Stuttgart

For the non-cup PCA club racers out there this thread over on the cup car forum is worth a read...

https://rennlist.com/forums/porsche-...-in-gtc-4.html

It remains to be seen what effect this decision will have on the trackside tire support available for non-michelin racers at the smaller venues. It's worth discussing

Stuttgart

Others have asked that I repost this here...
I fully appreciate all the hours of volunteer work that the PCA Club Racing staff puts in to make our races happen around the country, but I'm not exactly excited about this decision. I can understand the thought process, most of the cup guys run Michelin's why not go spec... but given the fact that the overwhelming response on here and I assume via email has been that we aren't interested in a spec tire why move forward? What are we getting out of this deal?

It's clear now that we did not get a discount, and rumor is that PCA got a big check (think the value of a cup car) from Michelin. The other tire manufacturers were given only a couple days to match the offer, not enough time get an answer from their home offices in Europe.

How much does everyone care about "bringing a new level of competition and visibility" to PCA racing? I'm a joe, not a pro and I know it. Not sure what everyone else thinks, but I race in PCA because its good clean competitive racing, a great weekend hanging out with friends. Everyone knows that "pro racing" is there if you want to write the check. I can't afford it, but for those that can and want more "visibility", there are plenty of options from IMSA cup, ALMS GTC to Grand am GT. With open tires, we had the ability to lower our costs if we so desired at the expense of outright speed, PCA has now taken that opportunity away from us.

I personally love the yokohama's; raced them for years on the 993 cups and looked forward to using them on the 996 cup. The cost is lower, you can get a million heat cycles out of them, and you can slide the car around more with less degradation in grip. With 20 heat cycles I could turn times 1.5-2 seconds off my best lap, try that with the Michelins.

With this rule change they have dealt a serious blow to the other tire dealers such as Bob Woodman. Bob's team has given PCA great support for years, especially at the smaller events, and it's my understanding they were never brought into the fray in this tire negotiation. Did PCA negotiate in the contract that Michelin/Jackson will provide trackside support at ALL the races? Last I checked they won't touch a wheel that has another brand of tire on it, so who's going to take care of the other non-michelin racers at the smaller events when the lost revenue makes it impossible for the other tire distributors to attend the smaller events.

Here is the announcment:
Michelin Competition Spec Tires
January 10, 2012 - Michelin Competition Tires will be the specified tire for PCA’s Club Racing GTC-3, GTC-4 and GTC-5 classes.

The spec tires will be required for the affected classes beginning at Sebring in 2012. The tires will be N1 in both tire size combinations (24/64-18 and 27/68-18 for pre-2010 Cup cars, 25/64-18 and 30/68-18 for 2010 and up Cup cars).

The agreement for a spec tire is with Jackson Motorsports Group who is the primary distributor of Michelin Competition Tires in the US. All tire ordering information is found at TireOrders@jacksonmg.com.

Jackson Motorsports Group and Michelin’s support of PCA Club Racing’s National Championship series brings a new level of competition and visibility to PCA’s already strong Club Racing program. Working with JMG and Michelin gives PCA a strong support system and a proven high quality race tire to help provide a championship series which will be the ultimate in safe, fun and competitive racing.

PCA Club Racing is delighted to be involved with JMG and Michelin and looks forward to a strong and lasting mutually beneficial partnership. Details concerning the sponsorship, contingency programs and other perks will be made available as soon as the details are complete.

JMG/Michelin has been a longtime supporter of PCA’s club racing program and their recent commitment to be the points series sponsor further illustrates how they intend to be beside PCA as we take our program to the next level.

PCA Club Racing is off to a great start in 2012 with a strong registration for Sebring and more than 25 races already on the schedule.

Safe Racing!
Bryan Henderson
PCA Club Racing Chairman
Bryan@BPHMS.com

jrgordonsenior

My gripe has to do with transparency or lack thereof. I understand and even read the blurb in the Club Racing News, a quarterly publication. I don't think many actual racers do read it at least not to the depth required to get to the fine print. My point is that for a change that impactive to be implemented the impacted drivers should have been polled first. Not hard to do, they're listed in the results pages and PCA certainly has eveyone's e-mail addresses. Since PCA doesn't operate a online forum, their information is not widely disseminated. Bruce Boeder posted here frequently during his tenure, a note here on the Racing and Cup forums would have been helpful. Addtionally a e-blast regarding this important subject should have been sent. They send those out frequently announcing events.

If the actual racers wanted and voted for a spec tire then great, it would have my support. That didn't happen. As for the monies received from Michelin, this non-profit orgainzation should disclose the amounts received and their intent for using those funds.....

PS: So what happens if a cup car shows up to race without Michelins? Are they denied entry or DQ'd?....

