Potential New event for 7Oaks ?

[alfaholic]

Given the rising costs of circuit racing along with sprinting as well and given the growing popularity of Auto Solos as a speed type event.

How about this ?

http://www.gymkhanagrid.com/competition.php

Watched it on Motors TV the other day doesnt require huge space but somewhere like North Weald could be ideal plus cheap to run if setup as a Gymkhana but possibly would be good to wear helmets.

Andy E. I know we discussed this a couple of years ago at Committee as a way to run side by side Auto Solos to make them something different. Run in class with qualyfing then a top 4 run off for each class dependent on number entries in each class. FTD could be worked out in the same way as a sprint would, but because of the shorter course would not neccesarily mean that the most powerful cars would win. You could even open it up to single seaters ! Classes could either follow sprint classes or Auto Solo with maybe an historics class thrown in.

I certainly would be interested in something like this , to be honest I find it hard to distinguish auto solos from Auto tests apart frm the surface , this would be something different. Should be easy to run and could be timed on stop watches if both cars are too close to call then just do the drift series thing of "one more time" and re run.

This could pull a lot of interesting cars out of the weeds, plus you might even get some sponsership from Monster.

What do we all think?

[alfaholic]

Brian Winstone and Bill McKenna side by side in their 911's could be interesting!!

[jeffw]

I think the North Weald residents would hate the extra noise of people drifting their tortured tyres round the course. Sounds like great fun but I think the noise will kill the idea.

[alfaholic]

If you set the course up correctly then you wouldn't neccesarily have to have lots of rifting and tyre noise , you don't have to follow the monster concept slavishly its just there to illustrate a new type of event , just an expanded Side by side type of autosolo

[stargazer]

In the USA they call autosolo "autocross" but they also have a spin off called prosolo (Tirerack scca pro series) which has two cars racing autocross side by side which is timed, I think this might be more up our street instead of more drifting based racing .its on youtube under "what is prosolo ?" its just an idea

[alfaholic]

Yes Stargazer, thats exactley my thoughts on how the event would look, a few twisty bits but no tight 360's for doughnutting and a longish section for a quick blast with slowing down wiggle into the finish area stop box. Somewhere akin to between an Autosolo and a sprint. I guess similar in length to the big autosolo courses Andy E lays out but somewhat less complex. A pair of linked lights at the start to launch the cars, then timed on a single stopwatch using the lap facility to record the time for the second car so that its the same timekeeper for both cars (is this possible) removes the need for complicated timing gear then.

You could have drivers draw lots to see who they are paired off with for qualifying runs then a draw for top 4 in each class for best of 2 runs - one on each course elimination run off to find the winner - 2 semis a final and a 3rd and 4th place run off.

[Colin S]

TWMC have just done an Autotest similar to this.

Each car would need its own timekeeper if you are using stop watches, particularly if they are closely matched.

They also ended up running a pair of cars and then swapping over courses and running again so each car got a run on each course and the times were then added together. This helps to negate the slight differences in course layout and surface It also means you get more runs, and if you know the other guy has beaten you on the first paired run you tend to try a bit harder....

It does need a bit of thought to try and ensure everyone gets a decent amount of track time, as if the draw goes against you you only get a couple of runs.

[alfaholic]

It would depend on how many entries there are but i'm sure you could set it up so that people get more qualifing runs. At the end of the day at a sprint you are lucky if you get two practice and three timed runs !!

if the venue was big enough you could always have mutiple double tests, I'm sure this could be made to work, although not suew what regs it would run under - auto solo or gynkhana.

[jeffw]

TWMC are holding a Gymkana in July next year...