FC Future Development.

[greg pizzo]

added pics from 2011

[Stan Clayton]

The future of FC? Lemme show you it...

[Steve Bamford]

The future of FC? Lemme show you it...

Did you include the Pro Series numbers in this?

[S Lathrop]

Stan;

I think it would be interesting to see not only FC and pro FC run under SCCA sanctions but also the total of FE, FM and FC. That would give an indication of the total market for cars at rough the same performance level in SCCA racing.

It may be that FC has lost competitors to FE and FM. Or that a large number of FC participants are running pro series vs club races.

[Steve Bamford]

Stan;

I think it would be interesting to see not only FC and pro FC run under SCCA sanctions but also the total of FE, FM and FC. That would give an indication of the total market for cars at rough the same performance level in SCCA racing.

It may be that FC has lost competitors to FE and FM. Or that a large number of FC participants are running pro series vs club races.

We all know there is a much larger group of potential FC cars that are running the Pro Series & avoiding SCCA altogether. Have a look at the Runoff's numbers for FC last year verses a high 30 low 40 car FC weekend at the Glen last year.

Your participation numbers of FB would be much less then current SCCA FC numbers if FB had its own Pro Series like it was trying to a few years ago.

Graphs are great but you need to included the proper data to make any sort of determination.

[Stan Clayton]

Stan;

I think it would be interesting to see not only FC and pro FC run under SCCA sanctions but also the total of FE, FM and FC. That would give an indication of the total market for cars at rough the same performance level in SCCA racing.

It may be that FC has lost competitors to FE and FM. Or that a large number of FC participants are running pro series vs club races.

Here you go...

PS - Sorry, I don't have the pro numbers.

[Steve Bamford]

Here you go...

PS - Sorry, I don't have the pro numbers.

Stan,

Bob Wright can give you the pro numbers, which are in a different thread here some where, but those numbers are north of 400 FC cars per year. If you add that to your graph it changes the landscape.

[Purple Frog]

If the F2KCS were counted it would bump the numbers by 400 race entries per year. And... it is a sanctioned SCCA event. Just not club.

[S Lathrop]

Thanks Stan.

For the most part, the numbers are depressing.

Interesting is the strong increase across the board in recent years. I wonder what that tells us.

If you add 400 entries from the F2000 pro, then FC is a very strong class. Could it be that things are not all that bad as they are?

[racerdad2]

Can someone give the specific parts for a longer lived, higher HP Pinto ? Cam, valves, rods, pistons, crank. PM if you like....

I just looked at the bare aluminum head at Pegasus. $3.5k. I need to add lightness.

The dual side drafts look cool. But, if they don't add to the bottom end, are we just trying to catch the Z's at the end of long straights ?

If, a big IF, I can become proficient at this CFC, I'd love to give it a go in a newer Pinto powered chassis.

[BeerBudgetRacing]

Here you go...

PS - Sorry, I don't have the pro numbers.

Do you have FE numbers?

[Stan Clayton]

Do you have FE numbers?

Yes...I'll add them when I get home.

[iamuwere]

1 I raced FE after quitting f5 because I had zero interest in the pinto engine. Zero. The Zetec rise led me to the FC

2 the Zetec alone was not enough because I have zero -0- interest in mixed club racing anymore. Too many dangerous mixings and slow cars. Too many much badness.

[BeerBudgetRacing]

1 I raced FE after quitting f5 because I had zero interest in the pinto engine. Zero. The Zetec rise led me to the FC

2 the Zetec alone was not enough because I have zero -0- interest in mixed club racing anymore. Too many dangerous mixings and slow cars. Too many much badness.

But clubs can't run events without mixing classes. Just not enough time in the day.

So what is needed is class consolidation..??

[iamuwere]

But clubs can't run events without mixing classes. Just not enough time in the day.

So what is needed is class consolidation..??

No. We just need f2000cs. It works well.

[BeerBudgetRacing]

No. We just need f2000cs. It works well.

