The "legendary" E30 M3 was trailing a piece of junk $1500 1980s Firebird, a car that would instantly be dismissed as "bloated, plowing, nose heavy pig that handles like a garbage truck".
But, the fact is the E30 M3 was trailing this Firebird for most of this video, even if you finally passed at the 4 min mark.

For me, it's just more evidence that the outright dismissal of big HP cars as crappy track cars is woefully ignorant and borderline brainwashing.
This "inferior, not worthy of consideration joke" of an 80s Firebird held it's own with "the ultimate driving machine" for many many laps, and given more laps, it may have taken the lead again.

I am not saying the Firebird is a better car.
I am saying the difference in track performance is not nearly dramatic as one would believe, if one believes everything he reads.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1456611615.png

Stop badmouthing the firebird Sugarwood!

I find the troll face disingenuous and intellectually lazy. I have commented on nothing but facts and reality based on what my own two eyeballs have shown me in the videos. At this point, there is ample evidence in over a half dozen videos, not just one or two exceptions. To go fast around a track, in absolute terms, horsepower damn well matters, and matters a lot.

In fact, the only trolling I see are preposterous claims that a pro driver in a Yugo will actually beat a novice in a Viper. My intentionally absurd unicycle quip was making a very significant point that no one seemed to grasp. At some point, claiming a slower car will be faster due to *only* driver skill is an patently false statement, since there is zero debate about the unicycle losing to musclecar, regardless of the unicycle rider's skill. So, that is proof that at some point between a lower powered unicycle or a Yugo or a 911, you will lose to HP no matter how well you can drive, period. Claiming driver skill is everything is patently false, proven by this Unicycle Postulate. Schumacher on a unicycle will lose to a V8 Camaro. Will he lose in a Yugo? In an Elise? In a 911?

...

I appreciate the trade-offs b/w weight and power, but one thing I can conclude with absolute certainty is that anyone who mindlessly parrots the car media rhetoric that "Muscle cars are utterly useless bloated, plowing, nose heavy pigs that handle like a garbage truck and perform like crap on a track" has absolutely no idea what he's talking about. Just another brainwashed internet forum & car magazine parrot. I have been guilty of this myself. But now it's obvious that it's not even remotely that facile and one-sided; the numerous videos here of 911's perpetually staring up a muscle car's ass for laps on end is undeniable proof of that.

sugarwood,

Do you have any track experience? If you had, you would have seen or heard about low horsepower cars driven by quality drivers smoking slow drivers in much faster cars. It happens ALL THE TIME!! It happens on motorcycles too! I ran faster laps on a 36 HP Kawasaki EX250 than guys on 140HP liter bikes.

Old Detroit muscle cars, stock, were "utterly useless bloated, plowing, nose heavy pigs that handle like a garbage truck and perform like crap on a track". The muscle cars from this century are much better. That '80's Firebird in the video above was gone over. So it doesn't count.

The bottom line is that handling is more important than horsepower. On a stock or near stock car, money spent on making the car handle better is almost always better spent that spending money on horsepower.

It sure seems like you have been trolling here......

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

I just want to apologize Sugarwood. Now that I have seen the facts on video, I have come around. For years I thought that a properly prepared low hp car with a good driver *could* be faster than a car with more horsepower. For a while i had been fooled by seeing it with my own eyes, many times over. But I am wrong. I was wrong. For example, lmp2 porsche rs spyders beating audi lmp1's never happened. And for that I am sorry.

What I have learned is that is that faster cars are faster. Read that again. Let it sink in. Now read it two more times, the second time in falsetto. The folks here with so called "experience" need to learn a thing or two from us "armchair experts."

Sorry, it's not confirmation bias at all. I did not say muscle cars are *always* faster.
Nor did I deny that that light and nimble can *sometimes* be faster.
The videos in this thread have both outcomes, and I clearly acknowledged that.

The point I am making is that most people say that "Muscle cars are only good for straight lines."
That is flat out wrong. What did I say? I said it's just not that simple.

The videos in this thread have both outcomes.
The reality is that sometimes muscle cars are faster around a track, sometimes light and nimble is faster around a track.
What I *am* saying is...that anyone talking in absolutes on this subject ("dump truck understeering pig handling 60s muscle cars always get blown away on the track because handling") clearly has absolutely no idea what he's talking about.
What I am saying is that, to some extent, the "disastrous handling" of muscle cars sure is made up for by big HP b/c they sure do hold their own on the track against light and nimble.

For example, go ask any typical car forum nerd you know what he thinks the outcome of a Porsche 911 vs. a '65 Mustang on the track will be.
The common answer will be "The 911 will run circles around the dump truck handling Mustang. American cars are only good for straight lines".
I *am* saying statements like this are utterly nonsensical and grossly ignorant.
And no, that doesn't mean I am saying Mustangs always beat 911's, either.
I'm saying it's not nearly as simple and 1-sided as the car blog magazine nerd makes it.

