$2018 Challenge Trivia - Did you know?

Some Q's for the trivia that I'd like to know:

What is the youngest car to enter (The mini cooper?)

What winner has had the lowest finish in one of the three categories?

Before the rules changed what car had the highest purchase price that was sold down to $20xx?

What is the rarest car to have entered?

What chassis has the highest % of it's production run enter? (e.g. There were 215K NA Miata's made.  If 25 have been entered that's 0.0116%

How many total cylinders have been entered into the event (bonus for the number of Trochoids too)

Note I will be amazed if you can be bothered to figure all those out, but it's what my mind demands.

In reply to Adrian_Thompson :

I'd be willing to bet the mongrel miata has the highest buy in pre rules change. 

The following info was pulled from the 1999-2017 events. 

To date there have been 18 GRM $20XX Challenges including the first $1500 Challenge held in 1999.

Did you know….

1. ....in those 18 events there have been 881 entries?

2. ....Dynamic scoring was first used in 2005 and has been used 13 times?

3. ….6 out of 18 Challenge Winners did not win a single segment of the event?. Ed Malle's $2014 overall win included a 2nd place Concour, 2nd place Auto-X and 2nd place Drag finishes.

4. ….the smallest margin of victory in the Auto-X was 0.050 seconds? 3 times FTD was set with less than a 0.100 second margin.

5. ….that the Auto-X FTD 1-2 gap was over 1 second (2) times at the Challenge? Ironically, both times a college team schooled the field by gapping everyone by 1.323 in 2015 (Texas A&M) and 1.275 (GT Wreck Racing). The other 16 events were decided by a margin between 0.050 and 0.820 seconds.

6. ….of the 881 entries, a car originally made by Mazda has participated (127) times (14.4% of the fields)? (58) Miatas (6.58%) and (46) RX7 (5.22%).

7. ….a car originally built by Mazda has the most Challenge wins with (4)? Honda has (3). MG, VW, BMW and Dodge all have (2).

8. ….that the Team that ran the FTD in the Auto-X in 2017 has a checkered past? That's right. The school has a 60+ year history for auto racing. But in the early days they were into .......Gasp!!!......Drag Racing! ...... Thud!!!

9. ….that cars manufactured by Mazda, Dodge and Ford have been part of all (18) Challenges? BMW, Honda and Chevrolet have all missed (1) year each.

10. ….that (11) of the (18) Challenge Winning Cars were powered by an engine originally sold by Chevrolet or Ford? Chevrolet has (8) [44.4%] and Ford (3) [16.7%]. Dodge and Honda have (2) each.

11. .…that (3) of (18) Drag races have been rained out? 2002, 2007 and 2011?

12. .…that there have been (5) two time Challenge winning teams and (0) three time winners? Of those two time winners, only one won with the same car (1999,2001 Mike Guido). Of those two time winners, (4) times the wins were won back to back. (1999,2001) (2002,2003) (2012,2013) (2015,2016). Of those two time winners, only one team did not win back to back. (2010,2017 GT Wreck Racing)

13. ….that the longest and shortest Auto-X were run in back to back years? 2004 FTD was 54.442 seconds and was held on the road course. 2005 FTD was 29.657 seconds and is the only event that was under 30 seconds.

14. ….that the speed record for the fastest Challenge team for (9) of the (18) events was none other than the Stepp/Jules/Westside entry? Yup. Those two kids from Cleveland, Ohio. In 2004 they laid down a pass over 128 mph. That mark stood for 2 years and in 2006 the flywithjunk Racing Datsun went 128.71 barely clipping the previous mark. Then, in 2010, Stepp/Jules/Westside shocked everyone with a 132+ mph lightning strike. That mark lasted 7 years and was eclipsed in 2017. Westside held the record for 9 years.
15. ….that the longest Auto-X held in 2004 also had the tightest gap between 1st and 10th? The (18) event average in gap between 1st and 10th has been 2.422 seconds. But 2004 had a 1.103 second gap 54.442 to 55.545. Ironically, the 10th place Auto-X car won the overall and the 1st place Auto-X car took 10th overall.
16. ….the 2003 event was the second longest and the only other A-x held on the road course? Ironically, while the 2004 event had the narrowest gap between 1st and 10th... 2003 had the widest gap between 1st and 10th at 4.092 seconds.

