[Rick Dittman]

I have been running these cars for 35 years.It started out with street cars with roll cages.Had to use stock brakes,stamped steel rocker arms,flat tappet cams etc.Times have changed and if I had not changed I still would be running at the back of the pack.I have almost 100 starts in the Trans Am series.I could never afford a new car.I always wound up with second or third generation car.Could finish in the top ten with that even against the factory cars by refininng what I had.But you can only do so much with old technolgy.So i sold my car and moved up to newer design over the course of my career.I was always happy with my results because I ran with the best and what I was spending was a minute amount to what they were, and on some days I could either out smart them or outrun them.Alot of the teams would give me their take off tires that had one or 2 cycles on them and I could use those and only buy one set.My Derhaag car I thought would take me past Cliff and Lewis.I have gotten alot closer than with my Camaro,but not past them yet.Maybe I am not as good as a driver then them,maybe my prep is not as good,but I keep trying to improve and maybe one day I will go by them.Running all those years in Trans Am taught me one thing:there will always be people with more money than me and I do not begrudge them that whatsover.I have to be happy in my skin,not put my family in debt to go out and run and try to have a good time and not be always pissed off about the rules and people with better things.Its like a hamster on his wheel,you will never get anywhere.I really wanted to run Trans Am this year (had my number etc)but I could not afford the expense this year because of mine and my wifes reduced income.I know its frustrating because I have gone thru it all.But you do the best with what you have and be proud of whatever you have gotten.We are still, with 15 year old race cars better off than 99% of people in the fact that we can actually have a passion and fulfill it.Best to everyone,Rick Dittman

[mike meek]

Rick Dittman, on 29 October 2011 - 12:58 PM, said:

I have been running these cars for 35 years.It started out with street cars with roll cages.Had to use stock brakes,stamped steel rocker arms,flat tappet cams etc.Times have changed and if I had not changed I still would be running at the back of the pack.I have almost 100 starts in the Trans Am series.I could never afford a new car.I always wound up with second or third generation car.Could finish in the top ten with that even against the factory cars by refininng what I had.But you can only do so much with old technolgy.So i sold my car and moved up to newer design over the course of my career.I was always happy with my results because I ran with the best and what I was spending was a minute amount to what they were, and on some days I could either out smart them or outrun them.Alot of the teams would give me their take off tires that had one or 2 cycles on them and I could use those and only buy one set.My Derhaag car I thought would take me past Cliff and Lewis.I have gotten alot closer than with my Camaro,but not past them yet.Maybe I am not as good as a driver then them,maybe my prep is not as good,but I keep trying to improve and maybe one day I will go by them.Running all those years in Trans Am taught me one thing:there will always be people with more money than me and I do not begrudge them that whatsover.I have to be happy in my skin,not put my family in debt to go out and run and try to have a good time and not be always pissed off about the rules and people with better things.Its like a hamster on his wheel,you will never get anywhere.I really wanted to run Trans Am this year (had my number etc)but I could not afford the expense this year because of mine and my wifes reduced income.I know its frustrating because I have gone thru it all.But you do the best with what you have and be proud of whatever you have gotten.We are still, with 15 year old race cars better off than 99% of people in the fact that we can actually have a passion and fulfill it.Best to everyone,Rick Dittman

[prt1983]