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track experience? Why would someone corrupt their armchair education with real world experiences? If it is not on video in this thread, it does not happen. And if it does, yet does not support my views of facts (like a lower class m3 passing a higher classed firebird... And me calling the firebird faster because it stayed ahead for three laps of a 30 lap race) i will ignore it, and twist it to support my preconcieved views.

the m3 was gone over also. And the m3 was in a lower performance class... And the firebird still could not beat it in the end. Firebird wins. Higher hp is better than handling. Checkmate.

It sure seems like you have been trolling here......[/QUOTE]

If horsepower is more important than handling is what you mean, than we agree.

Is this thread over yet? Or is the fun just starting? SmileWavy

What a minute... A balanced view of both sides of an argument? /thread.

You have come a long way baby!

Please do not miss the forest for the trees.
Yes, big HP does appear to actually win races.
Maybe not every race, but the point still holds: HP matters.
It's just not as 1-sided as people make it.

I just looked up the results of the last AX event I did at Limerock.
The AX track at LRP is basically all turns. So, it's all handling.

A 2015 WRX came in 1st.
A Z8 BMW came in 2nd.
A 2007 Corvette came in 3rd.

The 3rd place Corvette beat out BMW M3s, Evos, Porsche Boxster, Porsche Cayman, Porsche 911, Miata, etc.
Yes, obviously we're not holding driver skill constant, but remember, you've claimed God in a Yugo can beat anyone in a Viper.
So much for Corvette being a heavy bloated pig that can’t handle on an autocross track. Total myth.

Who said a corvette is a heavy bloated pig? Have you driven in one reciently? Best bang for buck I have seen. Just not my thing. also, remind me who won daytona and lemans in gt most reciently?

And sugarwood, if god can do what is claimed, i will put my money on god in a Yugo over anyone else in the fastest car ever imagined. Water into wine. Imagine what god could do to a Yugo!!!

If we focus on just that one single point for a moment, it is a good point.

Its an ancient and out dated belief
A lot of what makes up that belief is that for the late 1960s and 1970s, that was absolutely true.

Which leads to two other important points:

1) Old muscle cars that go fast around a race track do not have stock suspension. In fact , many have completely redesigned suspension with altered suspension pickup pints, and revised geometry, not jut racing shocks and sway bars.

2) New muscle cars actually do handle. The manufacturers have seen the light.
If one was to pick a specific point in time, it would be the 1984 corvette. (Cameros that handled came much later with the latest generation , while mustangs only very recently came with an independent suspension option, rather than the primitive live rear axle (look up why they were called live).

So, by today's track standards, you have a good chance in either a new muscle car, or a earlier muscle car with re-engineered suspension.

(...but now this opens the modern version of the Ford/Chevy debate)
Start at 9:00 in to this video

The listen to his comments at 10:00 to 10:35

Then by the end of the video, come back here and lets discuss which one wins and why.

(That is a friendly debate that I would like to have.)

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^^ I haven't watched, but auto journalists are the very source root of perpetuating this ignorant anti-muscle car mythology, so you can pretty much ignore anything that comes out of his mouth.
These bobbling heads all say the exact same thing, including the meme at the heart of this discussion
"USA muscle cars handle like dog****, and can only go in a straight line, and are total garbage on a track", said every cut and paste auto journalist ever.

Everything about "driving feel" is subjective, subject to massive personal bias, and therefore utterly useless without empirical quantitative measurement.
A Euro guy, operating under a lifetime of social conditioning and brainwashing, reviewing an American car?
LOL, that is the paragon of junk science and flawed experiment design (can we double blind the test drive?)
At best, they will reluctantly admit to the car being "not as atrocious as I thought it would be"
We might as well watch Chris Harris review a bottle of 1982 Chateau Margaux against a bottle of 3 buck chuck. Care to guess the outcome of that tasting?
Seriously, the 2nd best thing to do while watching a car reviewer is to hit the mute button, and just wait for the numbers.
(The best thing obviously is to simply ignore the entire auto blog/magazine industrial complex)

And who said Corvette is a bloated heavy pig that handles like crap? You're seriously asking this?
Do a search for "Corvette handles amazingly" vs. "Corvette handles like crap" and let me know how many respective hits you get.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_N%C3%BCrburgring_Nordschleife_lap_times#Pr oduction.2C_street-legal_vehicles
Back to actual data and evidence. Despite there being a glaring issue of "voluntary response bias" and a lack of "random assignment" (How would a stock '72 454 Chevelle fare? We will never know, since their owners aren't aware their cars can even turn), the top 10 best times on the ultimate track, Nürburgring include a Viper and Corvette. Two cars that internet car snobs instantly dismiss as "Heavy bloated American dumptrucks that are absolutely useless on a track, b/c they are only fast until you want to turn, only good for going in straight lines, and handling and cornering and wearing gold chains and hairy chest medallion" If you believe everything you read about American cars, Nürburgring is obviously some sort of German drag strip.

