Road Racing vs Autocrossing

PC: Perry Bennett

The debate of whether Autocrossing or Road Racing reigns supreme in the world of amateur motor sports has been ongoing for decades, and if you have participated in either at some point you have likely engaged in some form of dispute among fellow competitors. After coming across the article "Just Accept It: Autocross isn't Racing" that The Truth About Cars published late last year, it made me once again reflect on my own opinions. Of course you can see that the author clearly has a strong opinion solely from reading the title, but it wasn't the premise of the article itself that I had a problem with.

PC: Michael Wheeler

I believe you could have a valid argument to challenge whether or not Autocrossing should be considered racing, but that would all come down to what your definition of racing is. If competing for time is racing or not, that is up to your discretion. That wasn't the only point the author was trying to make, however, because he goes further by criticizing Autocrossing as a whole and the people that partake in it. It wasn't until I got to:
"Frankly, I was never all that great at Autocross--"

where every word that followed was irrelevant to the matter at hand. His lack of experience in the sport is a clear indication that he is an unreliable source to form an opinion from. Having been rather successful in both departments thus far, I would like to provide a more balanced review contrasting the two forms of racing.


ROAD RACING

Aside from perhaps NASCAR in the United States, Road Racing is what most often will come to mind when discussing car racing to the general population. I personally competed in "wheel-to-wheel" Road Racing for the 2012 and 2013 seasons, acquiring both NASA and SCCA competition licenses. While picking up several wins in Showroom Spec Miata, a large regional class, I also competed in the annual 13-hour endurance race held at VIR.

PC: Chris Schutze

Road Racing is a high-speed, intense battle among competitors where consistency, keeping a cool head, thinking ahead, and a fair amount of chutzpah are required to run at the top of the pack. There is a significant amount of risk when out on the track, where minuscule mistakes cost you a few positions if you're lucky, and far worse if you're not.

Road Racing allows you to reach speeds that can't (shouldn't) be seen anywhere else in a car. With no speed limits, and a mile of open pavement before the first corner, some cars can reach speeds of 150mph before jumping on the brakes for turn one. It's at this point you can only hope that you put your brakes back together properly a few days prior, and you complete that turn yet another lap.

Over the course of a typical racing weekend, you receive hours of time on track, broken down into several fifteen, twenty, thirty minute sessions. Autocrossing on the contrary, proceeds sixty seconds at a time so it can be assumed that more physical and mental endurance is required in Road Racing. Endurance Road Racing includes sessions that may last up to two or three hours, and extreme focus is demanded throughout the entire stint.

There is also a discipline factor that is required in road racing that is not in Autocrossing. Planning and executing the perfect pass takes a lot of patience, and a serious adrenaline rush comes with it. There is no other feeling like two people attempting to occupy the same apex in the quickly approaching corner, and you won't find it driving around cones on a parking lot.

PC: Sput Dodge

There is a reason I no longer participate in road racing; it's just too expensive. A prepared track car isn't necessarily more expensive than a prepared Autocross car, but the overall expenses are much higher. To conservatively campaign a competitive car in a regional road racing series, it'll set you back roughly a grand a weekend, which is a lot of lettuce over the course of the season. This is assuming you make it through unscathed, without any blown motors or car-meets-wall experiences. And while no one wants to make any costly errors on track, it does happen and you foot the bill for your own car, regardless of who is to blame.

With as serious as Road Racing can get, even at the amateur level, misinterpretations of the rules do occur. Since power is essential to keeping up with the competition down the long straightaways, most people are trying to get every bit of it from their cars, making the way rules are written very critical. Vague regulations tend to cause uproar, especially on a national level.

So if people are going through all this trouble, there must be a huge payout, right? Not exactly. While you may be able to win your entry fee back in contingencies at larger-scale events, your reward is usually a small trophy and your head swelling about 1/4" in diameter. Amateur Road Racing is a gentlemen's hobby, and it's not necessarily any different to the "professional" series you see on TV.

AUTOCROSSING

Autocrossing, or referred to in the SCCA as "Solo" is a time-based event where competitors drive their vehicles through a course defined by cones as hastily as possible. Their times are compared to other drivers in alike cars built to the same degree of the rules. These events are most often held on large, wide open parking lots found at sports stadiums or airports.

Having been involved in Autocrossing for over two thirds of my lifetime, I have become very connected to the sport including serving on my local region's staff. I have picked up my share of wins and championships on the national level, and work as an Autocrossing instructor regularly.

PC: Alejandro Aviles

Autocrossing puts a driver's ultimate car control to the test, where precision, looking ahead and quick adaptation is key to success. With a very limited number of chances to master the course, the way the driver can handle pressure is important to their overall performance. Autocrossing can provide you with one of the most extreme 60-second periods you will ever experience. 

