Justjim75 said:In reply to Antihero :
If I had to drive 40 hours one way, I'd consider filling the car with spares and tools, ship it and fly down.
Ive considered it, it comes out to about the same as driving, and amtrak auto train is only from washington dc.
At least with along road trip theres a fun element to it......but we are literally talking about 12 days total including the challenge that i have to put aside.
"it's not called the EASY" made me LOL.
In reply to Antihero :
You guys need to learn to drive together and overnight. My friend would do a 30 hr drive to Bonneville, race for the whole week, and it’s less than 12 days.
Our drive was a pedestrian 16 hours, but we would do it mostly at once.
I’ve been looking for a long distance fly and drive if anyone wanted to build my streetable challenge car.
In reply to Andy Neuman :
I'll build you a "streetable challenge car" for the grand total of $2018. I think you already have my PayPal address.
In reply to Stampie :
I’d like to request a Miata with 700/400 lb springs on coilover sleeves with a 225 200tw tire and the 3” lift kit.
I’m still thinking whoever ponies up for new Hoosiers this year has the best chance at winning.
In reply to Andy Neuman :
Cost to pick up your hooptie from the seller are exempt. If you wish to ship it to Seattle and pick it up from me there then go for it. Note that "streetable" wasn't define in miles.
Andy Neuman said:In reply to Stampie :
I’d like to request a Miata with 700/400 lb springs on coilover sleeves with a 225 200tw tire and the 3” lift kit.
I'd like to surprise you.
In reply to alfadriver :
I could definitely cannonball it and never stop.....but that doesn't leave much for a fun road trip. 12 days is if we, fiancee/wife by next challenge, take in some sights etc.
It's 40 hours driving one way so technically I could do it in 2 days without stopping one way.
This would be an excellent opportunity to temporarily relocate the event to Pennsylvania, New Jersey or even Maine.
In fact, GRM once hosted an event near Cape Cod, so we know that it is do-able.
Pete Gossett said:In reply to alfadriver :
I just wish they’d have pro drivers available for the 1/4-mile too. Surely Garlits wouldn’t mind helping out next year?
Maybe not technically "pro drivers", but I'm sure there are plenty of Drag veterans on other teams that would be willing to drive a pass or three to help out.
I leave for the summer and things around here go all wonky. Crimeny.
I'm not sure this influences any decision I might have had about entering any of the crap sitting in my yard as it's all ugly and uncompetitive, but my schedule did firm up so I'll certainly be there in something or another.
In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :
Welcome back!
Thanks for the positive and understanding response to what is a tough situation for all of us. We're going to work even harder this year to make sure the event is fun and rewarding for all concerned.
As far as the suggestions that we move the Challenge, we've experimented with the idea in years past, including one live run of a possible venue, but there are a lot of moving pieces that all combine to give the event the character it has; that makes moving it much more complicated and risky than it seems on the surface. And at the end of the day, we are not the SCCA devoting its large organization and volunteer force to a years-long process of planning and implementing a rotating road show. We are publishers that put on event-sanctioning hats a couple of times a year.
Now, would I rather Le Mans happened in the U.S. so I could get there more easily? Sure. But it happens in France, just as the Rolex 24 happens at Daytona, the Hawk happens at Road America, and the 12 Hour Race happens at Sebring–and the Challenge happens at Gainesville. That doesn't mean we aren't going to constantly work to make the event better. Hope to see everyone there.
Margie
Thanks Margie! While I would love to see The Challenge in, say, San Jose, California I completely understand the logistics of moving the event with the resources available to GRM. I also totally got the gritted teeth in the title and Tom's first post but I can see how that goes for the Gainesville facility. It's not like we're going to attract tens of thousands of spectators (Hey! Why not?) to buy beer, hats and hot dogs. All their schedule impacts in this case is about 50 competitors and another 50 spectators.
I'm really glad you've got something planned to keep this from being a Miatafest, not that it would be a bad thing, but my build revolves around a little more than a really good autocross car. I was initially going to pass but the 1/8 mile straightaway autocross course might work well for me. I know I'm going to get killed in the short course so the hope is to make up some of that shortcoming with the long course. We'll see...
That's the Spirit, This change benefit's cars like mine so yea,
Marjorie Suddard said:Thanks for the positive and understanding response to what is a tough situation for all of us. ......
.....–and the Challenge happens at Gainesville. ...
Margie
I fully endorse keeping the event in Gainesville. As a competitor there is something special about the event, the location, the track, the hotel and the opportunity to go to family friendly activities nearby. If GRM decides to take this on the road we will follow, But Gainesville is like a favorite pair of sneakers...it has a very comfortable feel that is part of the event.
Our decision to skip this year is directly tied to the Drags being eliminated. It was and still is with great heartburn. We love this event. However, for this year we were building 2 cars that were intended to back up last years efforts and for the post Challenge life they will be subjected to.
