This wouldn't all happen to be about the fact that if we made EV-X PAX 0.827 like the data says, then top EV-X would have PAX'd 2nd in STU just ahead of the #188 car instead of 6th behind the #88 car, would it?
I am just saying you are pick and choosing the results. Cameron is obviously the quickest EVX driver, his result at the finale shows that. You choose to use the national results to make your point about the EVX pax when the fastest EVX driver isn’t there.
I'm not picking and choosing. I'm using the exact process Rick uses to set PAX. PAX is calculated by looking at actual results at actual events, and comparing how the classes did. Rick has a reasonable way of excluding events where no top-tier driver showed up, but that logic wouldn't apply to EV-X at nationals even if you dropped the 1st or even 2nd place drivers. Rick's method is not to manually identify the fastest driver in each class and then only use their times when they happen to run and then ignore all other events, or to theorize what that driver would have run if they had.
Well, except for the fact that was exactly what Rick was doing to EV-X a year ago, using the exact same biases you have about "supplemental classes". He found some great driver in a Model 3 in a tight 27 second course in AZ, decided that all of EV-X PAX should be based on that, and off to the moon we were with EV-X PAX, climbing WAY above SS. I showed him how unfair this was, and to his credit he agreed and adjusted the 2023 PAX to something much more supported by data. And now that 2023 is basically over, we have even more events with EV-X participation, and that data shows the 2023 PAX is still too high, at least relative to SS and AS.
As someone that does Solo and Pro Solo a lot, you know Pro Solo is very different, and that's why they have different PAX/PSI systems and numbers. Using Cameron's numbers when he got 7 runs on the course and set his best time on the last run doesn't align with 3 runs in normal Solo. This is especially true when 0.3 seconds in Pro Solo can easily be your reaction time. We also know the Teslas do better when acceleration is involved and Pro Solo has that in both the launch and the shorter course.
Cameron clearly has skills and might have won the normal Solo, but we'll never know. But you can also look at the SS Pro Solo and see that Greer won Pro Solo but came in 4th in Solo. So is Greer or Yom the better driver at Solo? You going to claim Greer is better because of his results at Pro Solo despite getting beaten at the actual Solo? What about Damhoff and Likert swapping places between Solo and ProSolo in AS by a huge margin? What about Vajdak, Herrick, Green and Waldbaum all moving around in SSC?
It's far from "obvious" who the quickest driver is when you try to bench race apples and oranges. We had a good set of drivers in the Solo event, and PAX says that's what we look at, not trying to theorize what Pro Solo driver would have done in Solo. Are you claiming that if Goode had just run EV-X in Solo it's unquestionable he would have run 1.3 seconds/1.2% faster than the top EV-X driver and beat the top SS time, and that if we had put Mudge in the EV-X car it would have gone even faster? Just imagine how fast it could have gone with the top PAX driver (Larry MacLeod in KM) in an EV-X!
Also, it sounds like just because Cameron didn’t get top pax at the finale, you think that EVX should have a softer index than SS. So is pax only fair if a EVX car finish top PAX at a national event? The matter of fact is that EVX is a supplemental class, PAX should be harder for the class until there are enough competition's and development to show otherwise.
Given I'm only discussing Solo PAX, I am making no arguments about Cameron's results in Pro Solo.
However, the fact remains that in Solo, no EV-X has EVER beat an SS car, and is generally closer to AS times than SS times. And per Rick's method, this means the EV-X PAX should be closer to AS than SS, not the same as SS or even harder.
It's unfortunate to see another Autocrosser doing the "EV is a supplemental class, screw them!" attitude. PAX is math. It should not have a bias. The SCCA has already buried the Stock Model 3 in SS where it is irrelevant so it doesn't upset anyone in any stock class. PAX is all we have to compare. EV's are the future of mass passenger vehicles in the USA, and giving them a hard PAX just because you don't like them isn't doing the sport any long term favors. We happily adjust PAX in SS when the GT3/GT4's show up and become the dominant car (0.817 in 2018 to 0.833 now), even though those are low volume, $200K+ cars that can't show up at most local events because few can afford them. Why can't we be equally fair to the EV-X class, based on actual affordable cars? Why isn't a 2018 Model 3 performance the same kind of neat, affordable, daily drivable performance car a 2006 STi is? Don't these cars form the actual foundation of the SCCA solo program? (the 2006 STi cost more than a 2023 M3P FYI)
I honestly don’t care about PAX, but PSI is highly related to PAX and EVX runs in a national class with recognized classes.
Well, I do care about PAX, because in a lot of regions only a few Teslas show up, and thus the only way to understand the class of the driver is via PAX. And all I want is PAX to be fair and set the exact same way PAX is set for every other class. Sure, I would prefer that we had so many Teslas showing up that they could just compete amongst themselves, but even SFR has to run a lot of PAX classes to give people some competition.
