They don't make me like the used to; that's why new club racing cars are faster.

Last month I ran a vintage race at Spring Mtn Motorsports with my Datsun 1200. In Saturday's qualifying race I had to start from the back due to a minor mechanical faux paux. Long and the short of it I passed 12 cars in 5 laps and was dicing hard with the 4th place car and put up one of the fastest laps. I absolutely drove the wheels off the car. Started 5th Sunday, while I got clobbered on the start, as all the car around me were 2.0 liter cars, I managed to get back to 5th. Made some great passes and was very happy with myself.......UNTIL

I looked at the lap times from the from Club Spring Mtn Miata races, these cars are slightly above spec Miata. They have about 130 whp versus my 100 whp but they are 300lbs heavier. Top speed on my car is 111 just before turn 4 on what's called the Mansell C layout (3.4 mile with bus stop chicane). The Miatas are maybe 3 mph faster.

Wholly ego deflator Batman.......11 seconds a lap, Ssssssssssss I'm feeling slow now. I called my buddy who happens to be the fastest guy in the Miata group and was telling him the fastest lap in our group (D Production MGB) was still 9 seconds a lap slower. The top six in the small bore vintage group is running 2:52 to 2:55 versus top six Miata 2:43 - 2:46. Further rubbing salt in the wounds is looking at some times from other cars; another local in a stock FRS on sticky tires is running turns 2:50s.

For comparison that takes the driver out of the equation, my aforementioned friend coaches one of the B Sedan racers who also runs a Datsun. The car is down around 2000-2100lbs and sporting 200whp and turns 2:45s. My my buddy also mentioned he's 3 seconds a lap faster than the owner, so that would be 2:42s OR only a second a lap faster than a car that's 200lbs heavier and sporting 70 less horsepower.

Yeah they don't make me like they used to. It is aforemation of something I've been saying for quite some time; at track days I run the 1200 in the intermediate group and routinely catch and pass people in Boxters, Caymans and Corvettes, sure I may be an instructor but I should not be catching these cars. My Miata racer friend (who makes his living as a driver coach and instructor) and I have discussed this are both in agreement that even if I were a professional I should not be passing these cars as they are so much better. It's easy get a false sense of security running track day events.

While the newer cars have better aerodynamics it doesn't account for the huge difference, the cornering speeds are nearly identical as well; the bigger difference is the wider track and suspension compliance. You can get into and out of corners so much faster, modern cars are so much easier to drive on the limit. So next time someone starts on the they don't make me like they used just tell them "that's why new cars are faster" having the tires more connected to the ground is so much easier. Of course my wildly biased opinion is that old cars are way more fun........Hoosier TD bias ply 4 wheel drifty goodness.

Tom

Technogon on the celicagts forums runs an '84 gts with a turbo'd 22re. He reports waving at Porsches, mustangs, bmws, etc. around the track on a regular basis. A Ferrari f40 drives like a kart. The f50 drove like a bull in a china shop. advancing forward is not always forward thinking.

I drove a 1200 for years; its light weight allowed passing far "faster" stuff, but eventually I was getting passed by newer cars that made up for my weight advantage with suspension and horsepower.

Recently we were at a track day event and found out that the "super Miata" boys are dang fast. Limited to only 140 hp with sticky street tires, decent aero, decent brakes, good suspension, and low weight, they were circling Willow Springs at 1:32. The only way to do that is to hardly use the brakes.

So, the 1200 has a McPherson Strut front suspension and a solid, leaf-sprung rear?

That there's your problem right there, son.

Trackmouse wrote: Technogon on the celicagts forums runs an '84 gts with a turbo'd 22re. He reports waving at Porsches, mustangs, bmws, etc. around the track on a regular basis. A Ferrari f40 drives like a kart. The f50 drove like a bull in a china shop. advancing forward is not always forward thinking.

i find many cars in the 80s compare well to cars today in terms of how much tire you can put on and the suspension. Like my 80s skyline has double wishbone suspension for example.

Early 80s celica is certainly in this category. Didn't they get the "p-type" wide body as an option that the same era Supra had too?

Like someone else said, the problem here is the vintage cars in question's suspension is not the best. If we were talking like a 240Z here it may be a different story.

Mazda needs to make a new "RX3" (or steal the 510 shape) and put it on the ND chassis.

So there'll be a little more variety to vintage/club racing 30 years from now...

It amuses me that the "new" cars in this story are ~20 year old Miatas.

