2013 Green Grand Prix - NY - Fri Apr 19
 

This excellent annual event is at Watkins Glen international Raceway (NASCAR) near Corning, NY. I received this from organizer Bob Gillespie:

The 2013 Green Grand Prix will be Friday April 19th. It will be 1 day instead of 2.

Rally Stage 1: We will be on the WGI short NASCAR track from about 9 A.M. - 12 noon. [Bruce notes: The Watkins Glen Intl short circuit is 2.45 miles, cars run dozens of laps.]

2 hour break.

Rally Stage 2; on public roads 2- 4 PM.

About 6 PM: Awards dinner at Glen Club which is on the infield of the WGI circuit.

Please feel free to forward this tentative schedule to anyone you think may be interested.

Happy New Year,

Bob

Further information will be posted here:
Welcome To The Official Green Grand Prix Web Site
(No details for 2013 are posted there yet.)

It'll be here before we know it!

I really like this event - but being a chronic complianypants I will say I think it happens too early in the season. And the weekday schedule kills it for a lot of working people (I understand Bob's focus is involving schools at varying levels, which rules out a solely weekend event).

Yes the Friday schedule isn't workable for all. But I think the Friday date makes the track available to the organizers at little or no cost.

Last year I was there for both Fri and Sat. You could see the track made some real money on Sat from the amateur driver events they ran. I don't think the Green Grand Prix is ready to draw enough attendees yet to generate that kind of $$ for the track. So I'm thankful I can use it on Friday.

Coming up Friday April, 19, 2013. On the track for the Green Grand Prix at Watkins Glen with my Honda CBR250R motorcycle for a fuel economy challenge. I'm trying to improve on 134.9 mpgUS from last year with some Vetter style aero modifications. See you there and again on Saturday for the excellent tech display in the paddock and the Electrathon competition. Bring the kids and show them how fun it is to be green.
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We have to hope for better weather this year as Saturday washed out the electrathons last year. It is also too bad the track prohibits refueling on the grounds. Trying to weigh a 3,000 pound car before and after accurately enough is a terrible way to determine fuel usage. Rounding the read outs of the scales to the whole pound made things even worse. A few cars made gas. I used 1 gallonUS of fuel according to an accurate tank fill including the climb up from town and back down, but was credited with 10 pounds of use. I would be in favor of moving the fill and refill down into town at the gas station as it is on Saturday. Which still has it's problems with fill error, fill to the first click, and thermal expansion, and the bladder tanks in the Prius make this completely irrelevant.
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I also think that most competitors in a fuel economy challenge would rather have a simple, out and around the lake on Saturday, than the complicated navigating, and multiple man hours of scoring, required for a traditional SCCA time/ distance rally. The SCCA needs to come up with different sanctioning rules for fuel economy events which will become more and more prevalent as people start to think green.

What's the elevation change like for both the road and track rally? Also what speeds are we talking about in each section?

Do they determine your category by Old, or New EPA mpg? Cause the old EPA is 56mpg combined, and new is 47mpg combined for the Automatic non-leanburn version of the Insight (Of which i will probably be the only entry). The reason i ask is the classes are 45-50mpg, then 51-65mpg. The second category consisting of P&G Lean burn monstrocities getting 95.1mpg!

Aero mods on a stock car, is that considered stock or modified?

It's hilly.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWscth4N2yg
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In the past the target speed for each track lap was 45 mph.

Elevations of low and high points of the "Short Course" at WGI: 1507', 1631'. The Short Course excludes the "Boot" section of WGI.
Net elevation change: 124'
The "Boot"section of the track is not used in this event. The Boot's minimum elevation is 1490' and would give a larger delta.

See elevation map here

The most impressive grade change on the track begins in the "Ninety" turn, which you enter after passing the grandstand. In the Ninety, the track begins a quick drop from 1545' to 1507'. The first curve of "The Esses" is located at the bottom of that drop. I enjoy that section of the track every time I pass through. :D

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I believe that in past years, the GGP has changed the class bracketing cutoffs as needed to respond to the field of vehicles entered. You may find new classes created, or classes dropped if no entrants compete. Of course it's nice to be assigned to a lower class, and then excel. My perception has been that classing at the GGP is done with an eye towards having vehicles of roughly similar basic capabilities competing against each other. Seems reasonable to me.

2)
Based on the GGP competition classes I've been assigned to in past years, I believe they are using the current EPA numbers for all entries. This puts all EPA-based entries on a fairly even playing field, as the currently posted EPA numbers for older cars have been adjusted by the EPA to show what the cars likely would be rated if tested and scored by the current methods. No rating method is perfect but I'll credit both the EPA and the GGP for making efforts to use apples-to-apples comparisons.

In past years, the GGP has asked only whether your vehicle is modified or not.

Just recently I sent organizer Bob Gillespie some suggestions on how to more precisely define the line between modified and not modified. I'm sure it would still be based on whatever the entrant checks on the form because the GGP's volunteer staff is busy enough just verifying that all lights work and the vehicle has been fueled. But some stated guidelines on the form would be a real help.

I would think that any feature originally built into the car would not be a mod. Improvements added later, um, I would think they would be a mod.

Eventually the GGP could also start making finer distinctions such as:
If you restore a lost oem belly pan by building a coroplast one, is it a mod? Maybe not.
If a car has only one (or two??) minor mods, maybe it would not be classed as modded? That could be reasonable if other modded cars in the class had much more extensive mods, such as a performance gasser engine replaced with an econobox small diesel. Or gassers replaced with a battery bank and an electric motor.

Thanks! It sounds like the net of elevation change of 124' is way below the monster hills where i live. I expect the + and - gradients are shallow? I have a good idea now of what i can realistically accomplish without Lean Burn or P&G. In addition, i have some "plans" in the works that i won't divulge until the competition. Just to make it pressure free in case i fail, this being my first time aeromodding.

That said, expect some competition on the field this year! Any other Ecomodders going this year? Metrompg, the owners of this site, our friends north of the border?

Also i'm looking to split a room with anyone Thursday and Saturday night. I'll sleep on an airbed, and pay my fair share. Otherwise i probably will just sleep in the car.

See the link to the track elevation map that I added to post #8 above.