I also like to add to Rick's post but first, I did write to Tony Ave about a couple of concerns since SCCA made some of the rules different from GT1, they were engine compression, right side driver's net, 2 yr. recert. of fire bottle for TransAm, single fuel and tire companies. Tony was nice enough to write back and explain about the tire and fuel thing along with a couple other concerns. I Thank Tony for educating me and now that I can relate to it from a business point, I can work with it and won't mention it again in any posts. I also want to say up front, I apolizise to the TransAm people if I sounded against them, I wasn't and should have been clearer in my posts, that it was SCCA making the rules I thought dividing both divisions apart. Now that Tony and the other investors have taken over the TransAm Series, I feel that we will see a lot more positive come from it, I just believe that when racers run a series, they don't want any extra burden placed on racers yet we all want to be safe, so I see GT1 and TransAm people working closer together and hope more GT1 racers support them along with running some TransAm events.
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I think Rick's post is right on, I might disagree a little about concern for regulations but will explain later, on of the things I was going to explain whenever I hear someone wanting a spec. engine or something to have more of a chance, I was going to explain a couple things on the way a lot of us look at racing and Rick's is one of them. I would tell them, here is a guy that never had top equipment for a long time, but he's a great driver, smooth and smart, that a independant guy can sometimes outdo some of the big teams, like Rick did in the TransAm event at R.A. 1998-2000 (forgot the year), it had rained a little before the race but stopped before the race got started, Rick started in 21st or 22nd place, he went out on slicks while everyone went out on rains, well the track started to dry out, everyone had to come in to change tires, but not Rick, he finished 7th and I believe got the Hard Charging award or most positons improved, it was a good day for him. For me, sometimes outsmarting some of the bigger teams can be just as satisfying as a win.
.
Here's what I wrote on how I look at racing;
About the costs of racing, I guess I'm somewhat of a different breed of racer, my instructor in '84' said I had talent for a race car, I tried my hand at a couple of small businesses so it would pay for my racing, but didn't work out and I missed out on the racing I would have loved to done, but that's life and I still can get some racing in, being 56, but seeing some of the big money teams never dishearten me. I went to R.A. for the first time in '82' when CART came to race and soon after that, TransAm was included with the group. I saw DeAtley with two cars (Hobbs and Ribbs I believe), I talked with the Fischer engine guy, there were 3 new engines in crates sitting by the semi and 5 more were being flown in that night. That never discouraged me, I just looked at it as being able to race more and being in a pro series, going back to my friend with Dave Marcus, a little different, but he raced because of his love for it, never was going to win at it but he made a good living from it, there are probably half of the NASCAR field that know they have no chance to win, but love to race, yet we all hope we could have a chance to win. Now a days, we get some of these cry babies, oh I don't have a chance, we need to run spec. engines or spec. cars, I swear the next time someone pulls that, I'm going to lose it and tell them to shut up, get out of racing, pick up a fishing rod and go fishing, they probably complain the fish are not the same size.
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Some guys are probably wondering when they see me post, saying I know the cost yet turn around talking about belts and fire bottles being recertified, the extra costs to do that isn't much and why worry about it, it's the pricipal of the thing plus we know a lot of race groups have been in SCCA for over 30-40 years, there isn't much changing were we have to change rules. So my first pricipla thing, is that I wonder if it's like what I've seen in engineering firms, some people will do busy work to keep their jobs, so I feel the same with SCCA, that they may have gotten too big with staff and they are doing little rule changes to keep their jobs. The other principal thing that I explain is this; One regulation change isn’t much, but add in a couple more along with higher fuel prices, higher tire prices, traveling costs and lodging costs, I just don’t want SCCA to add to the burden, like the belts, doesn’t do one thing for added safety, belts will hold together for over ten years and when one sees Indy or ALMS not have a regulation on recertifying belts or bottles, why is SCCA burdening the racers. My logic tells me this, if corporation tax was raised from 35% to 37%, one could say that’s not much, but now add in property taxes going up every year, taxes for utility bills a little more when they raise prices, if your state raises it’s sales tax, now that pie is getting bigger, I feel it's the same with racing, add everything together.
If SCCA is changing the rules like on belts from 5 years to 2 years, it doesn't add to the safety factor at all, then one can only conclude that SCCA is working with the manufacturers so that racers spend more money and sorry but that ticks me off, their doing a lot of what the government is doing and it's our club, we pay the money. I wrote to Randy a year ago and was able to show them how inconsistent a couple of rules were, in GT1 stating fuel cell to be 31.6 gallons, when fuel cells are 32 gallons by the manufacturer and TransAm guys run 33 gallon, so I said, is SCCA doing that so they have something to disqualify a racer if they want, SCCA took it out of the regulations for GT1. The other was the left drivers side side protection in TransAm, they wanted 1 3/4" round, but I stated cars with 4 link setup couldn't have a round in the way, SCCA left the 1 3/4" in but took out the round.
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So we now come to another little regulation that SCCa has managed to mess up, part of it's principal thing, but also so TransAm and Gt1 cars can be consistent, not to add to our costs and to quit changing just to do busy work, if we can get SCCA to go along, it would help us all, knowing what our costs will be every 5 years or so and the rules stay consistent. Right now we have for TransAm, 5 years on fuel bladders, 2 yrs on recertifing fire bottles and nothing on belts. For GT1 we have 5 yrs on fuel bladders, nothing on fire bottles and belts went from 5 yrs to 2 yrs. I would be happy and I think a lot of us racers if we went to a 5 year rule across the board for GT1 and TransAm, 5 yrs. on bladder, on fire bottle and on belts. What I'm afraid of, if it's mentioned to SCCA, they might change the fire bottle and belts to 2 yrs for both groups, because I believe they are working with the manufacturers to get us to spend more money.. I Will Take Any Suggestions on How Should We Handle This?
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It was also good to hear that some of the TransAm guys didn't like the right side driver's net (I feel it could hurt one's vision and not help with a neck injury) and tried to get SCCA not to go with it, but SCCA Pro being stubborn wouldn't listen to them, so we GT1 racers are not alone and we have the TransAm racers with us on a lot of items for both groups..
So do a lot of racers agree with me, that a 5 yr rule for everything safety wise makes a lot of sense? Should we write to SCCA? each one of us or try to do something as a group? should a letter be written and other racers can send a letter to that person to be included with the main letter, try to get some numbers to back us up? But be warn, we know how SCCA works, they could make everything 2 yrs.
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here is my email address if anyone would like to do a response to my suggestion, prt1983a@tds.net