A typical Autocross consists of 3 or 4 attempts at a course that no one has ever seen before, and no one will ever see again. If you were to add up the total amount of time you spent Autocrossing on a given Sunday, you might realize that you spent twice the amount of time sitting on the toilet that day. This is the most common discouragement that pushes people towards road racing, and with good reasoning. Autocrossing has to be appreciated for what it is, part of the sport is only getting so much time on a course, or certain skills become irrelevant.

A major advantage to Autocrossing is that it can be done at a fraction of the cost of Road Racing. Lower entry fees, lower maintenance costs, and a significantly lower chance for damage repairs. Contingencies pay roughly the same as road racing, but there have been people known make more money than they spend in a successful season. The huge difference is that your Autocross car cannot be lost in the blink of an eye. 

Autocrossing is truly the only place where you can push your car to the absolute 100% edge of grip, without any consequence. With the worst thing you can hit being cones, it allows you to safely find the maximum capabilities of your car. While it teaches excellent car-control skills, it sometimes can create a reckless habit when an Autocrosser transitions onto the road course.

PC: Perry Bennett

The author who wrote the referenced article above makes the claim,

"Wheel-to-wheel racing requires every skill autocross does, and sometimes exponentially so."

If this was the case, any road racer would be able to instantly jump into the seat of an Autocross car and match the times of any top-national Autocrosser, which is never the case. The fact of the matter is, Autocrossing provides you with swift reaction time and precise car-control skills that most road racers do not obtain from just road racing. Fast Autocrossers often make for great road racers, Randy Pobst and Bryan Heitkotter come to mind, but fast road racers usually have some work to do if they step over to Solo.

Protesting is a rare occasion in the Autocrossing community. This isn't to say that no one is actually bending the rules, but the little things that may matter in Road Racing, make no difference on the Autocross course. Autocrossing consists of constant turning at relatively low speeds, so an additional one horsepower is quickly lost in all the mistakes that are made in an Autocross run. On top of that, Autocrossing rules are very particular to allow people to enhance the performance of the cars they drive on a daily basis, but keep comfort and convenience items to prevent from tearing apart the car. With little concern of people straying from the tightly-knit guidelines, Autocrossers are able to argue about more useless issues on the internet such as car floor mats and the numbers stamped on tires.

PC: Alejandro Aviles

Learning from experience, Autocrossing just doesn't seem cool to the general public. To an outsider, you are spending the entire day on a parking lot so you can drive around cones for 5 minutes, and reach higher speeds on the highway on your way home. If I'm trying to impress a high school classmate when approached upon the subject, I'm going to tell them about road racing, 120 mph inches from other cars' door handles. Not driving around cones on a parking lot.

THE BOTTOM LINE

To argue one trumps another is foolish. Autocrossing and Road Racing are amateur motor sports, they both require different skills and both supply a different thrill. At the end of the day, we're all people that spend way too much money on cars.

You can no longer consider yourself a sane human being once you have participated in any form of motor sports. Often compared to crack cocaine, racing as a whole is very expensive, and requires you to keep dumping money into the sport on a regular basis... and none of us stop.

The 2015 Washington Auto Show: What You Missed

Living roughly an hour away from the nation's capital, it is surprising that I hadn't ever made a trip to the Washington Auto Show held at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center. A friend of mine had stumbled upon some extra tickets and asked if I was interested, so I took it as the perfect opportunity to make my inaugural visit.

Of course following the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, I was very curious to see which new cars would be making appearances. Knowing that this is not an international auto show I had rather low expectations, but I almost decided to cancel after checking the show's website. With most cars in the roster being rather disappointing, I found that the C7 Z06, new Camaro Z28, Jaguar F-Type, and the Mustang GT350 would be there, and the new GT350 itself was enough to get me out of the house for the afternoon. Little did I know how much more would actually be there.

*Please note that if you go to the website now, there are additional vehicles that I don't remember being on there previously, including a whole sub-section, "Exotic Cars". My parents are likely shaking their heads as they always say I can never find anything.*

My eyes lit up with excitement as I handed over my ticket in exchange for a stamp on my hand, immediately picking out the bright orange Lexus RCF and shiny silver Audi R8 V10 on the showroom floor below. Both cars had not been listed on their website to my knowledge, which became the trend throughout the night. I veered left to find the 2015 Mercedes AMG GT sporting a vivid yellow, which had only made it's world premiere just in the Fall of 2014. I still can't find that one of the website.

Pictures don't do the AMG GT the justice it deserves, the car is absolutely gorgeous. It goes on sale in April of 2015 with a starting price of $129,900, in hopes to steal some potential buyers from the new Porsche 911 GT3 that starts at $130,400. Powered by a twin turbo 4.0L V8, the AMG GT will make 456hp and 443lb/ft of torque. Numbers are comparable to the GT3, which makes 475hp, but only makes 325lb/ft of torque from its 3.8L Flat-6. Both come with 7-speed dual clutch transmissions, so no manuals for the purists. Porsche did not make an appearance at the show unfortunately, but it will be interesting to see whether Mercedes can put up a fight to the mighty 911.

