[Purist]

Broadrun, at the end of the day, especially if you're not waist-deep in it like us, it's a Ligier JS P217 in WEC and in IMSA. So, why is the one so much faster or slower than the other? At a very basic level, it "feels wrong", and so long as that disconnect is there, it interferes with enjoyment to some degree.

You also have to factor in the feeling that regulators will take a mile in safety if we give them even an inch in speed. Furthermore, people routinely do 90-95 mph on the Interstate (regardless of legality), so the threshold for a level of speed that sounds impressive to people is higher than it used to be.

As TF110 points out, you can have excellent racing with fast cars. The 2007-08 races at Mosport stick out to me. The slicing through the GTs that the P1s and P2s were doing was thrilling. And actually, it was the LACK of paved run-off, the fact that you could SEE the grass, the final margin, RIGHT THERE that heightened the exhilaration to such a visceral level.

And a sense of artificiality is introduced when you KNOW the exact same cars that are on-track could go faster; it can bring in unpleasant thoughts of manipulation and even fixing. There's a reason we don't like BoP either. On the other hand, it can make every lap record feel that much better; it feels good, like the teams got one over on them despite the rules' makers best efforts to slow them down.

Sorry, but I thought it was worth trying to explain a little better what's going on and why these discussions crop up.

It looks like the #85 is a little too far off the pace, for whatever reason, so if not them, I hope ESM gets another one, or maybe one of the standard Ligiers gets it. I REALLY hope Risi can get a win. In GTD, I don't have a stand-out favorite, but I'd like to see a Mercedes win.

Finally, a note on Laguna Seca's history. For the ALMS years up to now, the track has remained unchanged. However, the current configuration dates back only to 1996. Prior to that, Turn 11 was closer to Turn 1 while Turn 10 was farther from Turn 9, and both took drivers/riders through a larger degree of rotation. So, the current layout is 2.238 miles and the 1988-95 layout was 2.214 miles. The original, which didn't have the hairpin and "infield" section, was just 1.9 miles, and pretty darn quick overall. I don't dislike the current version, but I do wish the original was still able to be used.