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See ya at the track... |
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Why GTA? I’ve been road racing since 1984, always in a V-8 powered car. I started out with a converted street Corvette (what used to be known as B Production), progressed through a series of tube-framed GT-1 cars (all Corvettes) and now have a GTA car with Monte Carlo bodywork. Once you give up the hope of winning a National championship, GTA makes the most financial sense of all the V-8 classes available. I prepared the following chart comparing the various V-8 cars eligible for SCCA road racing a couple of years ago, but it still appears to be valid. What’s NOT on the chart is a relative comparison of the operating costs of each class. While I don’t have hard numbers on all the classes, I can compare GT-1 and GTA since I have personal experience with both. If you’re going to have a reasonable chance of running near the front of even a Regional GT-1 field, you better have at least 650 horsepower on tap. Keeping that many ponies happy (and all the moving parts residing within the block) is not only expensive to start with, you need to rebuild the engine every 5-10 hours depending on how tight you want to turn it. You also probably don’t want to do your own engine work with that much at stake, so each rebuild is in the $3500-$7000 range depending on what parts need to be replaced. Add in the stress that much power puts on the other drivetrain components (clutch, transmission and rear end) and the constant rebuilds necessary on them, and it easily costs $5000 a weekend to race a front-running GT-1 car even at a Regional level (multiply by two for a National effort). And that doesn’t count crash damage! The GTA car, on the other hand, is limited to 7000 RPM and about 500 horsepower by a fairly rigid set of rules designed to limit costs. The traditional “carburetor” GTA engines use off-the-shelf engine parts designed for Saturday night circle track racing, which also keeps the price down. The relatively low RPM limit lets the engines last fifty (50) hours between rebuilds and each rebuild is in the $1500-$2000 range even using a professional builder (the ASA fuel-injected engines last even longer and run on 93-octane pump gas). And since we’re using components designed for 750 hp, the clutches, trannies and rear ends last a lot longer as well. We run on spec tires for $500 a set, so you’re looking at maybe $1500 a weekend to run at the front of GTA. And on those occasions you DO have an encounter with a hard object (not that such a thing would EVER happen to you <g>), the body panels for a GTA car are about 25% of equivalent GT-1 parts (again because of the circle track carryover). The cars are more affordable and the racing is better between GTA cars than GT-1, but that doesn’t mean the GTA cars aren’t a handful. With 500 horsepower and 10” wide slicks, the cars make all the right noises and will still get sideways in a heartbeat if you’re not careful. A good Regional GT-1 car will run in the high 1:29’s at Road Atlanta while the top GTA cars run in the 1:33’s with a top end of over 160 mph. At Daytona we’ll run almost 180, so there’s absolutely NO lack of adrenaline rush when driving one of these cars. I have no personal experience with American Sedan cars, but I DID consider getting one in the past. The reason I decided against them is because you’re required to use stock components rather than built-for-racing hardware, which means everything needs to be replaced more often. You can get into an AS for less than a GTA car, but I’m told you’ll have $30K in the car before it’s competitive and reliable even at a Regional level. And when you’re ready to sell, you still have a car that’s worth maybe $15K on the open market. Add in the cost of crash damage with a tub car and the fact that the GTA cars are faster than AS everywhere we run, then the ONLY reason to run AS is if you want to have a shot at winning the Runoffs. Otherwise, GTA just makes cents… V-8 Class Comparisons GT-1 . priced from $25K to $150K, “decent” entry level is $50,000
GTA . priced from $20K to $55K, “decent” entry level is $25,000
SPO . priced from $20K to $400K, “decent” entry level is $40,000
AS (American Sedan) . priced from $8K to $40K, “decent” entry level is $12,500
T-1 . priced from $35K to $80K, “decent” entry level is $40,000
T-2 . priced from $10K to $50K, “decent” entry level is $15,000
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