A new year rings in today, and so does the latest version of the 206 Cup rules!
There were some significant changes made to the rule book for the 2016 season. Along side the new class structures that were announced a few weeks ago, notable changes have been made in regards to event formatting, tires, and bodywork.
All events in the 2016 season will follow a new format. We have developed a new format that adds a qualifying round to the start of each race day. This does not mean less racing for our racers though, there will still be 2 heats and a feature race every day. However how those racers transfer from one race to the next is much different. Also, the feature race each day will be the only race that determines the finishing order for the day. We hope that this will expedite the end of day proceedings in regards to tech inspections and awards, as well as provide a better racing experience for all our drivers.
After months of development with Vega, we can now announce that the new tires we have been working on have a name. The Vega V1H compound tires will be the official tire for the Briggs and Stratton 206 Cup Series this season. We believe this new tire will be very well received by our racers. They still provide excellent grip, but compared to the FH tire they have a noticeably stiffer sidewall and greatly increased longevity. Vega is currently in production of the new tires, and they will be available well before the start of our season.
One thing that makes our series so unique is the intermixing of the two types of bodywork prevalent in our area. However in some cases; there was a distinct advantage to one type or the other at some tracks in certain classes. We wanted to try and find a way to further level the playing field and make sure that nobody felt they were at a disadvantage from one weekend to the next. So starting today, any type of chassis can run any type of bodywork. The bodywork components must still meet the rules for each individual component, but you may now have a large fiberglass nose on your CIK chassis with CIK pods if you wish, or vice versus.
Testing by us and others along side data collected throughout last season led to this decision, and we feel it is the best way to continue allowing the most types of chassis combinations while not requiring anybody to spend a lot of money to continue to racing. Obviously the easiest way to solve the problem would be to separate the bodywork styles by class, but we don;t want to limit the potential class sizes that way. It will now be solely the racers option if they would like to buy and race with a different bodywork type.
We encourage you to read through the entire book as some minute changes were made throughout to make the rules even easier to understand or to clear up potential confusions. We firmly believe that all of these changes will result in even closer competition this coming season.
Happy New Year!
