[clyde]

Originally Posted by JST

Your point on upgrades during multi-day competitions is a good one, but that’s an edge case that it seems to me could be dealt with by just forbidding people from applying any updates during a competition.

What if they don't have a choice? You turn the car on and it's done.

I don't know if that's how Tesla does it or if the owner/driver has a choice whether to apply it or not and I don't care. If it's not the way they do it today, it could be the way they do it tomorrow. Or that BMW does it the day after. Or Chevy the day after that.

Otherwise, no, am not just being a lawyer. I really don’t see the difference. Ford introduces a new EB mustang tweak—it hits dealers on Friday and someone buys one Sat, shows up to run Sunday. How is that different, from your perspective as a competitor, than someone receiving an OTA update on a car they already have? Or installing some sort of mechanical upgrade—forgive me, I haven’t been paying attention. Are new shocks still permitted in stock? Or whatever else.

Cars are classed based on the performance potential of the car with all legal allowances. The car as classed is presumed to have upgraded shocks, not stock shocks.

FWIW, there is a pretty massive debate going on right now about whether aftermarket shock controllers for active systems should be allowed in Street (read: old school Stock). They've been shown to have huge performance advantages. It's a messy situation.

The equivalent is classing a car capable of receiving OTA updates based on the absolute bestest, mostest, capablist an OTA could possibly make the car. Not what it can do as it comes form the factory. Not on what it can do when with simple hardware mods with well known and well understood limitations based on many years of experience. But on what it might, possibly, be able to do with a lot of changes to many systems that are not at all understood. In a sport where differences between winning and losing bad are often in what would normally be thought of as edge cases of noise at the margins, it make a big difference.

Existing cars get reclassed all the time. If Tesla introduces an OTA package that radically changes the car’s performance, why not just reclass it? Yeah, it takes time, but same is true of any upgrade to a model that might result in reclassification.

Before a car can be reclassed, a reclassing proposal must be announced and membership given time to comment. After that, the advisory committee can make a recommendation to the SEB. Then, the SEB can debate, vote, and send it to the BOD for approval. If it's decided the car will be reclassed, the earliest that can happen is Jan 1 of the following year after notification of the BOD approving the reclassing.

Say the Tesla 3 is a close also-ran to the top cars in BS for all of the 2019 Solo season. Top tier, multi-time national champions just can't get close to similar drivers in traditional top BS cars. Four mediocre drivers that are well known and known as mediocre drivers bring their 3s to Lincoln for the National Championships because it will be fun. The Monday of competition week, the cars receive an OTA update. These four mediocre drivers finish 1-4 with 4th place 0.5 seconds ahead of one of those top tier, multi-time national champions in a top BS car. The Tesla drivers say they drove well, but they know their skill level and that wasn't right. The top tier past jacket winner gets out claiming to have made the drives of his life each day.

The Street Advisory Committee holds their next meeting two weeks later, says, "we have to fix this," and puts out a proposal to reclass the Tesla 3 Performance to SS in the next Fastrack which is published in late September 2019. Memerbship gets at least 30 days to comment (not sure what the actual minimum time for comment is, but don't recall ever seeing less than that before an action was taken), so that finishes late October 2019. The SAC discusses the comments at their November 2019 meeting and refers a recommended class change to the SEB. The SEB takes up the matter at their December 2019 meeting, concurs with the SAC and sends the reclassing recommendation to the BOD. The BOD decides to allow the reclassification. Notice of that decision goes to the membership in the publication of the next issue of Fastrack which goes out in late January 2020. Because notice of the class change was not given before January 2020, the reclassing doesn't become effective until January 1, 2021.

If you are in the class with that Tesla, you're fucked at Nationals 2019. Before the 2020 season starts, you know the Tesla is gone for 2021, but you're stuck with it for 2020. What are you supposed to do?

The more likely scenario is the OTA update happens sometime earlier in 2019 and the proposal goes out in time that the reclassing is effective for 2020, but you're still stuck with it for the rest of 2019.

If Ford introduces a new suspension package on the EB Mustang on September 1, 2019, I will not be competing against it in Lincoln on September 7, 2019. The rules forbid it. A Mustang with a new suspension package that goes on sale Sep 1, 2019 will be a 2020 model year car. It will not be eligible for national Solo competition until Jan 1, 2020 unless it is explicitly classed via notification in Fastrack.

The Mustang example is like getting pregnant. You either do or you don't. It's black, white, and clearly defined. The Tesla is like getting a little bit preggers. It's never been done before, no one one knows what it means, no one knows how it works, no one knows what its potential is, and no one knows what its impact will be. Maybe it will be fully understood at some point, but that point is not today and not in the foreseeable future. Let's just put it to the side where it won't hurt anyone until we get it figured out.

Stability in stock classes is a season long at best as it is. Changing that to hours is not in the best interests of the membership, the club, or the sport in general.

If this still isn't clear, I have failed. Miserably.