V8s, how long??

[Crash Test]

Now that Super Touring has pretty much died and is having its funeral at the end of the season, ive been thinking, how much time is left in V8s??

These things are stuck in my head:
1. Becoming too expensive (heck, $300,000 for a HRT car is serious money, not many teams can cope with that sort of money)
2. Spectators aren't stupid. Watching HRT win every race by a streak isnt that a fantastic form of entertainment. People dont watch the box and say "that was a fantastic race for 5th position". People prefer battles for the lead.
3. Ford. if it aint starting to get its act together, Jo Blow ford fan is going to loose interest and watch the channel 9 footy again.
4. It has to die sometime.
5. Sort of related to 3, but did the V8s gain a lot from the Nrl/super league decable? When people start going back to that in their millions, V8s may go down a bit.

I still love V8's, and will do until they die, but what will replace them? De-tuned, affordable versions of the present variety? Something coompletely different??

[DJ]

V8 supercar is around for a while yet. They only kicked in in about 1988, and I reckon that the powers that be (AVESCO) want to see them around for time immemorial.

You want to see cheap racing. 5pm sundays, SBS. Speedweek. Daewoo challenge races - about 20 grand buys your car and seat in the series. At the end, u keep the car. Don't know what it's good for, but hey, who cares?

There's also a cheap v8 category. the V8 Lites. Although they need to have who's car it was rather than what it is.

Example: Dean Canto.
Description reads: Falcon EL
Should be: Neil Crompton's old FTR car

and so on.

The racing is there, the costs are immaterial, as it's the premier category (IMHO) in the country.

[This message has been edited by DJ (edited 12 April 2000).]

[kmchow]

OTOH, the BTCC was the top touring car series in England and look where it is right now? I don't think V8 Supercars should sit on their laurels.

[DAVID PATERSON]

Welcome DJ, actually V8 supercars kicked off in late '92. V8 lites aren't cheap, if you want to run at the front, a full season will cost around a quarter of a million dollars. The ROH wheels commodore cup series is much cheaper, the car will cost under $30K to buy and that much again will cover a full season. I think V8 supercar will be around as long as the manufacturers and sponsors support it, that's why ST is dying, no manufacturer support.

[Buckshot]

DJ, the governing body for V8 Supercar is AVESCO not IVESCO as you have written.

I think it stands for Austalian Vee Eight Super Car Organisation.

Cheers Bud.

[DJ]

V8 Supertouring will be around until the end of time, or until Holden decide to kill it off by taking the HRT team to formula Holden, Ford decide to take FTR and run a sports sedan, and basically all the major teams (Stone Bros, GRMS and DJR) all make the concious effort to up and leave the series.

As far as I'm concerned, nobody's going anywhere as long as the average Australian male (me included)aspires to own the kick arse version of their favourite brands V8.

While we can't we'll just kick back with a beer and pretend we're racing the ones on TV.

There's that, and the fact that they race on the best track in the world: Mount Panorama.

[elephino]

Group C touring cars, Group A touring cars were also, at some point, thought to last forever but look what happened to them. The teams will build cars to the rules (or slightly beyond them), it doesn't matter much to them what the category is. I'm sure if the V8 category hadn't come along, then everyone in Australia would be supporting either Super Tourers or some other category someone thought up.

[marcus]

V8 supercar is here to stay ...for now at least...the powers that be should be thinking of the future because in reality i would say there is probably only 7-10 years left in the series before it really has to move on to more modern machinery..just look at the toyota and mazda (i think) ideas when they wanted in with there cars but the rules state they carnt play so for now they wont..manufacturer support is what the series needs ..but how long will Ford and holden support the series..ford seem to be trying but if they carnt win then why should they support it..and Holden are winning therefore dont care what ford think..and they may get to a stage where they say ..well weve won it all for a few years now so lets call it quits until we need to come back to sell more road cars...no easy answer for this but im sure they are looking to the future thats why they are going overseas ..to try and help the series evolve into a global market..therefore prolonging the life span of the series.

[kmchow]

Marcus wrote:

>just look at the toyota and mazda (i think) >ideas when they wanted in with there cars >but the rules state they carnt play so for >now they wont..manufacturer support is what >the series needs ..
>
hhhmmm, NOT anymore!! Toyota has had their Celica homologated to race in the Nascar Goody dash series. Sorta like the F1600 or F2000 of Nascar?? You can bet Honda, GM, Ford is paying attention. Furthermore, Honda is now going (don't know when) to source truck engines from GM. Rumor has it that will allow them easily race in Nascar Craftsman Truck series!!

The goody dash series calls themselves a touring car series even though the cars are also silhoutte and built just like a Nascar car is, but smaller. Engine wise, OHC engines are now allowed. They are much smaller displacement and run several more restrictors to make it competitive against a pushrod engine.

Time will tell if you will see a Camry and 626 line up against a Taurus and Grand Prix at a Nascar winston cup event!!


[This message has been edited by kmchow (edited 14 April 2000).]