I'm with Greg et al. on the fuel issue.
This goes counter to the philosophical position that IT cars (and other regional-only classes) should be "real race cars" but the whole point, it seems to me, should be that we CAN run cheap-o pump gas.
The engines shouldn't require high octane numbers - if they are legal - and the difference in fuel bills between the Milton mini mart and the VIR pump a mile away is not just a few bucks: It's like 300%. My bill (car tank and three jugs) for the 3.5 hour race a couple weeks ago, with a car that gets great mileage on-track, was $57. Make that $180?
It seems like we have a policy position coming out of a cobbled up theory of what the problems are.
If the issue is dangerous stuff in fuel, the test needs to look for dangerous stuff.
If the problem is that the current test can't do that without being befuddled by other, non-hazardous fuel options, then the process becomes a de facto verification that the sample is from a specific source, and the point is lost.
Now, it has ALWAYS been the case that we run the risk of failing a fuel test if we buy carte blance from public sources. When we used to race karts, we knew when the seasonal alcohol content changes happened, and which suppliers used more or less moonshine in their pump gas, for just that reason. (The "baby bottle" water solubility test was the standard.)
That probably ought to be the way we go now, too but I'm a little glad that in NCR Region, the semi-official position of the tech guys is that "It's an IT car. We don't care."
K
