I am open to ideas, but I think that getting tire costs under control is a big key to the success of an entry level class.
FC, FF and CFF all run together now anyway, and the drivers have to account for differing cornering speeds, so I think this concern may be overstated.Because F600 will have to be on the track with FF and FC, in the interest of safety and good racing experience, the F600 should corner on a par with the other cars on the track. As such F600 should not be on DOT tires or super hard racing slicks.
FM has a "race what you qualified on" tire rule, and we almost had to abandon the rule this year because the grid workers could/would not reliably mark tires. As a consequence, the rule is on "probation" this year while we try to get Regions to enforce it, but the bottom line is that in the chaos that is Club racing, enforcing such a rule has been problematical.Most of pro series limit the number of tires you can use. I think that the pro F2000 limit is one set.
If you just implimented a one set only rule, then you have increased tire life by one third.
Your 2 session tire situation is more a reflection of the people you are listening to than the true performance of the tires. The experience of my drivers at the pointy end of the competition is that tires can go 2 weekends and some time more. Because there is no on track penality to abusing tires and because it is easier to put a new set of tires on than learn to get a good setup on the car and learn to drive with that setup, people will continue to use a new set of each race weekend.
My thought is to:
1. All tires are marked prior to the first practice session
2. Have a limit of one set of sticker tires per weekend.
3. Have a time penality of 1% for each sticker tire used in qualifying (if you qualify on stickers you have a 4% time penality)
4. Have a 1.5% time penality for each sticker tire you start a race with. The time penality is added to you qualifying time and you are regridded accordingly.
5. Tires that have more than one race stamp may be used without limit.
100 miles? That is barely more than one National race (45 mile race plus practice and qualifying), or $600 per race in tire costs alone, which I think is inappropriate for an entry level class. Even if the tires go twice that far, it still strikes me as violating the basic premise of a truly cost-effective class.Some program like this would put a premium on making tires last at least 2 weekends. You might be able to construct a scenario that favors 3 weekend tires.
People say they want tires that last, then make tire longevity a part of winning.
The tire testing I have done, has shown me that the current selection of tires will give a good 100 miles. Interestingly we have had the best performance over the full 100 miles with some of the softer compounds. But those soft compounds tires had many heat cycles. I am certain I can find tires that will do better if that is part of winning.
During the discussion last year about a tire rule for FF I spoke with reps from GY and Hoosier for their input. Both companies want wide-open tire rules. Period. Dot. End of discussion. Where the Club forces them to compete (SRF and SM), they will, but they don't like all-or-nothing propositions. I don't think they cared what tire type (racing or DoT) was permitted for any particular class, but they DEFINITELY wanted the opportunity to compete for sales in the class. That is why I commented as I did in the third choice in post #26 above.Lets get the tire companies in on this section of the rules.
Please believe me when I say that I am not interested in another spec formula class. That said, I think that an effective tire strategy is key to a truly cost effective entry level class (whether F600 or the more inclusive FD concept). Permit a state-of-the-art racing tire, no matter the steps taken to prolong their lives, and we are right back in the technology wars that have driven FF to the state it is in today.I would hope that F600 would not be a "spec car" in any way. We already have Spec. Racer for those who want that type racing at this level. F1 used a longevity rule to control tires, maybe we can do something similar with F600.