Idea: Club Miata

A long time ago, a collection of us Miata guys had an idea for spec style racing class. It was going to a be a bare bones, entry level class, founded on a nearly indestructible car- the Miata. Over engineered and under powered, the Miata had outstanding performance on the brakes and in the turns, was crazy easy on consumables, extremely forgiving in the hands of a learning driver and simple to maintain. I knew this would work, I was competing in a 91 showroom stock Miata and it was "all that". Some of us went on to actually build these cars and race them in IT and SM (in it's infancy). Proving it was a feasible idea.

The car would continue to compete on stock 14" wheels and minimal rubber (195-60-14 Azenis RT-615k DOT race radial $75-90 each), use stock sway bars, and an off the shelf non-adjustable shock and spring kit. The primary budget would go towards a standard rebuilt engine, sealed and freighted to competitors from a designated builder. It seems to me this would be a great bread-and-butter service for an engine shop. Engines would need to be 1.8 BP at this point due to greater availability. And I'd tend think the 1.8 driveline (no lsd) would need to follow for the same and to negate any advantage the smaller 1.6 diff might offer. No interior. No hard top. Standard GCR IT cage. 2100 lbs. Basically stock, with an IT interior and safety.

I've seen several NA Miatas recently around $1k, so I think a baseline car could be built in the $5-6k range.

I always thought this would be a great way to get people interested in racing on the track. Less about engineering and building a car, and more about driving. The concerns of set up would primarily focused on alignment- keeping it simple for somebody just getting into racing.

Discuss! - Rob

Is this the AZ group?

Sounds like the initial proposal for Sealed Spec Miata.

That is spec miata basically. I mean a little different rubber and you don't have to run the Hardtop but it's not far enough off to create a new class for it.

Besides, They already tried that with SSM Miata and I think it died pretty quickly.

So is Club Miata like all the other regular clubs, just more rainbows, scented body oils, and dickbutt?

Harris Hill H2R challenge. A friend built a whole gaggle of Miatas for this and was very active 'til the inevitable bullsh1t and attitudes of a couple people made it no longer fun.

H2R

Sealed Spec Miata is still around depending on your region. Our local SFR SCCA has such a class. Engine is sealed at ~115 rwhp. Awesome driver class w/o the wallet racing or National level Spec Miata.

This was the basic idea I pushed for during the original formation of Spec Miata as a regional class. It was declined for a variety of reasons- none I thought were justified. I was told that the wheels were beyond their prime and would be prone to failure. People drawn to this class are those interested in modifying their cars and building engines. A relatively stock Miata that I proposed would not deliver the level of performance these potential racers were seeking. I was also told at one point the hardtop offered an element of protection. Though there was an initial cost, the "ceiling" for spending more $ was ultimately limited. And I did meet plenty of people in Spec Miata that were there because it was so much cheaper than what they were racing prior. But it seemed to me that everything being instated was escalating the cost of what it could be. I suppose all of those could be true (to some degree). There were more, but I don't think any of it was abnormal for the formation of a new class.

I clearly had a different vision for the class than others. I saw it mostly as an opportunity for non-racers to start racing. That was probably because I was coming from nearly the same form of racing, while the others were involved in modified forms of racing. Ultimately I was told that all the low buck items would not be illegal, so those who chose that direction could still compete.

re: bmw88rider- I think the engine is a big difference. I was told by one competitor that he paid $9k for his SM engine and if he was beating people that didn't spend at least that, he had zero sympathy for them. The suspension would cost less than half. No intake mods. That stuff adds up.

I ran SSM in a privately built car. Owner figured he had just over $10k in it. The shop built cars were closer to $20k, but not over. There were at least 15 cars in the class and the racing was great. Though there was also a clear separation between SSM and SM at the finish. I thought it worked, but it cut half the competitors from the SM class.

re: yamaha- I have piqued your interest.

re: motormoron- Idealist never win? Sad to see something like that not prosper. MOAR rainbows and body oils I suppose? So what was the source of the BS- egos? H2R looks like win to me.

re:amg_rx7- Nice to hear that Sealed Spec Miata is alive in SFR. How big is the typical entry list in Sealed SM?

FE3tMX5 wrote: re: yamaha- I have piqued your interest.

Nope, not enough marching, neato flags, and war.....I'd still rather have my miata sized bmw with a roof.

Sounds like a sweet way for the Grassroots folks to have fun! The problem with almost any organization is the hyper-egotists soon take all the sweetness away. They make the organization quit being what made it great and it soon becomes yet another spend more than you can afford group.

SM was pretty much like that for the first year or two, before the class reached critical mass and the costs escalated out of sight. My first season I was on the track for ~$5k. Since there were only 5-10 of us in Florida-Georgia I had no idea I was not competitive. Damn was it fun!

I think you could find enough adherents to your philosophy in SEDiv to make this flavor of SSM a regional class and have enough show up to have a race. Rob, I'll make you a deal - if you get this going I will build a car.

