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PSR Divisional Series Rules

I.) Spirit of the Class:

PSR is a class intended to maximize the fun, safety, and competition of sports racers, while attempting to discourage the spiraling costs currently being witnessed in CSR/DSR. We will attempt to keep racing close via "VTS" base spec guideline sheets and "REWARDS" weight, a'la Speed World Challenge. The emphasis is on a year-long series of racing with the same group of people and cars, in contrast to the largely separate, unrelated events found in the SCCA today.

If you want to race more closely with a group of cars with a potentially older or less competitive car, are heavily constrained by budget, or simply want to have a lot of fun, this class may be for you. If you are seeking ultimate competition, enjoy "wallet racing", or will exploit gaps in this ruleset because we suck at writing rules, standard SCCA CSR/DSR competition or a spec class is probably for you - National racing is excellent for this! This class is not really ever intended for any kind of national status, but for intra-regional racing among a group of friendly racers with really fun, really fast little race cars like these bike-motored CSR/DSR's.

II.) Cars:

PSR class cars must start as SCCA GCR-legal DSR or CSR's. No rule below shall circumvent this, as we'll be racing and registering as CSR and DSR's. Older sports racers made uncompetitive with the advent of the Stohr WF-1 are all encouraged. Current pricerange is cars approximately $20-30K. Examples include:

  • Radical Prosport/PR6/SR4/SR3
  • Omnifab Cheetah
  • 1st-gen Stohr/West (without tunnel floor)
  • 1st-gen Speads RS0x (without tunnel floor)
  • A-MAC AM6/AM7
  • Other models not specified are encouraged, and will be accommodated with VTS sheets as competitiveness is evaluated, starting with their base SCCA CSR/DSR spec.


III.) General Preparation Rules:

In the spirit of sports prototype racing, and the enjoyment of development and tinkering, very few rules are made absolute. In order to avoid becoming obsolete, a'la some older Formula classes, these rules may be updated over time as newer cars come down in cost and become available to the more average owner. However, for the reduced spending and enjoyment of all involved, several strong recommendations are made:

a) Encouraged:
  • Stock Engines: Whichever engine is chosen (Suzukis are recommended so we have a common pool of spares to share), stock engines are encouraged, other than reliability upgrades such as clutch springs, cam tensioners, dry sumps, pans/baffles, etc. Reason: Stockers last longer and are cheap to source and replace.
  • Used Tires: 1-2 heat-cycle tires are commonly available from John Berget Tire in Wisconsin for $250 shipped. This will drastically reduce costs, and tire life is not noticeably less than new tires. Use whatever compound you like: sticky is more fun.
  • Pump Gas: Since most of us are running motorcycle engines, pump gas is encouraged to keep fuel bills down, where the engine permits it. This goes with the Stock Engines encouragement. Run the fancy stuff if you like, but no whining about it.
  • Cheap, Homebrew Modifications: If you have an idea, or have read about something, try it! We won't laugh too hard if it breaks or looks like hell.
b) Discouraged:
  1. Excessive use of Carbon, Titanium, and Unobtanium are discouraged: We're trying to keep the costs down, c'mon. See "spirit of the class:"
  2. Engine Upgrades: higher compression, cams, headwork, pistons, etc, all discouraged. Reason:These are expensive and tend to reduce reliability.
  3. Full "Tunnel" Diffusers: The revolution in laptimes, and cost, came with the tunnel diffuser floors. Homebuilt tunnels, however, are allowed, since they represent some creativity. See "Spirit of the class."

IV.) Entry Requirements:

To enter in the PSR series, a few things are required:

  1. A $50 annual series fee. This shall be used towards a great year-end barbecue/braii or get together, and maybe a few trophies or jokes related to the amount of farming done by a competitor during the season.
  2. You must provide a base-weight for your car-and-driver combination, the car, ready to race, with driver, but no fuel. This is the base weight against which weight adjustments will be made with REWARDS weight. Don't lie - see "spirit of the class.". Since base weight is taken with no fuel, this hopefully means that initial REWARDS adjustments can be made simply by adding more fuel at the beginning of a race or qualy session. This will hopefully reduce the amount of lead bolted to our cars. Send registration fee and base weight information to the series administrator, Jake Latham, jake.latham@gmail.com.

V.) Points:

Season points will be maintained at the regional PSR website home, www.jakelatham.com/psr/.
  1. Race Points will be assigned with the same schedule as SCCA point assignments, per the GCR, with a multiplier by # of finishers. As of this writing, SCCA points are awarded: 1st: 12, 2nd: 9, 3rd:7, 4th:6, etc. Points are cumulative throughout the season, in keeping with the "series" goal. Ties will be resolved per the SCCA GCR. SCCA points total is multiplied by the number of finishing cars, to weight finishes with small and large turnouts differently. For example, 4 cars finishing:
    • 1st: 12x4 = 48
    • 2nd: 9x4 = 36
    • 3rd: 7x4 = 28
    • 4th: 6x4 = 24
  2. One pre-multiplier point will be given for "pole position" amongst PSR competitors (regardless of race group pole) Reason/Intent: Encourages running a bunch in qualy and discourages sandbagging.
  3. One pre-multiplier point will be given for fastest race lap amongst PSR competitors. Reason/Intent: Gives you a reason to stay out on track even if you spun out of the lead…er, yeah.
  4. One pre-multiplier point will be given for anybody who breaks a previous SCCA lap record (CSR or DSR) Reason/Intent: because breaking records is cool, and it will bring attention to the class. This allows for multiple people breaking the previous track record in a given race.
  5. One additional pre-multiplier point (total of two) will be given to anybody who breaks, and holds, a new SCCA class lap record (CSR or DSR) at the end of the race. Reason/Intent: Because breaking records is cool, and it will bring attention to the class.
  6. DNF's will still be classified for points, DNS's will not.