Roaming through Mercedes I came across the Mercedes GLA45 AMG which I found rather aggressive and cool compared to its ugly and disproportionate base model. Moving over to Lexus and the RCF, there was a lovely lady going over the design cues on the spinning platform, but unfortunately it seemed as if my cat may have been able to describe the car with the same terminology. I stuck to the tablet displays for all the specs that I was looking for.

BMW showcased the M235i and M4 Convertible, as well what I consider the ugliest cars in their current lineup, the X6M and the 3 series/5 series "GT". A pair of i8s made it to DC, despite it not being there on the website (as well). 

The i8 is the polar opposite of the AMG GT, with its futuristic sharp edges and lines that make for a far less conservative super car. Revolutionary for BMW as a brand, the i8 runs under hybrid power. Its turbocharged 1.5L Inline-3 is paired with an electric motor to make a total output of 357hp and 420lb/ft of torque. With a sticker price of $136,625, the i8 is another competitor for the 911. Despite being less powerful than the AMG, With a 0-60 time of 3.8 seconds, the i8 just edges out the Mercedes (3.9 seconds) but couldn't catch the Porsche (3.2 seconds).

Other exotics were brought out including the Ferrari FF and California T, Lamboghini Huracan and Aventador, Mclaren 650S, and Aston Martin DB9 and Vantage, but those all sat behind the red velvet rope. All of these super cars left the doors locked, unfortunately.

While we all like to fantasize a little, there was a decent showing of reasonably priced cars including the newest MINI Cooper S JCW. I am still trying to warm up to the latest exterior design changes, however I did appreciate that the interior has kept the same circular, quirky style for yet another generation. The new JCW sees a significant bump in performance, with an additional 20hp and 44 lb/ft of torque added to the already peppy hatch. But with a starting price of just over $30k come Spring of 2015, it may have some trouble selling, especially with the cheaper 2015 Subaru WRX sitting next door. 

This is where the 2016 MX-5 is should have been sitting

I was disappointed to see Mazda did not bring one of the redesigned, 2016 MX-5s to the show, instead the still handsome 2015 MX-5 Club sat in it's place. *sigh*

The domestics had their own floor (with the exception of Toyota for some reason), which featured some of the best America has to offer. Stopping at Chevrolet first, the new Chevrolet SS sport sedan caught my eye first in it's ugly pea-green metallic color. After seeing it featured in Jalopnik's recent "The 10 Best Cars No One is Buying", I wanted to see it in person since on paper it sounds fantastic. On top of the unflattering color, the SS has a rather unappealing interior, not uncommon with most GM models. The bottom line is, it accelerates just as quickly as the 2015 Subaru WRX STi, lacks in interior design, and the buy-in is $10,000 higher to start. The advantages are the SS is extremely spacious, runs on brawny V8 American muscle for those not accepting of the "boost buggies", and definitely has a classier look to it. And as of 2015 they say a 6-speed manual is offered, so maybe that'll turn sales around a little.

The Camaro Z28 and C7 Z06 Convertible contained most of the crowds over at Chevrolet, but of course you're unable to sit in either of them and you don't need me telling you how fast they are.

Dodge brought one of their Charger Hellcats to DC, and while I am in love with high powered sedans and the aggressive look of the Hellcat, I can't help but grumble at the fact that they are not offered with a manual like it's Challenger sibling. I have learned it is due to the fitment of the transmission paired with the Hellcat drivetrain in the Charger, and the fabrication needed for it to fit would make it uneconomical. There is no mention of the Hellcat on the show's website.

The real crowds formed in the back corner by the blue oval, where Ford showcased the stunning 2016 Shelby GT350 prototype that was unveiled at the LA Auto show in November. I would've loved to hear the hum of the flat-crank 5.2L V8 stuffed under the hood, but something about starting cars in crowded buildings, I don't know. 

Ford also showed the world's cheesiest talking Fiesta ST named "Boost", which would definitely be first in line to star in a new "Knight Rider" series if it was ever recreated by the Disney Channel.

The new aluminum Ford F-150s were plentiful, yet slightly less appealing after learning that Edmunds ran up a $4,000 tab with the dealer after taking two good smacks to the aluminum bed with a sledgehammer. You can see that story HERE.

The coolest thing that I got to sit in was the Spongebob Squarepants Toyota Sienna of course, and it only felt proper to look like a tool while sitting in it. Toyota is sponsoring the premiere of the next Spongebob movie in the making, and their vibrant wrap did bring an otherwise so-so minivan a lot of attention. This particular Sienna, failed to be mentioned on the website.

I was very impressed with the overall size and quality of the show, if you missed it be sure to make time to see it in 2016! If time allows, I will be reporting from the New York International Auto Show in the Spring.