Lets talk STR

any somewhat open course and its hard for me to find a car on the list capable of taking on the 350z. Maybe the s2k.

Any the awd tire restrictions- is there a single car there even available with awd?

on open courses, the lighter/less powerful cars should be able to maintain their speed even better. the Z might have an advantage on tighter courses w/ a lot of acceleration zones out of slow corners. even then, it'll be tough. these aren't R-comps...w/ street tires, weight is king.

skeeler wrote:

if i could build any car for the class, it would be an '09+ 6-speed NC.

Why do you think the 6-speed would be a better choice than the 5MT? I know that I have to do more shifting to and from 3rd in my 6-speed MSM than other folks in Miatas with taller 2nd gears (ie, 5-speeds). Also, to get the 6MT in an NC, you are also saddled with at least a 31-lb weight penalty. If you could find an SV trim level, that would save you the additional 30-or-so pound weight of the A/C compressor. I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm guessing you know a lot more about this than I do, and I want to understand your reasoning.

the weight difference is pretty small...hell, i could stand to lose 30 lbs off my gut. the a/c in the NC is actually only ~15 pounds. part of the increase is the larger wheels in the 6-spd, so that's kind of a wash between the two. the SV might actually gain weight from 9" wheels and 255 tires.

the 6-speed's shorter gearing should help it pull out of the slow stuff a little harder than the 5-spd, and the higher redline allows it to go reasonably fast in 2nd (unlike the MSM and earlier 6-spd NC, which have short gearing and a low redline).

so the car has the same tire/weight on 255s as the light cars (Spyder, NB) on 225s, plus a lot more power than those cars.

moxnix wrote:

93celicaGT2 wrote: MR-S: Hard to argue with a less than 2200lb car on 255s... I know I'D want to drive that.

What 255 is going to fit the car and still give good gearing?

Probably the same holy grail that i've been wanting that doesn't seem to exist:

255/40-16s.

I've been getting by with 245/45-16s, moving to 265/45-16s for next season.

I dunno, on the tight courses we have in Oregon Region heavy cars just can't compete, even on R-Compounds. All of our sites have elevation changes which tend to upset suspensions, especially on heavy cars. The lighter stuff like my 7 can dance over it. I imagine locally STR will play out the same way, favoring the lighter cars.

I wonder what AWD car(s) they plan on adding?