much as helping our own program. I found I was continually passing out info be it setup wise or sharing company contacts to help hook someone up, lending parts, tires or even just a general helping hand wherever needed.

I think during this phase I believed we're all TA brothers, friends etc or whatever you'd like to deem it and paying it forward so to speak was the thing to do. It also made me feel pretty good, it didn't make me a better person or anything as I'm a dick and no sending someone the email address for Hankook or giving them a set of wheels etc is going to really change that but I certainly felt like I was helping and perhaps ultimately the sport would gain as a whole (this all really started as TA in the US was taking a hit)

Over the past two years as we as a team decided to step back and not rush a rebuild things changed a lot for me as an outsider looking in with a keen interest as we still aimed to TA, I'm not 100% sure it was just me as this is something shared by the crew here but what we all thought we were missing was hanging out with friends and overall paddock spirit at events which all of a sudden sort of clicked to us is more of an illusion or quite frankly a thin veiled mask of complete bullshit!

Stepping back a little and looking on opened my eyes to what I see more now as a bunch of small clicks holding a candle that should be flame of a niche sport, perhaps if my perception is in any way, shape or form accurate this accounts for a part of where the sport is currently over here. Regardless if I'm right or wrong my thoughts remain and the fact that I have gone from enjoying to be a part of helping others to feeling like I'm a complete twat to be used in doing so!

Where does this leave me and what I regard as the best crew out there in any form of motorsports (you'll be hard to find a more dedicated group of people on the planet) Simple, we're going to go back to our roots a little and refocus our efforts!

You may ask why continue attending events as you've basically posted above you think people you thought were friends basically used you for shit all the time? That one is also simple, as a person that has always been a fierce competitor at anything I have attempted channeling good or bad things into motivation was something I was trained to do from the earliest of ages. 

So here's why we do Time Attack, as a team we're more than that everyone on the team is family and we are all agreed on the fact we have really enjoyed learning to build a car around a fantastic driver with very limited resources and going up against big budget builds and the others in our class is something we really enjoy doing and none of us see that changing. We are going to put forth all of our efforts to continue to develop and learn with the goal of being the fastest TA car there is.

Rules Wars 1 - A New Hope

Firstly before anyone takes any real meaning from the title of this blog don't bother, I drew reference from Star Wars and thought it was funny nothing more nothing less!

Anyways it seemed I copped a little flak for what I fired out over coffee yesterday morning which in fairness I fully anticipated, if you're curious it was just crap like "Sure it's easy for you to say when your not actually having to write and implement rules" or "Mike your a complete Bitch, Dick, Cock Fuck head...... and more"

As it stands all of which I completely agree with, funny though how pissed off people get when your response is "Sure I agree" it's kinda like arguing with a woman, ever noticed how pissed off they get when you simply agree and move on as if you don't care? It's awesome only in this instance for me at least I actually did agree with them and I really didn't care what any of them had or has to say to me!

Right on to the point (Holy shit only two paragraphs to read prior!) so in the small hours of this morning (Friday) I was contacted by a completely new sanctioning body that will have everything from national NBC television coverage to free all expenses paid family vacations to the winners to create a rule set for them based off of 5 classing's with sub-divisions called MTA using the following guidelines,

Given the vast complexity of the guidelines I was asked to adhere to I decided the first order of business seeing as these are my rules not someone else's I would start with what I wanted them to accomplish for a Time Attack series, we're going to refer to them as goals from this point on!

Goals!

• Primary focus is to help grow the series
• Clear, Concise and easy to follow ladder path defined by modification level to promote driver/car development through the rules groups (i.e. Enth - Street - Mod - CASH)
• Clearly defined driver required experience requirement per class with associated form (this will become more apparent in subsequent blogs!)
• Promote very distinguishable classing structure so as it's very apparent via rule controlled modification level what class a car belongs in
• Tightened up safety reg's in higher classings 

There's a few more that will come to me but as I only have my 30 minute lunch break right now I'm trying to keep this a little short but sweet all while stuffing my face with CJ's.