Well, all the schedule says "With: F1600 and Atlantic"

So you are running mixed classes anyway.....

Out west we have Pacific 2000 series, but those events are part of the SCCA events.
and they mix in FM/FE/FA/FS.....
So to run Pacific can't make its own rules....

F2000cs is totally on its own or are those SCCA events as well?

[iamuwere]

No, F2000CS is a separate run group, as are FA and FF. Each gets their own with 30+ cars in FC and FF, and FA in the dozen or so range.

[iamuwere]

The F2000CS events are effectively stand alone from the SCCA events, typically.

[Stan Clayton]

Do you have FE numbers?

FE added.

[Peter Olivola]

So far, no one's mentioned the CART/IRL split as a contributing factor. I would suggest the decline in Big Time open wheel racing in the U.S. is a significant influence.

FE added.

[Rick Kirchner]

I'm sorry, but I think people are analyzing this data simply to support their own conclusions, and the numbers and trends here can't support many conclusions on their own. Correlation is not causation.

This chart is incomplete without SR/SRF numbers. SM numbers probably come to play here too, but they steal from a number of classes, which makes raw number data without stuff like survey data too hard to separate.

If you look at all the numbers together on the right-hand side you get something like 2200 formula entries. If you look at the totals on the left, it's about 3500 entries. If you snap the chalk at 1999-ish, you still get about 3500 entries. So the real drop is from 2000 to now.

There are only two conclusions to be made from this data: 1) that there's been an approximately 30% drop in SCCA national level open wheel entries, and 2) that the increase from 4 to 7 classes may have had a reduction effect on the original 4. That's it. Throw in SR/SRF and we have a whole different story. Vintage open wheel is considerably larger now as it was in 1986, throw those numbers in and there's yet another story. And there's still the F2000 pro series entries of all kinds east and west, and NASA FM as well in the mix.

My guess is the actual number of open wheel entries across all clubs and all classes is pretty damn constant and what we are seeing is club and class proliferation, with SRF and SM stealing most of the new blood. And let's face it, in the battle for filling independent open wheel seats vs. filling an enterprise seat or a SM seat, the SCCA fights on their side.

Also, looking at entries is only a part of the story. With that metric there's no distinction between a few guys that race a lot and a lot of guys that race a few times a year. Double weekends have also shown up in this time period.

To make any sense of this at all you have to overlay various major rules changes in both the club and pro communities onto the timeline – like the new engine in F440, the introduction of the spec FA cars and then the big FA car, the FC Zetec. Would also be interesting to overlay various economic crises that occurred across the timescale, and you could throw one more graph on top to boot – something like average cost per race of tires – not tire cost mind you , but a metric that takes into account the reduction in contingency programs and the increased need for the freshest, stickiest tires at every opportunity, along with the increase in the cost of a tire – if there's anything that might explain a drop in SCCA National level entries, tires have the potential to be the major factor across all classes.

I'll present the following hypothesis:

As far as the precipitous drop in FF numbers – they correspond directly to the introduction of the Swift. The growth in FC at that time takes into account people leaving FF to establish a new class with far greater growth potential than FSV/FC. The rest of the FF guys buy a SR, go to vintage, or drop out. At the time, a SR was much less than the cost of a FF and had a control tire and guaranteed stability – along with a pro series. That trend continued until 1999.

Interestingly, there's a dip in everything except FA in 96-97. That must be economic.

FA numbers got a bump at that time as the ground-effect SVs got the 1800cc bump, EFI, and moved into Atlantic, and the establishment of a pretty healthy pro series. For the most part though, FA participation seems to be pretty impervious to economic conditions, but highly susceptible to other factors.

Aren't the FM numbers incomplete in the early years? The existence of their pro series likely pulled a few numbers away from everything else.

How much of the FA bump that peaks in 05 is due to the introduction of the big car as well as Zetec FCs running as FA? It reduces the FC numbers equally.