-Kevin

Since 14s are getting harder to find, I wonder if you just go to 15s with some kind of weight cap to keep out the expensive wheels.

FE3tMX5 wrote: This was the basic idea I pushed for during the original formation of Spec Miata as a regional class. It was declined for a variety of reasons- none I thought were justified. I was told that the wheels were beyond their prime and would be prone to failure. People drawn to this class are those interested in modifying their cars and building engines. A relatively stock Miata that I proposed would not deliver the level of performance these potential racers were seeking. I was also told at one point the hardtop offered an element of protection. Though there was an initial cost, the "ceiling" for spending more $ was ultimately limited. And I did meet plenty of people in Spec Miata that were there because it was so much cheaper than what they were racing prior. But it seemed to me that everything being instated was escalating the cost of what it could be. I suppose all of those could be true (to some degree). There were more, but I don't think any of it was abnormal for the formation of a new class. I clearly had a different vision for the class than others. I saw it mostly as an opportunity for non-racers to start racing. That was probably because I was coming from nearly the same form of racing, while the others were involved in modified forms of racing. Ultimately I was told that all the low buck items would not be illegal, so those who chose that direction could still compete. re:amg_rx7- Nice to hear that Sealed Spec Miata is alive in SFR. How big is the typical entry list in Sealed SM?

Looks like we'll have around 17 entries out of a total of 39 at the season opener: https://www.motorsportreg.com/index.cfm/event/event.status/uidEvent/97885CF3-D776-44D9-8BCC18C48D054E41#group1-96201953-FA42-D246-4C2CB084A0420E3F

I haven't signed up yet. We even have about 5 guys who drive their race cars to the track - no tow vehicles.

I agree with the move to 15" wheels. I think they had a point. I also like the suspension. Not prohibitively expensive and much better than a softer setup. I'm not into building engines though and I think they totally berkeleyed that up by not going with a sealed engine program from the start.

I built my car from a tired, rusty 1990 donor for about 13k all in including 2k in body work and paint. Would have theoretically worked out a bit cheaper with a better donor but it was a known good car from a friend.

Fun class. Not as much bullE36 M3 as the National class. Seems like as soon as you make anything a National class, you kill the grassroots element of it and the big swinging dicks with big egos and wallets swoop in to ruin it.

David S. Wallens wrote: Since 14s are getting harder to find, I wonder if you just go to 15s with some kind of weight cap to keep out the expensive wheels.

So...just like Spec Miata.

Yes, SM wheels are cheap. Just not as cheap as stock 14s. They're out there, but nobody wants them so you never see them for sale. I would actually move to have similar 4x100 14" OE wheels made legal instead of new aftermarket 15s. Also the 15" wheel raises the price of each race tire by at least $25.

This guy would probably love a sealed engine program for Club Miata: http://www.rpmrons.com/Mazdaengines.html

Protege, Miata (94-97) 1994-98 1839cc BP05 engine 1.8L F.I. 16-valve DOHC 4 complete engine no core charge CEMA13M $1853.60 (~$150 freight)

Stock 14s are, at minimum, 15 years old. You've come across this before. Might be worth spending a couple of bucks on new wheels to avoid failure. It's not as if a set of 15x7s need to be expensive, there are a bunch at right around $100 brand new and of course they're available used.

As for tires, what tires were you thinking?
Onlinetires.com
Nitto NT01. $122 for a 205/55-14, $136 for a 205/50-15.
Toyo RA1: no longer available in 14"
Toyo RR: not available in 14"
Maxxis RC-1: not available in 14"
BFG Rival: not available in 14"

Tire Rack:
Dunlop Direzza Star Spec: $123 for a 185/60-14, $122 for a 195/50-15

So is time that ages the wheels? I put more hours on set of stock daisies racing than I could count. Like running a full endurance series, sprint series and DE events. This was after 60k+ road miles. That's my experience with stock wheels, or extreme use on alloy wheels in general.

My point with the stock wheels and 14" tires being that it's ~$400 to put rubber to the ground. 15" wheels and rubber is about double that. Of course I'm not going to argue a safety point IF that's a realistic factor using these old wheels. But I will say that there are stock alloys far older than 15 years being raced on- usually shod with rain tires, or on small bore IT cars. But they're out there.

$75-100 each for this tire: http://www.falkentire.com/tires/car-tires/azenis-rt615k-tire

Age and miles tend to be related. And I'd forgotten about the Azenis, they'd fallen off my radar. They are cheap, that's for sure.

Good luck with the series. You're missing one potential source - 1.6 Spec Miatas are pretty cheap. You can find them for $6-7k. See if there's a way to plug them into your series, as we're talking about complete, logbooked race cars for your estimate of the cost to DIY one from scratch.

1.6 SMs - great idea, and they could sell all their wheel/tire sets and profit ;) Srsly though- ballast should serve as the equalizer to the engine sizes IMO. The best route IMO is to follow SFR's lead since the work has been done.