17. .…that there is no correlation between Auto-x length and the gap time between 1st and 10th? However, there is a direct correlation with 1-10 gap time, drags performance and the overall win. Statistically speaking: A. The winners of the Challenge for the events with narrow 1-10 gaps (under 2.3 seconds) never finished below 3rd in the drags. B. The winners of the Challenge for events with wide 1-10 gap (2.3 seconds or more) have had drag finishes 10th and higher.

18. ….in the Dynamic Era, the Challenge winner finish 1st, 2nd or 3rd in the dynamic score every year? Dynamic finish for the Overall winners - (9)-1st, (3)-2nds and (1)-3rd. The concour helped the winner to leapfrog over the dynamic winner 4 times.

19. ….that ever since Cliff Sebring and Erik Lawson broke the 12 second mark, (1) in (16) (16.31 to be more accurate) Challenge cars have run 11.99 seconds or better in the quarter?

20. ....that in the (18) events the Challenge Winner won (5) Drag segments, (5) Auto-X segments and (9) Concour segments? However, since the start of the Dynamic Era, the Challenge Winner won (3) Drag segments, (5) Auto-X segments and (6) Concour segments. That's right...all of the Auto-X winning Challenge Winners have won since the Dynamic Era started.

21. ….that Tim Suddard won the first Auto-X at the first Challenge?
22. ....that in 18 events there has not been a 3 time winner of the Auto-X? Tim Suddard won the first Auto-X and the GRM/GRM Team won the 2001 (I don't have any details on that team). Since 2001, Lee Graser with the Tennessee Region SCCA, External Combustion and GT Wreck Racing have won it 2 times each.
23. ....that (2) of the (18) Challenge winners did not have a podium finish in the Concour? The (2) cars that did win would easily be considered in any conversation for greatest Challenge cars ever. The $2006 Winner Steve DeFayette crushed the field with a Dynamic score that separated his RX-7 from the field by 3.5 points. Steve ran 0.2 seconds behind the FTD Auto-X time and mowed down the clock at 10.926 seconds in the drags. Post Challenge, Steve has raced (and wins with) the RX-7 in Georgia posting 9 second ETs. The $2013 Winner Pat Culkin also won the Dynamic score with his Shadow. Pat ran 1.3 seconds behind the FTD time in the Auto-X and clocked in a 11.319 second pass in the quarter. Pat’s Shadow is one of the 'greats' in our world as it has successfully competed and completed Drag Week, been Land Speed Raced and won the $1008 Challenge within the Challenge.
24. ....that an engine sold through Chevrolet has powered every Drag winning car at the Challenge except one? Pat Culkin's Dodge broke the string by winning the 2012 Drag event.

25 ....the oldest car entered at the Challenge was Jon Haas's 1949 Chevrolet? It showed up in 2007 and is still one of the all time favorites for anyone who saw it. The car identified as a 1947 Coupe was actually a 1971 VW.

26. ....in the early days of the Challenge there was a "Race" and a "Street" class?
27. ....that (4) of (18) Challenges had a single team finish 2nd overall? All of the 2nd place finished occurred in the first (6) events. 1999-2005 Team MiniMe finished 2nd (4) times, 3rd (1) time and 4th (1) time. (3) of the 2nd place finishes were back to back to back 2002-2003-2004. Hence the reason that the team is part of every conversation about "teams to beat".
28. ....that (8) of the (18) winning cars were there for the third time? No cars that have been there more than (3) times have won the overall or a segment of the event. JG wrote an article about way(s) to win at the Challenge. One of those paths included bringing a car and refining the entry over time. That recipe worked in 2004, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016 and 2017.
29. ....that (14) of the (18) Challenge winners were RWD? (4) were FWD. An AWD car has never won.
30. .... that as of 2/05/2018 there were 91,875 photos of the $2000 Challenge on our server?
31. ....that (10) of the (14) RWD Challenge winning cars had IRS?