My thoughts exactly. The MX5 Cup cars are faster than a Spec Miata, and I'll bet the Global Cup cars are faster yet. Suspension is important. So are brakes.

@KB58 1:32 at Willow Springs is 9-10 seconds a lap faster than a front running car in the small bore group.

@Kanaric Z cars have the same Macpherson struts as my 1200, the front suspension on my car IS all Z car, so are the brakes front and rear. The much touted IRS rear suspension is actually a rather poor design especially by modern standards it may be better than the cart springs on the 1200 but not by much. The vintage race spec 240s make up for their shortcomings by having 300 rear wheel horsepower.

@MCarp22 & Keith Tanner some of the Miatas are as new as 2001, it think my buddies is a 99, that's practically brand new. The FRS mentioned is a 2014. Another local with a S2000 in near stock car, whose trap speeds are only 2-3 mph higher than the 1200, is 9 seconds a lap faster

The member cars are pretty close to Super Miata spec. My lap times in the 1200 on the layout we used for 2015 spring race were .4 faster than NASA Spec Miata winner on the same layout but I honestly do not believe they were national level Spec Miatas.

I have a good number of laps in friends Exocet and I'm 11-12 seconds a lap faster than I am in the 1200. I could probably go even faster but it's not my car.

When I sold off the D-Sports Racer and got the 1200 back I wasn't surprised that the 1200 was 33 seconds a lap slower as the DSR was a lap record holder but a Miata modded to near the 1200 level being 10 seconds faster was a dose of reality. The funniest thing is the car is 7 seconds a lap faster than it was in 2014.

On a slightly different but similar vein; the DSR was only about a second slower then Mike Lewis' ex Roush Trans Am car at the LVMS road course and at Spring Mtn 2-3 seconds faster than one of the factory Vipers, naturally I was quite proud of this as well........till an Indy Lights team showed up to do testing. My previously fast 1.09 didn't seem so fast in comparison to 56 seconds lap of an Indy Lights car. This was on a the 1.5 mile layout. Indy Lights at that time were something like 5-6 seconds slower than Indy cars and that Indy cars were slower than F1 cars I remember thinking an F1 car would probably get around in 47-48 seconds and how the f@#k does a human being drive around here 20 seconds faster than I'm going now!

Tom

I club race in a class that is essentially a stock E36 M3 powertrain on better dampers and race tires (IS). That car and I will do a 2.10.xx at the Glen and that is pretty close to the class's pointy end there. Race pace will be 2.11 to 2.14 or so depending on traffic. So, not DSR speeds at all but damn I'm wheeling very hard to get that out of my car. I'm in all the gear, sweating with the cool suit on... every nerve lit up. Telemetry on the dash - exhaust note ripping thru the car so it's all I can hear. Focus at maximum. No mistakes. I'm exhausted after a 45 minute race.

Then I'll instruct or do some 1:1 coaching in a student's new Vette, M3 or Cayman or whatever and crush my best lap by an eternity with the AC on, in a polo shirt, casually having a discussion about driving. We are in a golden age of speed. Showroom floor performance cars are really, really fast.

It's all relative but vintage racing is going to be pretty weird if 50's MG's will be lapping with what is out there today 25 years from now. To a guy in a late model Z-06 a 50's MG will appear to be completely stopped. To the guy in the MG... there will just be an occasional phantom wind and a humming sound.

It's going to get even worse as direct cylinder injection takes hold. The combination of that computer-controlled turbocharging allow previously "insane" levels of power.

That is, until batteries finally get to the point that it makes them a reality for most cars, then we start the cycle all over again.

OK understanding that this topic is a "well duh" overstating the obvious but I though I'd add a bit more.

You guys got me thinking and I double checked some results; in 2014 spring race we had a 1917 (yes 97 years old) Chevrolet Speedster run in our group. He was 38 seconds a lap slower than the 1200. When I came up to lap him I was impressed as we was driving it pretty rapid, rear wheel contracting band brake and 4 inch wide tires.

Also for comparison I looked at lap times from Laguna Seca; In 2014 Peter Giddings turned a 1:59 in his 35 Alfa 8C Gran Prix car. At that years Runoffs the fast lap in the Spec Miata race was a 1:45.

I can't remember when it was but around 7-10 years ago we had an Indy Car street race in downtown Vegas and the vintage F1 cars, some as new as 1982, were slightly slower than the Atlantic cars. Some of the vintage cars were driven by former Indy 500 winners and F1 drivers.

Tom