Mitch

[tom stanford]

I am a proponent of safety and invest in safety items ahead of many other drivers and I would like a 5 year rule for all. 2 years on belts is silly, unless I was laying my belts out in the Arizona sun everyday, all day, for 2 years. Manufacturers won't support anything beyond 2 years, that will make it tougher.
Tom

[RACE71]

I just couldn't help myself, I had to chime in here. Like most GT-1 drivers, I started in smaller, slower, and cheaper cars until I could afford the car I wanted. I chose a stock-car based GT-1 car because it was in my budget, and that's the type of car I wanted to race. It was a couple of years old when I bought it for 10K as a complete roller, and I started with an engine I could afford that made about 500 h.p. I was thrilled to be running the car, and if I ran a 1:15 at Blackhawk, it was a good day. After saving up for a little better engine, buying all of Dittman's old Muncies, and learning how to drive the thing a lot better, it runs 11 flat at Blackhawk, and I'm not afraid of anyone at a track 2 miles and under. Yes, it's a slug at Road America, but so what? I can run it at a number of tracks where aero and an extra 100 h.p. don't matter, and on ten inch tires, it's competitive and a blast to drive. Like Tony says, this is the class where the big boys (and girls) with the big wallets race, and you have to expect the bar to be raised every year. I'm OK with that, because the whole point is to try to get a little faster every time we run the car. If you can't be happy racing GT-1 with the car you have, either get a new one or go vintage racing where you can just enjoy driving the thing fast without worrying about the rules or the other cars.

By the way, if anyone wants to buy my car for about 40K, I'm listening, because I really want to buy Rick's ass-kicking Camaro!

Mike Dimand

This post has been edited by RACE71: 07 November 2011 - 03:05 PM

[ToddBenne]

The great Roger Penske once said, "Hotels and food cost the same."