Why so few GT3 Porsche's in Trans Am ?

Yes , I realize they are in the process of bringing the series back to life and it's pretty much a Semi-Pro series right now , but considering how many GT3 Porshe Cup cars are out there , why are aso many sitting in garages when they could be on track?

 

my guess is that the running costs for a GT3 Cup car are significantly higher than running a GT1-style Corvette/Jag/Mustang.

that series is pretty much dead and has been for some time, I question the sanity of anyone trying to make a go of it.

 

I don't know. There were 30+ cars at the ARRC this weekend.

It's so hard, IMO, you have ALMS GT at the top,
GA GT under that,
ALMS GTC under that,
GA CTSCC under that,
IMSA GT3 Cup under that,
World Challenge under that,
Trans Am under that,

then you have the Am series like NARRA, PBOC, PCA Club Racing, Mission Foods GT3 Cup and the West Coast stuff under that.

Jeez, it's enough to give you a headache!

The GGT (Global GT) class in Trans Am would be great for Cup cars, but a proper Trans Am car is close to (or equal in lap times) to ALMS GT! No GT3 Cup driver's ego could stand being several seconds off the leader's pace and mired in the maggotry of a bunch of Stock Cars, lol! David Seuss is the only entrant, I think. He's been around a long time and a great guy.

 

maggotry, good word

ARRC is an amateur series, and if you're going to run a Cup car in an amateur series there are plenty of choices and most of those (as you say) will see you at the pointy end of the grid, not several seconds off the pace of a tube frame V8 TransAm car. I'd love to have a GT3 cup car but I'd be in POC/PCA/Pirelli Trophy first...

right now TransAm seems to be neither fish nor fowl, it's definitely a lower level/discarded "pro" series but probably too expensive for an amateur to be able to do properly without spending boatloads of cash.

which is a shame, I grew up watching TA back int he days of Kendall, Pruett, Sharp and Gentilozzi, it was a phenomenal series then.

 

I recall the greater days of it as well , but this weekend it just amazed me the lack of GTT cars when so many are out there somewhere . Also I don't see the full on TA cars costs being effective.
As for the weekend it was highly enjoyable for us as the GTA car we brought won both of it's races ans the V8Stockcar Championship and Cameron did well in the Miller Racing TA2 car finishing 2nd in the first Trans Am race with a suspension breakage while leading and won the other TA2 race
I really have hopes the series may have a full rebirth , if nothing else for reasonabe costs (If the TA2 format is the chosen future) where competition and not outrageous budgets rule. I am still perplexed on why so many P cars stay parked...

 

Which is a shame, I grew up watching Jones, Revson, Posey, Donohue, Follmer, Savage, Gurney, Titus, it was a REALLY phenominal series back then... (sic)

 

How do you have so many series and still get anything accomplished?

Too many series - too many different (variations of) rules, nobody really wins.

 

you're old, and I'm jealous

exactly, way too granule. hopefully the GA/ALMS merger combines a lot of feeder series too. at least for a while...

 

Hey guys, I am David Seuss and probably the best person to respond to this thread if anyone is still following it. (And thanks Procoach for the nice words above!) I just won the Trans Am opener in Sebring in TA3, Trans Am's new name for the GGT class. (See Peterson, Lawrence and Seuss on top at 2013 Trans-Am Series opener - Autoweek) We had 5 cars entered in the class (out of a field of 38 total for all three classes ) but one scratched when the driver was, are you ready for this, bitten by a brown recluse spider. Anyway, we had two Porsches (my 996 and Tim Gray's 997), two Mustangs, and a BMW M3 (the spider-bitten driver). I am an experienced Porsche Cup car racer, coming in second in the 2012 PCA club national championship in my GTC3 (996) car and winning the NE PCA zone championship.

As to why there are not more Porsches in Trans Am, I think it is just because no one has thought of it. The Trans Am series is very well run being owned by drivers in the series. (Drivers make the best officials!) The weekends proceed on schedule and smoothly. Everyone in the Trans Am organization bends over backwards to be helpful and there is no runaway bureauracy like in many sanctioning bodies. Cost is not meaningfully more than a PCA club race. You do have to be comfortable running with higher horsepower, faster cars in TA1 and TA2 (at least the front runners in the TA2 field is faster than a Porsche Cup car), but if you have ever run an SCCA GT National you know that this is not that big a deal. One really nice thing for the PCA GTC3 class is that Trans Am rules make the 996 competitive. Over half the Cup cars in a typical PCA club race are GTC3 and right now Trans Am is the only pro series that let's them be competitive. GTC4 and GTC5 cars can also run Trans Am too. For the PCA club racer that would like to run one or two more races a year at your favorite track, Trans Am is a really good deal. Also, Ferrari people, Ferrari Challenge cars can run in Trans Am.

 

nice win!

can you explain a bit more about the series now? I really don't understand what they're trying to achieve. but hey, they had 35 cars show up at Sebring so something must be working...