Geoffrey

The car would likely be moved to another class where the tires were legal ie GTC3 to GTA-1, GTC4/5 to GTA-2

Rick

And I was pretty happy when I just got 3 sets of sticker Yokos and a set of Hoosier stickers with the car I just bought. Now I have an unplanned $2K expense to go to Sebring.

Crap.

Geoffrey

I really don't see how you can complain about transparency. You participate in a club sponsored series. The rules are known, you get a rule book when you start and the rules are updated on the website. Further, there is a process for rules changes, and even those are posted online. Everyone has the same opportunity to participate in the rules change process and I'm always amazed at how many people can take the time to surf Rennlist, but not take the time to write in to PCA club racing during the appropriate time and share their concerns. Statements like "Everyone doesn't want this" really donesn't make sense because Rennlist posts don't get a vote, your vote is cast by the submission to Walt during the proposal period. Futhermore, PCA Club Racing Committees are made up of racers and they are moved to make decisions on what they think is the best for the club based on a variety of factors INCLUDING the feedback of the racers.

So, get your head out of the sand and participate in the process if you have an opinion.

FWIW, I would prefer to see the spec classes to allow any tire as this is club racing not professional racing. Everyone knows that the Michelin tires are the fastest tire for a GT3 Cup, but maybe a middle or back marker in the GTC classes might prefer to run a less expensive tire which also provides a slower lap time because he/she is just out for fun.

I also think that if you took a pole, you would find that 80-90% of the Cup guys are already on Michelins and I bet that PCA Club Racing has already done the research on that. I cna't see them making the decision without that data point.

I doubt this decision will have any impact on Hoosier or Bob Woodman's attendance at PCA races.

Sean F

Does PCA club racing release its financials? I know the club does (never look at them), but do individuals divisions like club racing?

With respect to transparency, I think the issue is process and communication. We all get that there are rule suggestions (I've submitted quite a few) and that there is then a comments period. The question, I think, is what happens after that when a rule is discussed and decided on by the committee. There have been several situations when a rule has been submitted and there is broad support from racers who do send in comments but it was killed. Then there are very controversial suggestions that get heavy comments on both sides and the rule passes. I get it's not a democracy, but we're all blind to the conversation and rational for the a rule passing or not (other than a blurb in racing news). Sometimes the reason given is simply hard to understand. The rumor in the paddock is that sometimes it simply comes down to personal preference on the rules change committee or possibly the personal interest of a committee member.

Why not post the meeting minutes of the rules committee and make the votes on every suggestion public (by committee member)? That would be transparent enough for me. Then, if I didn't think much of the way one member or another was voting, I'd like to be able voice my concern.

mglobe

Probably not, and even if they do, there's no reason why parts of the PCA organization shouldn't make money to offset expenses elsewhere. I know that in LSRPCA, where I'm the VP, we have events that make money, and events that lose money. There's nothing wrong with that in my opinion.

Sean F

Not saying they shouldn't make money on this or anything else we all want them to be financially stable just saying it's our club and we should know

Rick

Geoffrey,

I can't disagree with anything you've stated. I did voice my opposition to the proposal and I respect the fact that the majority of the votes were in favor (I'm assuming that BTW).

It unfortunately points me to racing somewhere other than PCA for now given my unique situation.

Cheers,

Rick

Geoffrey

Really, I mean, to be honest, I run GT3 Cup tires on my GT3R car, and I've run used Michelin slicks purchased from some of the GT3 Cup guys for $400 a set, and they were the same lap times as another brand sticker tires. There are always creative ways to cut costs, and I think that the difference in cost between a Michelin and the LEAST expensive other option is what $300? split between 2 weekends, that is $150 per weekend. It really doesn't make a lot of difference.

Bryan_H

I notice reading through this thread that many of the comments express hope that the spec tire would be Michelin. A trip through the paddock indicates that the vast majority of GT-C 996 and 997 cups are already running Michelin. I am told 90%.

We went through the normal rule making process with normal comment period and normal procedures. This was all standard stuff. We had to wait until the process was complete and the rule officially adopted in late November before we sent out request for bids. We sent those out December 2, 2011 to five manufacturers with a deadline of December 30, 2011 for bids so we could get this done for Sebring. We received bids from most of the manufacturers. The ones who did not bid have asked that we include them next time. A major issue for several suppliers was having enough tires on hand for Sebring and even beyond. We accepted Michelins bid on January 9th and announced it a.s.a.p.

The fine details have yet to be worked out, however, in addition to the usual tire support by other companies at races, there will be JMG/ Michelin tire support at at least 7 races and any other races that have 10 or more GTC-3,4,or 5 Cups signed up two weeks in advance, 4 weeks on the West coast. At the track mounting and balancing will be free for Cups when Michelin is there. When they are not there (smaller races) they will ship tires to the track free. There will be a tire contingency program throughout the year and separately free tires will be awarded at the end of the year. PCA members will receive significant discounts on other Michelin, Wiley and Impact products. Since Michelin was already being used by the vast majority of our Cup Cars the impact on other tire supporters will be minimal. Michelin technical and engineering support will be available to all CTC Cup class drivers.