Now I got to thinking OK I kinda know what I want to achieve here but what's the best path to follow? I mean there's some obvious ways to write a rule book and none are what anyone would call easy but obviously some are easy than others so where I am right now is at the point of choosing a path from something like this,

Once you're overall main rules are written each class rules are governed by if we say you can you can but anything we don't say you can you can't

The other way would be the inverse of the above which to me seems like it would be a royal pain in the ass!

There is a third and much more interesting way of doing it, you do the above (the first option) and then you generate what's called a VSS, a VSS is a Vehicle Specification Sheet. This way of doing things is typically found in Professional racing and is probably by far the most complex way of doing it but the most clearly defined way of equalizing cars to promote level playing fields.

Right the lunch bell just rang and that's all I have time for today, tune in early next week to find out what path I choose to take when I pen and publish Rules Wars 2 - The rule book strikes back!

Rules are for fools... or are they?

Let's face it we all have to deal with rules, they are there in front of us every single day. Society as a whole is nothing but a ruleset governed environment. We all know we have to pay taxes, can't simply shoot someone that pisses us off and more recently regardless of fame can't verbally and physically abuse a co-worker and continue on like nothing happened.

Yes granted some rules are just plain fucking stupid, I mean why can I drive 400 miles in either direction with a truck and tailor and be allowed to drive the overall speed limit yet within the 400 miles (CA) I have a rule that means I have to watch even Prius drivers pass me by? Yea the 55mph rule in CA sucks and is stupid!

When we move into things such as major sporting events and activities things become a little looser and we replace gun toting police officers with whistle blowing referee's and subjectivity and human error comes into play. We've all watched a sport we love and seen a shitty call from the ref and how does that make you feel? For me as a Football (Soccer to you yanks!) fan it really pisses me off I know that much!

Now regardless of shitty calls and such we all can agree that the rules within professional sports are fairly clear and concise and more so we all understand them, obviously they are broken from time to time hence there are penalties and such but all the same we do know and understand them and can agree they are in place for a reason!

Now here's where things take a twist, Ability!

Ability has no bearing on the rules we are all governed with in our everyday lives, sure we all have the ability to chamber a round and shoot someone but in most incidences we receive a penalty for doing so, if we're not caught it's similar in some regards to sports as we could say that person cheated the law or rules case in point would be OJ.

But in sports ability has a much more pronounced meaning, let's face it we all dreamed as kids for running out with XYZ shirt/jersey on at favored teams stadium playing for them professionally but the reality is the statistic for having the ability to be professional athlete is in the 0.001%.

Now as we're all (well for the most part) not in that 0.001% does that mean we can't play? Hell no we all fall into different levels of Ability and such as which there are different levels to play in much the same as Time Attack (yes you did have to read through all of the above shit to finally get to any form of point I may be making!)

So if we're drawing comparison from Societies rules, Sports and using Ability (Ability in some cases with regards to Time Attack can also be offset by cash flow, see below) as our cross reference we have something that breaks down a little like this,

Overall Governing Body Sanctioning rules = Society's rules

The are the general sports rules and guidelines which cover the specifics of the sport and guidelines to be followed by all participating.

Unlimited Class specific rules = Professional athlete

These are if you like your 0.001% with the exception they don't get millions and get to go home and bang Victoria Beckham. Love them or hate them they are the ones that people pay to watch and for the most part have the if you like most Ability!

Modified Class specific rules = Semi Pro athlete

I can't fully determine the statistic here but let's as a broad example call it 25%, these are your guys either apprenticing with the aim of being in the 0.001% Ability stakes above or simply this is where they are going to stay as their Ability which for the most part is cash dependent dictates this is the highest level they will achieve. This level still draws at times a paying sizable crowd without the players bringing in the millions and banging the superstar wifes!

