Enduro length question?

I am tired of the "Its not an enduro" line. The next step up from sprint race is enduro.
I am not aware of a single SCCA national or regional or NASA sprint race over 45 minutes in lenth.

Since there is nothing in between a sprint race and an enduro, by definition a race longer than a sprint is an enduro. The honest question is whether its your kind of enduro or not.

The "its not an enduro" claim only serves to eliminate or make exclusive YOUR kind of enduro racing. That means that it serves to discourage, not encourage people to join us. Thats the wrong approach. Hell, I drive a V8 car. I am not even allowed to enter most SCCA enduros. Thank god for NC Region and Atlanta Region.

So, lets start telling guys that are curious that its not an enduro unless they are ready to run at least 6 hours. Unless they know enough guys to crew the race car and know someone else he trusts to drive or is willing to chance driving someone else's car.

Last point in this rant. The pitstops. Its not a real enduro unless you have no required pitstops.

Grand Am Rolex requires a pitstop in the first 30 or 45 minutes of a race. I think ALMS does not allow any work on the car until fueling is completed. These are professional series. We are AMATEUR racers. AMATEUR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1.a person who engages in a study, sport, or other activity for pleasure rather than for financial benefit or professional reasons. Compare professional.

Either we do pitstops in a way that takes as much of the risk for injury out of it or we go professional style, which means your entire team must be in firesuits with helmets.
 
Grand AM ST and GT classes (sedan cars similar to IT - not prototypes) run two to three hour sprint races as the norm. No mandatory time for pit stops but usually with two drivers. They also run a 6-hour Enduro at the end of the season at VIR for those cars. Just sayin....
Chuck
 
callard said:
Grand AM ST and GT classes (sedan cars similar to IT - not prototypes) run two to three hour sprint races as the norm. No mandatory time for pit stops but usually with two drivers. They also run a 6-hour Enduro at the end of the season at VIR for those cars. Just sayin....
Chuck
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Actually, they require a driver change. That means they require a pitstop. Of course none of the cars could run 2.5 hours on a single tank of fuel anyway. The cars fuel load is regulated so that no team/car has an advantage.

The 6 hour race was reduced to 4 hours this season as well, because of increasing expenses and falling car count.

So, some of this applies and some doesn't.
 
>> I am tired of the "Its not an enduro" line. The next step up from sprint race is enduro.

No fair arguing against drawing a semantic line in the sand by drawing your OWN semantic line in the sand, Rob. The original question asked for what those dictionaries call an "opinion."

How about a little more leeway in terminology? There's a whole 'nother genre that's somewhere between "sprint" and "enduro" - in my OPINION - that includes ECRs, 3- or 4-hour races, and anything that mandates pit stops. Some think of them as "enduros," others don't.

Sprint - Go as fast as you can for a short period of time; rewards intensity and the ability to get 10/10ths out of car and driver over the short run; requires optimization of the car for the purpose - outright speed.

Enduro - Go as far as you can over a long period of time, as fast as you can; rewards preparation, teamwork, organization, and patience; requires optimization of the car for the purpose - to run a long time without stopping.

"Extended Sprint" or "Mini-Enduro" - Go as fast as you can over a time longer than a sprint race; rewards some compromise between what is required for a sprint or enduro; requires no specific optimization beyond that required for sprint races due to specific mandates in the rules.

It's that last bit that is crucial to the definition. It would piss off the ECR/3-hour crowd if the rules let me show up and run one stint with my distance-optimized car. It pisses me off because mandatory stop rules handicap me for choosing to specialize my hardware. What if I asked that the supps demand cars tweaked harder than mine (solid bushings throughout, right at the minimum weight, etc.) to start 20-minute sprint races with a 1 lap deficit, to make the situation equitable...?

Mandatorty stops are racing socialism. :happy204:

Look - at NO point did I say, "Hey, regions wanting to make money - don't run any 3-hour or 90-minute races, dammit...!" I just said, "In my opinion, when they DO that, the races don't qualify for 'enduro' status."

K

EDIT - Sadly, I heard that NCR didn't get to its minimum entries to break even on the event. (I think Jeff Y. told me it was 60...?) Consider though for a minute that the economies, though just as real, are different for something like the 13-hour. Remember that the entry fee was $825.
 
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Actually, the OP was asking what is the minimum lenth for an enduro. Not the optimum lenth.

Which is why I said 90 minutes. 3 hours would be my favorite and the most often scheduled distance. Then I saw one "its not an enduro" after another.

The q was what is the minimum distance.

If we killed the under 6 hour enduros because, well, they aren't enduros. How many enduros would we have left?

As you say even the VIR 13 hours is struggling to survive.

I'd love to see a 5 or 8 race 3 hour enduro series. I think that would be a blast. But, i guess its not an enduro.

As for me...I am really looking forward to the ARRC 3 hour not an Enduro. I want that checkered flag for my trophy case. Enduro or not.
 
I believe its not an enduro if some cars can complete it without having a pitstop. Running 90 to 180 minutes without a stop is just a long sprint race.

The benefit of having pit stops (even if there is no fueling or tire changes) is that it allows multiple drivers to help pay the bills and gives a lot of guys the taste of what endurance racing is about. The more drivers we have, the more endurance racers in our pool. I thought it was great that the ARRC 3 hour had two manditory stops because it let me put 3 guys in our car. Also, it encouraged guys to compete with their sprint cars as it didn't penalize a team who wasn't running a giant cell. The result is there were a lot of guys at ARRC who now can say they have done an endurance race. Perfect.
 
Bob Roth said:
I believe its not an enduro if some cars can complete it without having a pitstop. Running 90 to 180 minutes without a stop is just a long sprint race.

The benefit of having pit stops (even if there is no fueling or tire changes) is that it allows multiple drivers to help pay the bills and gives a lot of guys the taste of what endurance racing is about. The more drivers we have, the more endurance racers in our pool. I thought it was great that the ARRC 3 hour had two manditory stops because it let me put 3 guys in our car. Also, it encouraged guys to compete with their sprint cars as it didn't penalize a team who wasn't running a giant cell. The result is there were a lot of guys at ARRC who now can say they have done an endurance race. Perfect.
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The ARRC 3 hour not an enduro is my favorite race of the season. I reject the idea of the "long sprint race". Sprint racers run 30-40 minute races. A 90 minute is more than twice the lenth of what a sprint racer runs. The Indy 500 and NASCAR races run 3 hours. They are considered endurance races.
 
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