There's nothing in all these posts regarding change to the FC formula that's likely to increase numbers in SCCA National level events until there's a scientific understanding of what's “wrong” and only then if a politically acceptable solution is available, and you don't have the data to support that yet.

[Stan Clayton]

...There's nothing in all these posts regarding change to the FC formula that's likely to increase numbers in SCCA National level events until there's a scientific understanding of what's “wrong” and only then if a politically acceptable solution is available, and you don't have the data to support that yet.

Wow...great post, Rick, but ultimately beside the point. The vagaries of class participation is not an engineering problem amenable to a rigorous solution, because you can neither define the objectives nor control the variables. Instead, SCCA competitors are just normal folks who make their decisions based on a host of factors: family commitments, financial circumstances, inherent platform limitations (is my older FC chariot competitive), changing interests (the average competitor is active for about 5 years), and last but not least, marketing, to name a few. The idea that one can control of those variables rigorously enough to come to "a scientific understanding of what's “wrong”" is, sadly, laughable.

To paraphrase an old truism, keep a class interesting, current and competitive and they will come. Lose sight of that and they will leave.

Oh, and the 96-97 bump in FA? Those were the years the FM cars were admitted to the class while they built their numbers to become their own class in '98.

[Rick Kirchner]

Not beside the point at all Stan.

"Scientific" in this case means an approach to understanding why class participation is dropping and has nothing to do with an engineering based right or wrong. It's market research. There actually are professionals who know how to ferret out this kind of information Stan, the SCCA just doesn't employ them to work on this problem.

While your graphs are interesting and illustrate the existence of a problem, they yield absolutely no insight into the problem itself. Nice try at the dismissive distraction though.

The SCCA doesn't know who owns the cars. They don't know why guys in a given class stop racing. They don't know what changed from the 80's to now. If they did, we probably wouldn't see nearly as much of a problem - or they just don't care. All that's been presented here are two dimensions of numbers, that show with the exception of FA and FB, significant losses over the past 15 years.

While you make statements about not being able to control the variables (along with an exhaustive list of soft variables) I find that across a wide variety of classes with vastly varying requirements for engine, chassis, and tire costs, mechanical aptitude requirements, entry costs, time investment, re-sale costs, etc, the curves are surprisingly consistent. That suggests that there is if not just one, perhaps no more than two major real reasons for the decline - because if these variables are different across so many classes the probability that all would combine in such a way to create such consistent results is extremely remote.

In the face of all those curves, your old truism really doesn't hold at all. There have been a number of changes made in different areas across all classes, yet the results are remarkably similar. I would propose it's because the root cause has not been understood or addressed. That's not necessarily an engineering problem, but it might be.

[Steve Demeter]

5 why time.

Ask why participation is down and then ask why to the first answer and so forth. Should prove interesting at least if not actually yield some productive information.

[EYERACE]

too many new classes every time you turn around, so some classes take away from older class entries &

the SCCA slowly becoming the SMCCA spec miata car club of America &

it's the economy stupid &

people getting laid off so they can't afford much of anything &

people buying [and maybe also later losing] a bigger house so the racing budget went to the bank instead &

tire costs &

lack of a tire rule for some classes, so some people - even though they could have afforded to buy another set to remain competitive - deciding it wasn't worth it, so they quit racing all together &

towing costs &

the slow steady rise of marque non-vintage racing organizations &

the slow steady rise of the many vintage racing organizations &

the lack of the SCCA having a 13/13 rule &

the rise of PDX entries so some owners can "arrive and drive" just like the "good 'ol days" and totally give up wheel to wheel racing [variation of the marque reason above] &

the graying of the SCCA making some drivers not interested in racing as much - just enough to maintain their license &

failing health &

kids growing up carting but thinking stock cars as they grow up because of the saturation of NASCAR marketing and the number of short tracks across this land &

races that have a purse instead of a $10 plaque &

lack of open wheel exposure via TV time leads to fewer newbies thinking to run an open wheel car &