Street Class specific rules = Saturday/Sunday league players

This statistic is huge in sports, Time Attack has one additional class to make reference too but it is equally the largest of the classes so for arguments sake we'll call it 50%. These guys are you're bread and butter, they play week in week out and without them your sport falls out of the mainstream, think of it like this if these guys that give up all their spare time and earnings to play and didn't go to games and buy the teams apparel and such there really would be no sport or need for the guys with more Ability/Cash. Or at the very least the sport as a whole falls out of the mainstream and simply becomes a niche thing sustained by a small amount of die hard's grasping to what was or could have been (Oh the irony of how this hits the mark with current US Time Attack huh?)

Enthusiast Class specific rules = Hmm I've seen that dude bend the ball and bang the hot chick I need to see what this is all about

We'll call these guys the remaining 24.999%, the way I see them rightly or wrongly is these are the guys that perhaps played another sport at much different Ability level and are checking out something new, perhaps the flipped the channel and thought oh that looks cool I'd be down to give that a try.

And the Point is?

Now I'm sure at this point your saying OK Mike you just spent some time (and/or wasted mine reading this) and yet there is really no clearly defined point other than we all can agree we'd like to be that Jeff Westphal lookalike that's made millions from kicking a ball around and gets to bang a smoking hot superstar wife!

Well here's the thing as I see it, Time Attack at least in the United States is at crossroads. Sure I think the last couple of years it's made a very small dent in the damage that occurred in the past but still falls into the niche category supported only by the current crop of die hard's. The crossroads I speak of are whether it's to push on and make it's way back into the mainstream or slowly dwindle as the die hard's move on.

Everybody has their own opinion and obviously I am no different so my opinion of where it's at now and how it takes the right road from this point goes a little something like this,

The rules we're working with are to put it simple archaic written in something like 2004 and slightly tweaked since then, this has lead to a ruleset which has no clearly defined path between whether it's written from the stance of if it says you can anything it doesn't state you can't or visa versa. Keep in mind that the clear determining factor the rules were originally written around were tires being the main differentiating factor between classes, this worked in 2004 and too some extent till not all that long ago but started to fail badly as the sport reached it's peak due to some of these reasons,

 The sport grew and thus tire manufactures support and willingness to create specific tires occurred which in some cases completely lays to waste the existing treadwear class rules.

Technology, obviously nothing stands still modifications that were simply not present at the inception of the rules are not governed

Participation increase and lack of rules that were in place being enforced (think of RTA hay day and all the waivers)


Now if you're thinking OK but how and why are the rules so important for the continued growth of the sport? It's simple, even if my above statistics are mere fiction they at least are somewhat in the ball park. So if your sports main growth stream is its Saturday/Sunday league players (Street class) then without clearly defined rules which set apart it's differences with the higher ability/classes meaning players/cars with higher ability or cash can just run in their class collecting trophies why would more and more people join it's ranks?

At the end of the day most people go out there for fun but at a certain point as in the case with getting hammered by other teams at a sport each week it losses it's appeal and the participant level dwindles. There's a very good reason for the lower classes as they are for everyone to go out there have fun and perhaps if their lucky get up on the podium once in a while and get soaked with champagne, if obvious gulfs in ability/cash or the like exist this becomes an impossible reality which only hurts the overall sport.

My take on how things are shaping up currently due to if you like the loop holes or lack of adapting the rules to the current technology and available modifications is that you end up with you're primary attendance class being overran with trailer queened purpose built race cars running on fictional treadwear tires which serves to not only reduce your overall event attendance but also skew the goals of the class participants (think non achievable records and such) but don't worry they still have some interior so they ain't race cars right?


These are my views and opinions only so feel free to disregard/ignore or call me a wanker it really won't hurt my feelings at all I just felt compelled to explain my own thoughts based on the fact I really would like to see the sport grow as I think it can in the US and nothing more than that.