Michel Hoche-Mong Professional Moderator Location: Campbell, CA Join Date: 02/28/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 1,156 Rally Car: Golf, Golf, RX-3 |
Tom B Wrote:
------------------------------------------------------- > > I would drive a clown car sponsored by huggies if > the damn thing scooted out in the woods. > Having seen videos of your driving, I presume the Huggies are for Don? 
Anyway, I think that at this point psychology plays a bigger factor in winning MaxAttack than does car prep. Jake's set up the MaxAttack series so that there are only three events, with many months in between. This lets the MaxAttack-only competitors drive the living snot out of their cars, knowing that if they wreck they have several months to fix them up before the next event. This is at odds with a competitor whose intent is to run the whole series (either RA or USRC), and needs to get the car through each and every event without undo damage (unless you're independently wealthy or are like the Subaru Factory Team with five backup cars). I think right now it's possible to win MaxAttack with only a moderately well-prepped car driving at 88-90%, but if this catches on, the ante is going to steadily increase. At least four of the top six finishers in MaxAttack were National contenders who just entered MaxAttack on a lark, and their real goal was to make it through the whole season. I'm predicting that one of three things will happen: 1) MaxAttack will catch on and become the biggest 2WD Rally Championship the US has seen since the late 70s. In this case, you will see people prepping really high-end cars with tweaked turboed motors and dogboxes and uber suspensions and big tire budgets. The sponsorship money will go up and that will cause the ante to go up, so we'll see extremely good drivers in extremely well-prepared cars, driving at 92-95% of the Open Class cars, and even beating them if the circumstances are right. 2) MaxAttack will become big, but will expand to include more events. In this case, we'll see the same high-end cars, but the driving speeds will go down to 89-91% as teams start thinking about "saving the car". 3) MaxAttack will continue to be an auxiliary to the regular series, and we'll continue to have troubles getting coverage of 2WD, which means fewer sponsorship dollars, and it will be the teams with moderately-prepared cars who don't have anything to lose by driving the living snot out of them who will win. In this case, we'll see the majority of competitors driving at the 88-90% level, with a few "one-shot" teams driving at at 89-91%. As for me, I said right up front that I wasn't going to be going all out for the MaxAttack. I was definitely "driving to save the car", and braking early for turns and not pressing overly hard. I'm sure this annoys Jake and would put JVL to sleep if he saw a video of it, but that's our season game plan and my co-driver has instructions to wop me upside the head if I deviate from it and start pressing too hard. There's a weird Catch-22 I hadn't anticipated though - apparently I'm boring to watch on stage, which means I don't get much media coverage, which makes it hard to get sponsors. Self-righteous douche canoe Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/01/2007 12:19AM by hoche. |
Eric Burmeister Elite Moderator Location: Michigan Join Date: 02/14/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 307 Rally Car: Mazdaspeed3 and Mazda Protege |
Michel Hoche-Mong Professional Moderator Location: Campbell, CA Join Date: 02/28/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 1,156 Rally Car: Golf, Golf, RX-3 |
Eric Burmeister Elite Moderator Location: Michigan Join Date: 02/14/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 307 Rally Car: Mazdaspeed3 and Mazda Protege |
Michel Hoche-Mong Professional Moderator Location: Campbell, CA Join Date: 02/28/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 1,156 Rally Car: Golf, Golf, RX-3 |
Grant Hughes Elite Moderator Location: Whitefish, MT Join Date: 01/11/2006 Age: Midlife Crisis Posts: 6,818 Rally Car: BMW |
Eric Burmeister Elite Moderator Location: Michigan Join Date: 02/14/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 307 Rally Car: Mazdaspeed3 and Mazda Protege |
No, WV is a twisty, twisty thing all on gravel. I'm told that if Cherokee Trails was a 10 on a scale of 1-10, WV is 11.
Again, in keeping with our hope of making these DRIVERS' competitions, we picked events where well driven cars are the key, not monster powah. Makes it harder for me, but it's the right thing to do.
Lurch Eric Burmeister The west coast...of Michigan |
Michel Hoche-Mong Professional Moderator Location: Campbell, CA Join Date: 02/28/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 1,156 Rally Car: Golf, Golf, RX-3 |
Josh Wimpey Super Moderator Location: VA Join Date: 12/27/2006 Age: Midlife Crisis Posts: 649 Rally Car: Sneak the Golf |
Dave Shindle/Navitron 2000 Super Moderator Location: Virginia Join Date: 05/23/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 99 Rally Car: Someone has to call the notes |
Grant Hughes Elite Moderator Location: Whitefish, MT Join Date: 01/11/2006 Age: Midlife Crisis Posts: 6,818 Rally Car: BMW |
Eric Burmeister Elite Moderator Location: Michigan Join Date: 02/14/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 307 Rally Car: Mazdaspeed3 and Mazda Protege |
Jim's a quick driver, too. And he's got the right codriver.
Lurch Eric Burmeister The west coast...of Michigan |
Dave Coleman Mega Moderator Location: Long Beach, CA Join Date: 05/13/2007 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 448 Rally Car: Mazda3, SE-R Spec-V, 510 |
Dave Coleman Mega Moderator Location: Long Beach, CA Join Date: 05/13/2007 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 448 Rally Car: Mazda3, SE-R Spec-V, 510 |
Eric Burmeister Elite Moderator Location: Michigan Join Date: 02/14/2006 Age: Possibly Wise Posts: 307 Rally Car: Mazdaspeed3 and Mazda Protege |
Uh, Dave, your alter ego is surfacing again...
Time for meds. Lurch Eric Burmeister The west coast...of Michigan |
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