Irony can be pretty ironic. At the moment, you don’t need to look any further than your local track, then glance to your local car dealership, to get an epic dose of bitter irony injected right into your heel and toe.
A statement I’ve been able to make truthfully every single one of the 33-plus years I’ve worked here is, …
I'm definitely having to play a game of the car I need vs. the car I want with our next vehicle purchase. In a perfect world, I would just buy two different vehicles, but that's not something I can afford.
You can still get a brand new car with turbo, manual, good tires and brakes right off the lot for Well under $30k. $26,545 for a 2024 Forte GT Manual. Get 'em while they still make them!
Possibly the bigger problem beyond affordability is that the number of cars being made that might be appropriate for track use has dwindled rapidly in recent years. SUV's and crossovers have almost completely taken over the car market. I, for one, am completely uninterested in these types of vehicles for either street or track duty.
One possible solution is to daily a 1/2 ton pickup or larger SUV, then get a trailer. If you remove the requirement for your track car to be street legal, a whole world of inexpensive possibilities opens up. The only real flaw in this argument is that you need a place to store the trailer and the car, which can be quite expensive.
I don't know about 30 years ago, but 20 years ago you didn't need a race car and competition license. What mostly changed was the internet and how easy it was to find a group of people renting a track. I ran with forum based groups back then. I imagine PCA and BMWCCA had enough people to be doing it as well (though I wasn't involved with them then). Its stupid easy today even compared to then. Track specific sites the list nearly every hpde and even allow you to register are amazing.
Between cars costing more, they're also a bit more complex/expensive to maintain and fix. Also, there's just less of a variety of cars to get and finally, most people don't have the discretionary income to have a "toy" car thanks to increased cost of living and wage stagnation.
You can still find trackable cars for 6-10K.
No it won't be top dog.
Our Foxbody Mustang is costing me $7500. I will be adding $600 worth of brakes now and another $1500 later on.
ND Miata will spank that car; they shall spank it on the ground, they shall spank it in the air, they shall spank it in the sea........yet I shall drive it with glee.
The problem (that's not really a problem) is every one thinks they need a 45-50k car. Lemons and Champcar proved otherwise.
All you need is a reliable decent handling car. My son is tracking his Lexus LS400. He paid 8K for it.
The average price of a new vehicle in 2023 is $48,759. If you use that as the top of the bell curve you can find plenty of options of track oriented cars on either side of that bell curve while still staying towards the top.
The problem is that how many of those cars are actually track capable? I'm not talking about the ability to go out and turn a single hot lap, but instead go out and run a session without overheating something.
Easy. The Great Depression of 2008 trashed new car sales for years, and now those cars are the bottom of the depreciation curve. Now there's not enough available, so everything left went up in price. This hit enthusiast cars especially hard.
I have it on fairly good authority that the car in your photo is most certainly not easy to get.
Tom1200 said:You can still find trackable cars for 6-10K.
No it won't be top dog.
Our Foxbody Mustang is costing me $7500. I will be adding $600 worth of brakes now and another $1500 later on.
ND Miata will spank that car; they shall spank it on the ground, they shall spank it in the air, they shall spank it in the sea........yet I shall drive it with glee.
The problem (that's not really a problem) is every one thinks they need a 45-50k car. Lemons and Champcar proved otherwise.
All you need is a reliable decent handling car. My son is tracking his Lexus LS400. He paid 8K for it.
This. You can still find manual accents and Rio's for $4-5k, put $1500 in suspension, brake, wheels and tires and have a track capable car that will run on the same consumables all season.
Not fast enough? There's plenty of 1.6T cars available in the $6-8k range from both Hyundai and Kia with 6MT. Same $1500 plus a tune and now you've got a 2900lb car with 230whp and 12" brakes.
Most of these were pre-price jump but still a decent representation of cars that can get you on the track at a reasonable cost. All times are from Gingerman Raceway and driven by me at different levels of track experience. Every one of them was fun and the only one I felt like I was getting close to the cars limit was the Fiesta and I am sure it had room left for improvement from a driver perspective as well.
In reply to ShinnyGroove (Forum Supporter) :
So trailering a car to open up inexpensive options. Yes. Okay.
It's expensive to track my C7 Z06 -- like over $2k/day just in tires expensive. Ouch. So I bought a Miata to track -- and then promptly bought a different Miata to track, but that's another story. I also own a nice 24' enclosed trailer.
Okay, so now I have my Miata that I can track. It's currently street-legal. However, I should really be running harnesses rather than seat belts in it. Okay. That will necessitate a proper racing seat. I'm a plus-sized human, and the only seat I found that will fit me will absolutely require a floorpan drop. That's annoying, but fine, okay. Except when I go that route, well, a seatbelt won't work anymore and a harness will make life difficult on the street. In addition to this it's just patently unsafe: Without the collapsible seat to provide a cushion, in the event of an accident there's the very real risk of an internal decapitation. Also banging my nugget on the roll bar would probably scramble my eggs, y'know?
So now I need a floor drop, racing seat, harness, and helmet. But that still doesn't remedy the risk of cervical spinal dislocation, so now I need a HANS too. At that point, though, it's so onerous to even get in the thing for street use that it's hard to justify. It also means that shoulder-checking for traffic would be quite difficult. At this point it's fair to say that the car would be track-only. Floor drop, harness, HANS, proper seat: Even doing the work myself, that's a good couple grand.
