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My old RS500 has been taken north of the border to act as a spare car so I doubt if it will be seen out with us, which is a shame as it is a very good car. Both myself and my brother will be racing again this year. i will be in my 98 Nissan and Michael in his new 97 Nissan meaning that we are in the same class.
Steve Hirst has a 95 Audi A4 and has been going well in testing. We should have the 2000 Mondeo's out and hopefully a 98 Alpha at certain meetings.
Apguy, the reason the registration fee is so high is that it cost a lot of money to run the Club and promote it. We have to buy our own trophies pay for our own technical officers travel costs etc, buy club scales and equiptment, end of season awards dinner, stand at the autosport show,
hospitality motorhome and awning at selected meetings etc.
If we could reduce the registration fee we would but we need a sponsor. Hope you do manage one or two meetings with us as it is always good to have new people out with us.
To answer questions about ex-Thundersaloons, both Rod and myself have been trying to track these cars down as it would be great to have them out, but they just do not seem to be out there. Those type of cars took quite alot of money to look after and the running cost may be above the average clubmans budget.
As to BHP, after 2 years of trying to get cars out in the championship it became evident ( by a lot of phone calls ) that it was the big powered cars that numbered only a few where putting of the lower powered cars ( under 500bhp )
from coming out, so we tried to get a fair restrictor regulation that would cap BHP at 500. That was good in theory but as I found out with my RS500 we could get almost 600BHP out of a T5 turbo and 47.2mm restrictor. However the engine could not substain this and 560 was used at the start of the season but we ended up with 530 ( and went quicker ) because we could get the power down easier. Most of the top cossie boys are running approx 530, with some lower spec ones running 450. Dave brodie runs with around 450 but will beat a 530bhp car because his car is designed to go around corners and has the right breaks on it. Most people think that the more power you have the qucker you will go, this is only true to a certain extent. There's no point in having 600bhp if you cannot stop properly, get the power down or go around corners. This is why a 300bhp Touring cars will beat a car with almost twice the power, because it was made to go around corners.
HoweverRod has proved that if you have power and a car that handles it will beat a Super Tourer. This is what makes our Championship attractive, we have a class for any Saloon Car and most people are interested in at least one type of car racing with us.
We have worked hard to try and get the balance right and we feel we are almost there but we are always looking at ways to improve the series and are always open to suggestions and constructive critisism.
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