Quote:
Originally Posted by JAG
I've never understood why NASCAR chose to create such an ugly class of car, was it simply a case of ensuring DP's didn't look as slick as the stock cars?
If second generation DP's look like a 962, or even a Salleen, they'd win over a great many new fans.
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I think they got somewhat outsmarted by the chassis-builders.
Here's an early sketch of what the Fabcar was going to look like:
Not that bad, eh?
But then there were a number of bad accidents at the beginning of the decade, especially in Open Wheel Racing, but also Sportscars (Alboretto) and NASCAR (Earnhard) and they decided to make the cars super-safe and mandated green-houses that were big enough to allow for helmet-removal while the driver was still in car.
At this point, I think, they didn't know what they would end up with and even with the current chassis-dimension better looking cars would have been possible. The greenhouse is not significantly bigger than on a GT-car, in fact the DPs are a good deal lower than the Grand Am GT-cars.
Their idea was "Less GTP, more GT40" - and on a car with basically a GT-body the greenhouse dimensions would not have looked out of place.
The Doran and the Fabcar (and the Chase) were somewhat built in that spirit and are actually quite nice looking.
But then came along Riley (a company with a corporate history of ugly cars) and ran everyone else into the ground, and here we are today.
In my opinion, the frantic racing really makes up for the somewhat different aesthetics, but I can understand those that disagree.
And only very few LMPs are beauty queens either. Those who say that there has been no good looking Proto in the last 20 years are pretty much right - except for some late 962s and the 90s GT1-cars.