Quote:
Originally Posted by Bruce Noland
Guys,
These CJ's don't represent any great change in the way nhra is going to run their "show." This deal looks to be a cash'n carry deal. Sure nhra will publicize the CJ's but there will be little exposure for the rest of the category. Top Stock and Junior Stock are prime examples of what can happen to a class when the fast cars take over. It dies!
This CJ deal is different than finding out a killer car has slipped through the cracks of the ahfs. Currently, a killer car in any class may be 20 horsepower soft and prehaps nobody saw it coming until a racer looked at the sheets and said wow this looks good. More power to him/her. And usually there are only a couple of these killer cars sprinkled around the country and they are raced by blue collar sportsman racers. No, this CJ deal is about a car that can roll off the trailer and run below a very tough national record on it's first attempt at a serious test'n tune. This car is not 20 or even 30 horsepower soft. It is 80 to 100 horsepower soft. It is so soft that Ford won't produce any horsepower numbers in writing. They are marketing an ultra high tech, Injected/Supercharged car and don't want to produce a dyno sheet for nhra to see. Nobody should be able to walk into nhra and say well the car may be a little bit soft but the ahfs will correct the numbers. That would be a fraudulent proposition and should never be allowed. And these cars will run all over the country; with more of them coming out this fall. Like most of the racers on this site, I can't wait to see them run in person. Some of these CJ's have a great team owner who wants to run these cars all over the country and I'm darn happy to have him, but he needs to run his cars in the right classes. Running these Rockets against 40 year old cars just doesn't work and I think the public will figure that out as well. Ford and nhra will come away from this current deal with a lot of bad press. Obviously nhra and Ford can do pretty much what they want but both should be careful about what they are asking for because they may just get it.
From what we have learned so far, this car has been able to slip bye nhra's vetting process or nhra is going plug this car into regular classes without seriously studying it's performance. It's not a difficult excersise to put these cars into classes where they can be evaluated and yet still enjoy all the pleasures of class racing in Stock Eliminator.
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I don't know how many times I've seen "work harder on your combo" spouted on this forum. I guess if a statement like that applies to someone that is a few tenths off his competition it should apply to everybody that is a second off this new Mustang. Maybe that will be NHRA's argument?
Regardless of who needs to work harder or what the HP rating of this Mustang or even the Challenger should be, the fact is none of these cars are regular production vehicles available to the public for street duty. That has been the premise for NHRA Stock Eliminator competition since day one. If Dodge & Ford want to offer these special vehicles for street use with EPA & NTSA approval, fine, let 'em race in Stock. But since the manufacturers have by-passed all the stringent requirements for street certification, then these vehicles shoould be mandated strictly to Super Stock. No different than the Hemi Darts & Barracudas, SS/AMX and other factory race cars of the past. Some vehicles such as ZL-1 Camaro's were street approved so they should be allowed in Stock.
And I guess the argument should be that all factory SS packages of the past should now be allowed in Stock Eliminator. Looks like that is where the bar is now. Wonder if NHRA ever thought of that?