We weighed our options very quickly. One option was to continue the current builds and drive them around the autocross events. We build Challenge cars. The cars have to do all three parts and they would not be bad A-x'ers, but they would not be the high(est) performers. And as JG wrote in a great article, we all have to devise a plan to capture the points needed to win the overall. 2018 was going to be our grand finally for the Drags, as we plan to do an all out attack on the only discipline we didn't win after this year. That is now going to have to wait. I am thrilled to share that Fuzzy (Calvin) has many runs deep into the 10s in testing on his own tune and has over a dozen 130+ passes. A goal this year was to get him to a point where he could get his Pro License. The car was immediately altered with the announcement of the event change. More will be heard on these cars and specifically the one Fuzzy is testing now. Option 2 was to throw the Vette together and come down. Had the announcement come 2 weeks earlier we would have brought it. Option 3 was to bring Bugzilla back in A-x dress. It has placed in the top 10 each time it competed in the A-x, and finished in 2nd in 2011. But ... we are running points in Bugzilla and we are currently 2nd in the points in our class. The series final race is immediately after the Challenge and we can't afford a failure or the time to switch things back and forth. Option 4 - we debated the merits of running another competitors car. Buying a set of tires for one weekend did not make sense.
Long story short we are very disappointed that we can't share what has been a 1000+ hour effort to prepare 2 cars that will be very successful in the intended post Challenge venues. For those of you following the X-Bomb build, we started installing higher dollar parts onto the car the day that we got the news about the event change.
We are already preparing for 2019. We laid out a plan to use information learned this year on the car Fuzzy is testing to help make our 2019 effort even better.
Truth be known, I haven't canceled the hotel room yet...we may just come to visit with enough enticement....we really do enjoy this event.
We’ve shifted to fixing the steering on the Datsun to try and run as many local events as possible before it gets cold out. Apparently you can finish 3rd overall in a car with non existent steering rack bushings and tie rods with almost enough play to pop the ball out of the socket.
I’m thinking of doing a build thread on the currently top secret (now) $2019 car because it’s going to be hard to keep it wrapped up while testing next year, and we’re hoping the two we want to bring next year can squeeze into the trailer. The V nose might make that possible.
Going to take advantage of skipping this year to do a family vacation that does not require forethought for parking a 34’ long trailer. It gets old fast trying to find somewhere to stay that has those kind of parking accommodations
i agree it’s called the challenge for a reason, but you’ll understand when you see what i’m building why it’s not feasible. I’m coming to play on my own terms from now on, in the end I need to live with the cars I build so I’m building stuff I want to own.
There's an answer I'd like to get from Gainesville Raceway. Repaving a racetrack is not an overnight decision. I would think such a decision was made at least a month or two ago so why would they wait so long to tell GRM? Motorsport Marketing rents the track for a couple of days. That would make them a "preferred customer" in my mind so why wouldn't they accommodate GRM by starting the re-paving after the Challenge?
I'm just a guy who follows the event so I really don't have any skin in the game. However, it looks to me like GRM got the shaft from Gainesville.
Jerry From LA said:There's an answer I'd like to get from Gainesville Raceway. Repaving a racetrack is not an overnight decision. I would think such a decision was made at least a month or two ago so why would they wait so long to tell GRM? Motorsport Marketing rents the track for a couple of days. That would make them a "preferred customer" in my mind so why wouldn't they accommodate GRM by starting the re-paving after the Challenge?
I'm just a guy who follows the event so I really don't have any skin in the game. However, it looks to me like GRM got the shaft from Gainesville.
G’ville told us earlier in the year that the track was scheduled to be repaved at the end of the year, but that it wasn’t expected to impact us. Although we didn’t get any detail as to why they decided to hit the go button sooner on the repaving, I wouldn’t be surprised if our super wet summer so far either degraded the surface, or made them want a wider time window to get the job done.
Either way, they are in business, and having the track ready for the Gator Nationals in March is going to be more important than keeping it open for the Challenge. I get that.
Here in Norwalk, Ohio the local Drag Strip, Summit Motorsports Park did a $1.6M repaving. It was fraught with weather delays and some "concrete application error" delays. This local article went on to say:
As a result of the delays, the 37th Annual Spring Warm-Up this weekend, which was to be the season opener at the park, and the Lingenfelter Performance Engineering Wednesday Fun Night on May 2, were canceled.
The 30th Annual University of Northwestern Ohio High School Nationals, which was scheduled for May 6, will now take place on Sept. 9. This means that these High School Seniors will not be able to compete in this event until early in their Freshman year of College, ha.
I am sure the world of NHRA sanctioned facilities is a very small world and I would not be surprised if the issues at one track did not make G'ville reconsider their timelines.
In this article, the track owner says
“We lost the first two weeks and five total events
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