You really should watch the video before you comment. It goes in an entirely different direction.

Please be open minded.
It compares one muscle car against another (mustang versus Camero) and has good things to say

It would be a positive and useful datapoint as part of this discussion

...also, you should drive a 69 Camaro and a modern Camero back to back. You would be horrified and likely even terrified by the 69 Camaro.

The '69 Firebird seemed to kick ass just fine on the track videos, as evidenced by all the viewing time of its tail lights. And your argument that the 60s muscle is not stock so it doesn't count was a bit flawed. Almost none of the Euro cars in the videos are stock, either. It's a wash. One can at least conclude that the modified 60s muscle is clocking just fine on the track against modified Euro nimble. But, no one ever says, "USA muscle can only drive in a straight line, but with mods, they can hold their own against a nimble Euro car" (said no internet car geek ever...) As you know, they simply unilaterally state, "USA muscle handles like crap, and gets left in the dust on a track with turns". This is incorrect.

Are you just trying to cause a fight?

Why don't you watch the video so that we can have a useful conversation?

I'm going to repeat Scott's question. Sugarwoo what is the extent of your track time? Not AX, but on a hot track?
Second question - who cares what's faster? Nobody's racing vintage musclecars or vintage sports cars for money - at least not big money. We do it for fun. If you think a Firebird is fun - get one. If you think a Porsche, or Bmw, or Yugo is fun - get one.
The problem with these discussions is anyone can prove pretty much any point they choose to defend. That is if finding a youtube is considered definitive proof. My PERSONAL experience on track (I can't afford to race, but I've driven in approx 20 DE track days and run in intermediate, advanced or HPDE group), is that at anything below club racing level, driver experience wins out on our track (Portland International Raceway). PIR is a deceptively technical course. It favors good braking and driving skill with it's off camber turns and undulating back straight (we have rain here in OR, so the track has to drain). I have PERSONALLY watched one of our local racing legends ( IMSA, CART, INDY) get waved by huge horesepower modern cars (V8 Audi's etc) in his 1.3 liter STOCK vintage Sprite race car. It's got 85 hp. His SCCA Midget which has more like 75 horsepower, with him in it, turns lap times that are more than 10 seconds faster than me in my 2.7 911, which is stock, but has somewhere around 175 hp. Figure in power to weight (my car has very little interior) and I still beat him in the hp/lbs category, but it's not even a fight on the track.
BTW, God could beat anything he or she chose whilst on foot. He/she's got those lightning bolt things so it's game over... wait that's Zeus... sorry I'm not a religulous person, I mix 'em up...

Amen brother. I had a '67 Firebird in my youth that I transplanted a 327 into. Headers, 4 barrel, drum brakes. It's a miracle I didn't die in that car... Looking back, the biggest mistake I made was not keeping it original and restoring it. Today it would be quite valuable. Was a red/red 'bird with the overhead cam 6 and 3 on the tree. I'd kill to have that car today...I'd get me some of those fuzzy dice and an 8 track...

Funny, because it seemed like you'd been saying from the beginning that power is all that matters, and handing is irrelevant. Heck, even the thread title says "What good is handling"...


As a general rule, talking absolutes about anything related to racing is misguided. Even such near-universal truths as "Racing is expensive" and "Racing is highly addictive" do not apply 100% to everything.

However, old muscle cars with stock suspension are in fact usually understeering pigs. They were made to go very fast in a straight line, and little if any consideration was given to corners. In general, the ones that go well around corners are either not old, or not stock.


That can happen, given a long enough straight, and specific drivers, and setups.

It can also happen that the nimble car can make enough time through the twisty parts of the track (if there are any!) that the higher-powered car cannot catch it even on the long straight.


No, the claim was that an excellent driver in a Yugo could beat an idiot in a Viper. Specifically, me. (Seriously, I'm the only one I know of who has ever STARTED an autocross run backwards!!)

Anyone who has attended an SCCA event would laugh at anyone who said that a Vette cannot be fast on a tight and twisty track. Many of the Vettes that come out and run are staggeringly fast around the cones! They have power, and they handle! That's a heck of a good combo. Combine that with a good driver, and you get astonishingly good times.



I love this discussion--it's almost like a check-list of fallacious argument techniques! You've most recently trotted out the ad-hominem one, what's next?

--DD