Mara goes Letara, Ep. 4-1: Back to racing basics?
Previous post (previous era)
Prelude to era 4 (carshow post, sets the stage for this ep.)
14 March 1974
Great Exhibition Hall, Lerance, Letara
Towards the end of the first day of the Auto Exhibition, Mara’s Comrade Executive Director Fedor Piechov visited the Mara exhibition stand located in a side room of the main hall. Inna Horyova, Comrade Director of Letaran Operations and Rodyn Gumprov, lead development engineer for both cars on display, approached Fedor and exchanged greetings. Fedor threw an appreciating glance at the prominently displayed Kavaler exhibition model.
The Mara stand at the Letaran Auto Exhibition
“Since I have you both here, let’s discuss whether there is anything to take care of in Letara for the next years”, said Fedor.
Inna started. “There should be no surprises for us in the ongoing public discussions and planned government initiatives. There is one manufacturer initiative to reduce engine emissions even further, but since leaded fuel is already banned, I don’t think that would have much impact on the people.”
“The only thing I could think of would be to ditch the antiquated rule that rear tail and brake lamps cannot be in the same fitting. Always annoying to have separate rear light clusters for the Letaran market”, added Rodyn.
Fedor nodded. “What about the future of racing here? I hear the current format is up for debate.”
Shaping a vision for a new racing format
Inna started. “If you ask me, racing should be more accessible and closer to what companies actually sell, not some wild fancy machines with little relation to what’s in the showrooms. By lowering the barrier for competitive entries we’ll also get larger fields.”
“So street legal cars without too many modifications or extra engineering?” asked Rodyn.
“Yes, and the format should obviously also allow us to enter a 3-door Irena in the same look as the current R2 race car.” Inna had good reasons for this argument.
“If the new course would be short and twisty, noone would not need big engines or fancy aerodynamics to be competitive.” Rodyn reminisced of his collaboration with the Aljoscha aeroplanes engineers to prepare the R2 Irena ten years ago. While this cooperation was certainly key to the string of podium finishes (and three wins) on the high speed race track, that exercise yielded little practical insights or implications for their regular products. He continued. “A mixed surface might further help to negate the advantage of excessive power. Just like on the long course on our proving grounds [BeamNG: Long race circuit on the Industrial map] where I recall that the V8 Irena interceptor a couple of years ago on cross-plies was hardly faster than the regular version and actually struggled more on the dirt parts.”
Inna added. “Prowess on loose surfaces would actually be well in-line with some of our future marketing which will be more geared towards farmers and others in rural areas where there still are dirt roads.”
Fedor stared at Inna and said only a single word with disdain. “Marketing?”
Inna shrugged. What did Fedor know of the struggles to run an operation in a free market economy? “I could also see the new racing event to be even more a spectacle for the general public where everyone can come together in one place once a year, enjoy the race together and celebrate the performance of what looks like what everyone has in there in their own driveway. Should help raise awareness also among the non-car enthusiasts. And those not liking the race can always go on the Ferris wheel or whatever.”
“Come for the event, stay for the cars?” asked Fedor.
Inna nodded. Rodyn picked up the thread. “This would mean a longer endurance event, but on a smaller circuit so that cars are passing - and lapping - each other regularly and appear frequently for all spectators. Reliability will be key here - which is something we have been good at anyway.”
“Sounds like you are talking about something like rallycross”, summarised Fedor. “There you can have a collective closely together around the venue for the duration of the entire event with lots of alternative activities on offer.”
“Of course we have to think in detail about the rules and the location, of course”, said Rodyn. “While we’re here we could check whether others at the car show like the idea as well, to build a short rallycross track inside Lerance raceway, and to propagate the introduction of a yearly big rallycross endurance event.”
Fedor nodded his curt approval.
OOC / TL;DR: Here is an idea for a rallycross extension (yellow: new tarmac, brown: new dirt, red - NOT part of this proposal: Aruna’s alternative plan for modifications to the big track - independent of the rallycross idea - as discussed on Discord and below).
The format would require low-ish budget street legal cars and emphasize handling (and off-road, to an extent) over power, aerodynamics and quality spam. See the 24 hour clunker run threads for a good inspiration for the proposed format (just with MY1975 cars). (The scale of the rallycross track is debatable, if it is a bit too short.)
If you like it, feel free to spend and or lobby for the rallycross extension (so just the yellow and brown bits) and racing format, and let me know if you have further ideas to improve the details of the racing format.