Tru-start poll for DIv 1

[Pistol Pete]

Originally Posted by cmracing

How did that work? Was every race basically a heads-up race with no breakout? Was your dial based-off the National Record for your class at that time? Curious as to how it worked back then.

I remember in 1974-75 you ran off the National record with a tenth under breakout was allowed.
It was handicap racing, with the handicaps coming from the National record in your class

I think the index system came out in 1977 & if your car was faster than your given index
you were allowed to dial quicker, but not sure if you can dial different each round.
Don't think you were.

[Rusty Gillis]

Originally Posted by Pistol Pete

I remember in 1974-75 you ran off the National record with a tenth under breakout was allowed.
It was handicap racing, with the handicaps coming from the National record in your class

I think the index system came out in 1977 & if your car was faster than your given index
you were allowed to dial quicker, but not sure if you can dial different each round.
Don't think you were.

You could run a tenth under the record except there was no breakout in the final in 1971.

[Ed Wright]

Originally Posted by Rusty Gillis

You could run a tenth under the record except there was no breakout in the final in 1971.

I liked that deal. In the heat, at slower tracks, not everybody could run the record. Mattered how fast you were. Kinda dumbed down now.

[cmracing]

Originally Posted by Ed Wright

I liked that deal. In the heat, at slower tracks, not everybody could run the record. Mattered how fast you were. Kinda dumbed down now.

So, someone shows-up with their U/SA capable of going .09 under their National Index. Unless his opponent hits the tree better or can go .10 under their National Index with the same light, the guy can't lose?

[Ed Wright]

Originally Posted by cmracing

So, someone shows-up with their U/SA capable of going .09 under their National Index. Unless his opponent hits the tree better or can go .10 under their National Index with the same light, the guy can't lose?

Why would you think not? If he is the only car that can run that far under, and he is on time, how would he lose? Lower class cars won all the time. Very few could run so far under back then, at least around here, that there was not much "driving the stripe". A lot of the slow guys went bracket racing when that came along. Car counts went way down.
NHRA had to go to these slow indexes to draw the slow guys back. About any old thing will run under these indexes.

[Hacksaw]

The trouble with running off the records was basically two things. There was always somebody with a soft record and he would have a big advantage, and the flip side was somebody setting the record in mineshaft conditions hurting everybody else in the same class.

[Ed Wright]

Most were smart enough to not bomb the record, since they had to run off them. It was not that big a problem. Most I have talked to that raced back then, liked it better.

[cmracing]

Originally Posted by Ed Wright

Why would you think not? If he is the only car that can run that far under, and he is on time, how would he lose? Lower class cars won all the time. Very few could run so far under back then, at least around here, that there was not much "driving the stripe". A lot of the slow guys went bracket racing when that came along. Car counts went way down.
NHRA had to go to these slow indexes to draw the slow guys back. About any old thing will run under these indexes.

Just wanted to make sure I understood how it was back then. I guess Class Racing was starting to die when too many people just felt uncompetitive and NHRA changed the way things ran. No more heads-up unless you were in the same class. Kept more people interested, otherwise Stock would look like Comp now, if it was even still around.....

[Ed Wright]

Only heads ups were between cars in the same class. Had none at national events because only class winners ran eliminations. I won my first points race, at slow track, running a tenth off the record. Didn't have a real close race all day.