Hi Stan. I think we are in agreement. I thought I was clear in this context, but I didn't mean to imply that NO current SCCA car has good crash protection. I was talking only about the current FC/F2000 cars, the ones with which I am familiar and which teams might want to run on ovals in a new F2000 pro series.
Also, I stated earlier in this thread (way up top ) that I thought a steel tube frame car could be made safe on smaller ovals. It is a lot easier with a carbon monocoque, of course.
The FIA F3 standards would be a good start, but I'd like to see a bit more protection for oval tracks, especially in certain areas. Of course, nose crush structure is only one small part of the entire safety package. You can take the Elan approach of just beefing up the structure until it passes or you can actually engineer the impact structure and test it to confirm your design. I think the second approach is much more efficient, but in either case it ain't cheap.
I also agree that series that use spec cars aren't very interesting, nor do they necessarily decrease the cost. But along with sanctioning bodies, maybe less knowledgeable fans like them?
Nathan