people who wanted to race, couldn't afford to go pro, but thanks to the SCCA they got involved and then did race with the SCCA for a little while, so now they have no interest in doing it anymore [been there, done that] &

wives telling their husbands to stop racing &

kids &

more kids &

divorce costs and kid support instead of that money going towards the race car &

too frequent changes to the rules of a given formula so an owner/driver had to continue to spend money on not only maintenance but the upgrades, so what was imagined as the racing budget just didn't go far enough anymore &

boats &

the cost of a very very nice luxury street car being way higher than what many people drove years ago so again the money for racing just doesn't go as far &

hoarding: the owner/driver who now has that big house I spoke of earlier, now by virtue of having a great place to store the race car, is simply storing it, so even though they have little inclination to race again any time soon, they also have little desire to part with the car so there's one less car to go out on the track...and they're not in a position to rent it out and act like a prep shop &

the decision that spending a total of as much as $2,000 with a prep shop/travel/meals/hotel/etc. to rent a race car for about 1 1/4 hours of seat time over a weekend just wasn't that worthwhile &

fear got the better of them &

the cost of health insurance slowly going through the roof, so there goes the budget too &

the cost of event insurance slowly going through the roof so entry fees go up &

the cost of a driver's equipment [even though it's better than years ago.....HANS, carbon and/or Kevlar helmets, driver suits that are over a thousand dollars, etc.] going up and up so the entry cost to a newbie make them think twice &

the costs of adding data acquisition &

and radios &

and steering wheels that cost more than the car itself &

.................. &

So let's just say racing's not cheap, which we already know, but some people have made it for the simple guy an expense that's taken the fun out of it and when the fun stops, the racing stops.
During a double weekend, when I see a fellow club ford racer change out their spec tires that could have maybe run easily another three to four weekends, so that next they beat the former winner [who is still on his old tires] by one length at the end of the second race, it makes others not want to race anymore.

When I went through my SCCA classroom as part of my first Driver's School, the Chief Instructor said, "Five years from now 90% of you will not be racing and money is the only reason." No argument there.

[Modo]

Good stuff Eye, I swear, I'm still going to make the yearend gathering at Sebring, Ive been meaning to do that for the last umteen million years, even donated an entrance fee or two, it's fun and u have demonstrated your passion for it, my car is almost off the saw horses ..........

Fear, I like that part, no one talks about it, more like fearless, my too too is still there thank god!!!!!!

[RobLav]

Rick Kirchner's posts are spot on. I do this sort of stuff for a living (lately in submarine tactics). And our Eye Doc listed a bunch of other potential causes.

[Pi_guy]

My first race at Lime Rock in the 70's was a National with a Pro Atlantic feature race, there was not one spot of grass unfilled with spectators. Now the cameras hide how few attend races.
The other element that has taken hold is the green movement and sustainable living. It knocks motorsports as a waste of resources.
Finally there is too much other diversions from monster trucks to racing lawnmowers, why do something with traditional roots when you can be king of the lawnmower racers.
This same issue has hit downhill ski racing, there is less and less places to ski race and fewer competitors.

[blackbmwk1200r]

Rick Kirchner's posts are spot on. I do this sort of stuff for a living (lately in submarine tactics). And our Eye Doc listed a bunch of other potential causes.

There is no doubt that Rick has done a very nice job of articulating his argument, however I still don’t understand how it applies to this situation. Unless the SCCA can reasonably be expected to commit the very considerable effort and cost required for comprehensive data collection and analysis; what’s the point? Maybe I’m wrong but I see this level of commitment unlikely to be undertaken by an organization of this size and financial wherewithal. Particularly when at the end of it all we could very well still be left without a clear direction forward.
Absent this effort and cost we are left with the data we now have and that which can be obtained easily, the generalizations that can be made as to cause and effect by those who have been involved over the decades, new ideas and suggestions offered by today's participants as well as intuitive reasoning and decision making by those experienced and competent persons entrusted to make tough decisions for the organization.