Fine, though, the car would now be track-only. I own a nice trailer, so that's at least not an expense. Unfortunately, my DD (a Cherokee Trailhawk) will not safely pull my loaded trailer so I'll need to go to my warehouse to get one of my work trucks. Except now that limits me because those are work trucks and we have to use them on job sites, and therefore I'm now looking at buying another DD.
I use my SUV for both the 'S' and 'U' purposes, and my wife and I enjoy light overlanding and camping. I've made good use of the locking diff and wouldn't want something with only soft-road capabilities, so now I need to look at SUVs that have decent off-road chops as well as the ability to tow 7,500lb. The Land Rover Defender seems the most likely candidate.
So let's see. . . now I'm spending about $70k on the infrastructure to make my Miata track-only -- but think about how much I'm saving on tires!
In reply to fusion66 :
My bigger takeaway from this is that a somewhat similarly prepped NC Miata was 6 seconds faster around Gingerman than an S197 Mustang.
fusion66 said:Most of these were pre-price jump but still a decent representation of cars that can get you on the track at a reasonable cost. All times are from Gingerman Raceway and driven by me at different levels of track experience. Every one of them was fun and the only one I felt like I was getting close to the cars limit was the Fiesta and I am sure it had room left for improvement from a driver perspective as well.
Rio is running Gman at a 1:54 with a total investment including purchase price of $8k now, and that includes 3 seasons of tires, two sets of wheels and two sets of brakes for 3 seasons.
Boy, my old Lotus 7 replica sounds better and better. Two years, half-a-dozen track days and a dozen autocrosses plus a good deal of backroads flogging, and I went through a fuel pump and gas. Okay, I had to replace a couple items when I ran into stuff, but no other consumables.
Meanwhile shifter kart prices haven't gone up at all.
$13k still buys you a brand new Factory Kart with a 125cc shifter engine.
In reply to Puddy46 :
I think the Miata 200tw tires versus the Mustang 300tw tires made up a fair amount of the difference. The other key factor is the Mustang was my second car on track and the Miata had more track days then the rest combined.
But yea, I don't think the Mustang was going to keep up even with all things being equaled out. Bang for the buck and pure fun, the Miata was the answer.
I wouldn't say it's the end of the cheap track car but cheap has certainly been redefined with first gen Miatas selling for $8k-$10k.
30 years ago I was looking for a fun car and picked up an FB for $250. Those days are certainly over.
15 years ago I picked up a little piece of insanity called the Abomination for $3500. What's not to love about a rotary power Spitfire sitting on purple crack?
5 years ago I was looking for a track rat. My requirements were, 300 hp, RWD, and manual. At the time a 2003 G35 fit the bill for $4200. It was a fun car.
I did that again mid-Covid with the same requirements and landed a 2014 Mustang V6 Premium for a touch over $8k. It's easily twice as good as the G35.
You can still pick up a fun cheap car if you aren't in a hurry. Mini Coopers are regularly under $2500 now and you can pick up a Mazdaspeed 3 locally for $4800. I picked up a regular Both of them will be a hoot to throw around a track and fairly easy on consumables. They won't be the fastest thing on track but will still be fun.
25 years ago, a 150k car was pretty much used up. Now that same 150k mile car will knock down 30 mpg and still put a smile on your face at the next TT. No, it's not going to be as fast as the guy with the M3 or the Corvette, but if you want to play with those guys you aren't shopping for budget cars.
Then there is always Lemons and such. A $5k-$10k car, including entry, split 4-6 ways is stupidly cheap track time. And if everyone takes care of the car, it gets even cheaper for the following events. The ROI really can't be beat.
The cheap seats are still out there but you are going to have to hunt for them and be prepared to jump as soon as you see them.
In reply to brandonsmash :
I have a $9000 race car towed by a $9000 van.
While this is true and cars are stupid expensive there are ways to easy the pain. Just get a car and have fun, not everything needs to be a Civic type R. I run a 15 chevy sonic, ran it in H street auto x and s6 track events....not the best but fun as hell in a $12,000 car with three pedals that got 40mpg. Fast forward to now and a few mods later it runs in STH autox and T4 track events running competitive with mk 7 gti's, still gets 30mpg and is a freaking riot to drive. There are ways to have tons of fun on the cheaper "never want to say cheap" if you don't have to have the car everyone wants and you don't need to win everything you enter.
I'm with Bobzilla on this. Years ago, I raced an ITB VW GTI, and then switched to a SpecMiata. Consumables were cheap for both, although the VW was running Hoosiers. We used a spec tire (Toyo RA1) inour Miata group and six tires lasted me most of two seasons, so I'd run some tire that was durable. Any four cylinder sedan/hatch/Miata would do. Since I have experience racing on my roof (twice!) I'd also want a cage. I could do that for $5-600, maybe less. Wheels can be had cheap, 4x100 in 15" or 17" for $200/set are easy to find. Suspension can be anywhere up to $1500, but I'd McGiver something cheaper. I already have a truck and trailer. The trailer would need to be rewired and a coat of paint would be nice. I think I could be on track for $7K, or less...........I should have kept my $1000 Challenge Miata, but it's too late now..........and there is a second Cooper S sitting in the other garage......
In reply to DeadSkunk (Warren) :
Agreed. I'm probably $12k into my track car and that is with a complete suspension and brake rebuild. I could have been cheaper but my JDM hatch was something I always wanted and glad I got.
In reply to Toyman! :
If only there was a place, an online place for these do it yourself, cheap almost "grass roots" type builds out there. Some place that could show what can be done for under $10k all in on a track car that doesn't break the bank every weekend.
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