The fact is the PCA GT-C stock Cup classes are spec classes. They are probably more spec than Spec Boxster or Spec 996 or Spec 944. Spec classes run on Spec tires pretty much everywhere. This is not new ground. Michelin is the tire that the large majority of racers were using last year and that was a consideration in the selection process. This should provide the least disruption to the racers given the short time frame. The next time we should have a longer time frame.

For the last several years Club Racing has been cutting cost at all corners. This deal will allow us to do lots of things that we haven’t been able to afford do in several years. I think you will see vast improvement in Scrutineering and other facets of PCA Racing over the next couple of years as we add staff and improve training. For example, a factory European tech will be at Sebring helping our guys to learn better ways to tech Cup Cars. David Murry Coaching will likely be at multiple events this year. We will build on that start and add more equipment, staff and training. An increase in our travel budget will allow us add Scrutineers and increase Scrutineering at all races.

I am a racer myself. I am a competitive person as most racers are. One thing I expect from a sanctioning body is a level playing field. I think we owe it to our racers to make it as level as possible. This will significantly help that endeavor in our Cup classes and every other class in several ways.

I don’t post much here because frankly I don’t have that kind of free time and much of the stuff is just wrong especially the assumption that everyone who is involved with PCA Club Racing, drivers or staff, reads this list daily. I believe that Rennlist Forums represent a relatively small percentage of the 159 racers who raced Cup Cars with PCA last year. I also note that several of the folks commenting in this thread do not appear to be GTC Cup racers, or even PCA racers. How can you tell for sure? If we went here for input rather than using established formal channels how would we ever separate the wheat from the chaff.

As for transparency, unlike just about everywhere else you can race these days, PCA is not a profitmaking organization. After providing the necessary things that give our sponsors the visibility they need, 100% of the support will go into PCA. That means we can improve the services we provide to the racers. No one in PCA profits from this in any manner.

We have a staff of over 40 Stewards, Scrutineers and Time Techs already and hopefully will add more. It cost money to train, equip and move the staff and equipment around the country for 29 to 30 races each year as well as providing other services like timing and scoring and Scrutineering equipment, licensing and a myriad of other details. I think most of you who have actually raced with us will agree that PCA Club Racing, all things considered, is a great value that hopefully is going to get better.

There will be more details coming out over the next few days.

Bryan

cgomez

Agreed. Michelins were already used by most and IMO not only faster but do make a big difference ( positive) in the way the car behaves ( Cups are designed with the Michelins in mind and run in superCup). Even though Im forced to run Yokos in IMSA, I do enjoy the chance of running Michelins with PCA.
I see no downside of this rule, unless we get a big price hike on tires, which I don't see coming.
Also it gets rid of a good amount of driver excuses
The possible rule change was well anticipated and informed, so I see no transparency issue whatsoever. The elected officials have and are expected to make this type of decisions, and hats what they did. Any money being collected has to go back to the Club, which belongs to all of us, so what's the issue?

PedroNole

For me, the only real disadvantage of having the Michelin tire as the spec is that for some of us who run both PCA and IMSA, we still have to switch back and forth between the Yoks and the Michelins. IMO, there really isn't that much difference between the two tires after the first 5 laps. IMO, the Michelin's are REALLY awesome in the first few laps but, after that, the Yoks are every bit as good AND they don't go away as quick. Any other tire besides the Yoks and Michelins will be noticably less fulfilling and some of them I wouldn't even run if you GAVE me the set... As Yokohama sponsors IMSA, I would be surprised if they aggressively bid the PCA deal but that's total speculation on my part.

For anyone not expecting to finish in the top 3 on a consistent basis in the PCA points, it's not as if PCA is saying you can't use other tires....

M758

Spec tires are not new ground. However in 944 spec the tire selected was primarily to limit costs. We (as in me along with the other series directors) choose the Toyo RA-1 not because it was the fastest tire, but because it would provide the lowest opeating costs over the life of the tire. This tire is slower than many other options and would not be the the tire most would run if we had an open tire rule. Most would probably run hoosiers, but despise the cost. Our class would be smaller and less popular on hoosiers. We could in fact spec a hoosier tire for our class, but since we are cost based series it made no sense.

Spec boxster and spec 996 also use spec tires as a way to control operating costs. Point is while you can certainly state these other spec series have controlled tires they are one of most value oriented tires rather that being the fastest tire or "what everyone was running". So not really apples to apples.