VI.) Schedule

As PSR is intended as a divisional points series, the schedule will be made up, typically, of the complete regional series of events in the Rocky Mountain division.

Additionally, one event a year will be an out-of-towner double points event, where we'll load up the PSR circus and head to a special, historic venue, such as Road America, Road Atlanta, VIR, Laguna Seca, Sears Point, etc. The intent here is to have at least one really memorable event per year, and the double points will encourage everybody to attend if possible.

VII.) Competition Adjustments

To help keep close racing, competition adjustments will be made in the following ways:
  • General adjustments to the VTS sheet of a given car or cars in the form of encouraging or discouraging certain changes to certain models. This helps keep cars on a relatively close baseline. These can be made at any time during the season, and will be made by majority vote of competitors registered in PSR.
  • Note that the emphasis in adjustments, when possible, will be on trying to speed slower cars up, rather than slowing faster ones down. Faster is more fun.
  • REWARDS weight similar to the SPEED World-Challenge. This helps keep the field tighter by adjusting for car-and-driver combinations.
  • Peer-voted cheater-car weight additions. This discourages expensive modifications to buy laptime.
  • Data-based weight adjustments.
a) REWARDS WEIGHT
Weight is added for good finishes, and removed for bad finishes. Weight must be run for qualy and race sessions. The difference in weight will be applied at the next race the car/driver combo attends. The maximum weight a car/driver combination can have added above its base weight is 75#:

1st: +25
2nd: +15
3rd: +0
4th: - 15
5th: -25
6th and lower: remove any REWARDS ballast.


b) Peer-Voted Cheater-Car Weight Addition:
If a competitor thinks that a change to another competitor's car is against the spirit of the class, he can call for the rest of the class to vote on the change's advisability. To decide, 3 judges (who are not the protestor or protestee) will be randomly selected from the present PSR entries to vote on if the change is OK or not, and assign a weight penalty if not. Bribing judges to assist their decision-making process is encouraged.

The protest fee is payable in beer-and-or-burgers. If the protest is upheld, the loser must buy beers or burgers for the protestor and judges for being a cheater. If the mod is deemed OK, the protestor must buy beers or burgers for the judges and protestee for being a whiner and/or putting us through a weenie protest. Hopefully this will keep protests less emotionally charged…or at least delicious. No appeals. If the judges decide against you, yer boned.

c) Data-Based weight adjustments:
If a particular car-and-driver combination continues to kick the class's collective butts even with maximum REWARDS weight, they'll be asked to carry a datalogger, probably a TRAQMATE, for a session to see why. God help you if you sandbag. If there are noticeable discrepancies in corner speed or straightaway speed, adjustments will be made to try and speed up the other cars. If the data appears to indicate that the driver is just outdriving our sorry butts, we'll just have to get better, or resort to sabotage.

VIII.) VTS Sheets

VTS Sheet: Radical Prosport / PR6
  • Stock 1300cc Hayabusa recommended. Reason: Radical's greater weight versus AMAC, Cheetah, etc.
  • Perhaps 2008 1342cc Hayabusa as prices come down, or as evaluated versus 1g Stohr CSR's.
  • Semi-tunnel of PR6 will be reviewed based on competitiveness.
  • 1400/1500/1600cc built motors highly discouraged.
VTS Sheet: Radical SR4
  • 1400cc Hayabusa recommended. Reason: The SR4 is big and heavy, and needs some extra juice.
VTS Sheet: Omnifab Cheetah
  • 1000cc engines are encouraged due to the Cheetah's weight advantage over most competing chassis (which are encouraged 1300cc or greater engines).
VTS Sheet: 1st-Generation Stohr/West:
  • 1st-generation, non-WF-1 "flat" Stohr floor required (the one with the small diffuser)
  • 1st-generation, non-WF-1 front splitter/diffuser encouraged. (will evaluate based on competitiveness)
  • Stock 1300cc Hayabusa recommended. Reason: non-carbon bodied Stohrs are relatively heavy, esp. with Dry Sumps.
  • Or: Newer GSX-R or other 1000cc engine, often with wet-sump due to lighter weight.
VTS Sheet: A-MAC AM6/AM7
  • Recommendations Pending…

APPENDIX A: PSR ACRONYMS:

  • Prehistoric Sports Racer
  • Pre-Stohr Racer
  • Pennywise Sports Racer
  • Pacific Sports Racer
  • Pat's Slow Racing
  • Poor Sods Racing
  • Please Send Rand
  • Paul's Spun Radical
  • Powdery Sand Racing

Sources

Sources of inspiration for this ruleset:
  1. 24 Hours of LeMons: http://www.24hoursoflemons.com/rules/
  2. Pro-IT Rules: http://www.njrrs.com/proit.html