robz

Some thoughts concerning drag racing since I'm bored and taking a break from work.

MPH

--It is fun to track and it often shows the potential of the car on the strip.
--It can also give an indication of the power the car is making.
--Contrary to what some believe, it is driver dependent and can vary significantly from one driver to the next.
--It is also affected by weight,wind, power under the curve, gearing, traction, accelration of motor, over setup of car, and many other specific factors.
--Different tracks timing equipment can affect mph.
--There are times when you spin and see a false high mph.
--There are times when your best et is your best mph.
--Converters and locking them up or not affects mph.
--Where you shift,how you shift,and when you shift affects mph.

***MPH/RWHP/Weight calculators are not real world due to their inability to factor in all of the details above.

Saying a car is faster or ran faster because it has achieved a higher mph is incorrect IMO.

I think et should be factored in to which car is faster.
I'm tired of the quickest/fastest semantics bs.

We set our cars up to run best et. MPH is good for shop bragging rights.
I like throwing up a big mph like anyone else but I'm not going to claim the fastest just because of the mph. That's my opinion.

Which car is the fastest or ran the fastest?

1) 11.03@ 135.50
2) 10.45@ 135.40

I say #2 is the fastest.

ZZOOM06

I'll take #2 any day of the week! Trap speed doesn't win races, ET does!

Jimbo

C5 Pete

Yeah, Rob, It's all about ET...

tirecraft

Rob # 2 will take it all day long.

Ps. You cant take a break from work when you didnt even get there yet. This is not Mark

clemsondave

My top 3 ET passes were not the same as my top 3 mph passes. Unfortunately, I do not hit the track enough to experiment with different variables to see what happens to ET/mph.

I cannot tell the difference between 135 and 139mph. But I can tell the difference between a 10.0x and 10.2x.

Lowest ET for a given mph shows the talent of the driver.
Highest mph shows the talent of the car. I agree, though, that the driver has a big influence here too (intentional or unintentional).

cyclerage23

I would say faster isnt a good word for this. Quicker would be more descriptive. IMO faster=MPH, Qickness=ET

robz

That's the thing Jay, many people accept that; I have trouble agreeing with it.
Most of us would rather have # 2 but what would you call/consider the fastest car?
I'm thinking # 2 is faster and quicker. I know it's all semantics, but

I hear claims of guys/camps having the fastest car based soley on mph which is weak IMO.

I just can't consider #1 the fastest even though they have recorded the highest 1/4 trap speed.

That's the crux of it.

robz

Ok, round 2.
Let's take a c6z cam only record (hypothetical).

One guy runs 10.15@134.
Another car runs 10.55@136.

Some people like Jay mentioned above would consider the 2nd car to hold the record for fastest cam only c6Z06.

I wouldn't.

Who holds the title of fastest c6Z06 cam only??

It's interesting to hear what people think and how some people who have been around the sport for a long time differ in opinion on this simple issue.

LS1LT1

100%

Now, a car that traps 130mph with only an 11.5 second ET might have the potential (ie: with a better driver, more traction etc.) to 'out ET' a car that had some upper RPM problems (bad spark plug wire, clogged air filter etc.) and trapped only 120mph on an 11.0 ET but in that particular race the more desirable car to me is still the one that ran the 11.0.







But like Rob said a lot of that is just semantics and wording...often times people say "faster" when they actually mean to say "quicker" when referring to a particular car or pass (I personally am usually pretty careful how I word it) but it really shouldn't matter anyway because in drag racing the quicker ET really is more critical than the trap speed IMO.

C5 Pete

You do bring up some interesting points, Rob.

We have, in several places on this forum and others, a "Fast List" for Corvettes in various configurations.

Perhaps these lists should be renamed the "Quick list". That seems to be the goal of most people - to run a quicker time.

IMHO, I'm not at all concerned with MPH. It will be whatever it is for a given pass. I am concerned with ET.

clemsondave

If the basis of "fastest car" is drag racing.... the 'goal' of drag racing is ET. If the 'goal' was mph, we would be doing things different.

If the basis of "fastest car" is something like the mile runs, then mph is key.

LS1LT1

In a case such as that perhaps the 10.55 car will have to specify in exact terms that his car is the 'fastest trapping but not quickest cam only C6 Z06' when posting/describing his car while the 10.15 car still gets the title of 'quickest ETing cam only C6 Z06' ?

Naahhh, that seems like a messy way of doing things.
The 10.15 car is simply the fastest, period.





Same here.

98vettedave

Regardless of the type of race...horse race,dog race,drag race and any other form of racing the only factor that is important is who or what gets from point A to point B first. Elapsed time (ET) is what determines the faster car,horse,dog or whatever. MPH is an indicator of a cars potential based on the trap speed (HP) being produced,thus a factor or factors other than HP is what determined the race between cars #1 and #2.

Of course top end type runs (events) are solely based on MPH,but these events are not considered as a race perse.

GARY2004Z06

Fixed.

GARY2004Z06

V=D/T where V is velocity or speed, D is distance and T is time. Your average speed will always be higher with a decrease in time where the distance is fixed.

clemsondave

Dang it Rob, you got me thinking....

Your examples were very close in ET and mph, but what if they weren't?

1. 9.94 @ 138
2. 9.95 @ 150

Would you still say #1 is the fastest C5? Certainly #1 is the better driver and would win the drag race, but which car is faster in the broad sense of things??

99ZX9R

I would argue that fast = quick for drag racing purposes. Since drag racing is an acceleration competition as opposed to a mph one, I can't see how anyone could argue that the car with the higher mph is faster than the car with the quicker ET.

GARY2004Z06

See above.

Roostertail

#2

I almost never look at trap speed. It's all about who gets to the finish line first...

Nick

robz

That's kind of my point.
Who get's the title?
I know some guys will say 1 and others 2.

This may be one of those subjective things.