A/SA First in the 9.80's

[Mike Mans]

Ken hit my point exactly. While all of the old pure muscle cars are great pieces of art, there has to be an update to bring in new racers and brand loyalty again. I am sure that GM will come out with a new Camaro to compete against the CJ's and Drag Pak cars when their financial state turns around (at least they better if they hope to have any new cars built in stock). This isn't the exact addage of race on Sunday - Sell on Monday, but it's close. There has to be some type of a car that fans and race enthusiasts can relate to or tell their buddies that they just picked up from the dealership.

I know full and well from Super Stock that there will always be a disadvantage to whatever class/combo you decide to race. It's just to what extent. For me to compete against Dave Bogner and his ultra-fast small bodied Mopar is a bit of a handicap when I'm pushing a whale through the wind with my Firebird. But, I feel that on many of the track surfaces we are faced with in the heat of the summer - I may have a better chance at consistency than if I had a new Cobalt. Now, a Cobalt with our drivetrain would probably be about .07-.10 faster due to the hole you have to punch in the air - but I have just grown so much trust in my car that we deal with it. I could be totally wrong and naive in thinking this car could ever be better than the Cobalts etc.. but we'll stick to working hard on everything else to be faster.

Newer isn't always better, but in some cases - it's here to stay and we all have to adapt in one way or another. Everyone gets so heated when we talk about this stuff, and I know it's because we're all passionate about what we have and what we feel can be done.

My point that Ken touched on is this. If you were to go back to when you were a 20 something guy at the dragstrip back in 1970-75, were you elated to watch 40 year old cars go down the track? No. Back then you would have been watching a Model T roll through the traps. And while I don't see it that way, and I can definitely see that you guys don't either - any new 20 year old guy that has no history in cars - will see all of these 60's muscle cars as Model T's... It's a generational gap.

I have a guy that I work with driving a '90 Mustang in Outlaw 10.5 with a turbo running 8.50's and he's got about $25-30k total in his car. Now, imagine the conversation when I tell him that he would have to spend about $15k to build a killer 5.0 motor to compete in Stock and try to qualify on the top (running 11's). He thinks we are all a bunch of crazies spending endless time and money trying to go fast when power is so readily available with turbos and blowers - why spend a fortune to go 11's or 12's? This is the next generation. They want to go fast, and tune it on a computer or work on the blower/turbo. This is the current factory power plants that they are taught to work on and understand. They have no clue what a Quadra-Jet is, or a Thermo-Quad for that matter. They need a reason to be attracted to Class Racing.

You guys have your generations of cars and nobody is forcing you to change anything about them. But, if a 2010 high performance car doesn't outrun a 1969 high performance car - we have some serious incompetent engine builders at the Big 3.