DOES ANYONE HAVE A SPREAD SHEET WITH THE 2018 INFORMATION?  It might be fun to get these factoids updated or kick the dust off this too get the Challenge juices flowing.

In reply to wheels777 :

RE 12, repeat winners, 

I think you mean 2002 and 2003 as repeat B2B winners- both of which were Mongrel Motorsports.  I can't recall who won in 2004, but it wasn't them.

alfadriver said:

In reply to wheels777 :

RE 12, repeat winners, 

I think you mean 2002 and 2003 as repeat B2B winners- both of which were Mongrel Motorsports.  I can't recall who won in 2004, but it wasn't them.

You are correct 2002 and 2003 was B2B for the Mongrels.  2004 was won by Erik Lawson.  My bad.

In reply to Adrian_Thompson :

In 2004, Dr Frankenstang’s wife brought a 2002 Kia that was stitched together from two totaled cars, one a front-hit and the other a rear hit.  I think that’s probably the youngest.

One question I have:

how many times has the autocross been won by a GRM Pro Driver vs a car owner / team member?  I’d like to see the list of autocross winning cars and drivers.

[in before alfadriver]

alfadriver won the autocross in 2004

[/in before alfadriver]

In reply to AngryCorvair :

Which just reminds me that I'm relieved that you are putting on disk brakes.

In reply to wheels777 :

2018 spreadsheet, I love the trivia!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vSfCI6lQ-vIVAAcd3JQK9DTcA5Rn5hrIckPmoZymhtEiF7YEY586xEaT4ARNh7JsqqU74uhLM91zgTW/pubhtml?gid=1903101663&single=true&range=F1:BE70

alfadriver said:

In reply to AngryCorvair :

Which just reminds me that I'm relieved that you are putting on disk brakes.

You muscled that drum-wearing turd to 18th place IIRC, and for that you deserve some kind of medal.  Highest autocross finish to date by a Corvair.

In reply to AngryCorvair :

Georgia tech drove their own in 2017 and put over a second on the rest of the field

Patrick said:

In reply to AngryCorvair :

Georgia tech drove their own in 2017 and put over a second on the rest of the field

Didn't Texas tech drive their own Miata in 2016 as well for the autox ftd? The e85 superlightweight?

In reply to Adrian_Thompson :

My Mini Cooper S was a 2003. 

IIRC, John Welsh’s Nissan van may have been a 2004

SVreX said:

In reply to Adrian_Thompson :

My Mini Cooper S was a 2003. 

IIRC, John Welsh’s Nissan van may have been a 2004

shouldn't that be like a 'moving math' thing...

youngest.entrant = grm.challenge.year - entered.vehicle.manufacturing.year;

In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo :

You’re probably right. 

AngryCorvair for the win!

In reply to Robbie :

Thank you.

This thread should be under the $2000 Challenge Page/Forum

Bump for eastside Tim

This one.

This should be moved to the $2000 Challenge page.

wheels777 said:

The $2013 Winner Pat Culkin also won the Dynamic score with his Shadow.  Pat ran 1.3 seconds behind the FTD time in the Auto-X and clocked in a 11.319 second pass in the quarter.  Pat's Shadow is one of the 'greats' in our world as it has successfully competed and completed Drag Week, been Land Speed Raced and won the $1008 Challenge within the Challenge.

I know this is an old comment, but Pat's Shadow had another claim to fame.

IIRC, his car was the only car to be DE-TUNED and re-entered in the Challenge to win in a "lower" class.  He won the overall in 2013, but in 2014 the car came back with (a different engine?) and all the go-fast goodies removed under new ownership- Pat's son (was he 12 year's old?).  The car won the $1007 category, as well as the rookie award.

What's the highest finish for an AWD car?

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

What's the highest finish for an AWD car?

Westside took 2nd overall in 2010 with a Mitsubishi Mirage that had been converted to AWD with DSM running gear.  Not sure if any other AWD cars finished 2nd in other years.

wheels777 said:

This thread should be under the $2000 Challenge Page/Forum

Guess I didn't see this request the first time.

Done!

Dave Melton. 

wheels777 said:

Dave Melton. 

The answer to the question no one is asking?