Bob
I took part in the meeting Harold of Montpelier hosted expressing his desire to put together a class of Midgets to race at Montpelier Speedway several years ago. He took the input crunched it together and came up with a very simple straight forward rules package. His rules have served him well. We suggested that he govern and handicap his cars with a RR tire size. He did limit the RR for national powered cars to a 10" wide wheel and the use of only one RR tire per race.
This rule works well for most of the older Midgets and the Mini Sprints and Focus>Ecotec Midgets have faired very well. Several Main's have been won by the Motorcycle and Stock block powered Midgets.
As in any racing you always have a few better financed teams show up to race with fast and late model engines. These cars have a definite advantage over the other cars in the race. One reason for this is Harold always give the racer one heck of a race track to race on often working the track over before the Main events, making for a heavy fast track and taking the traction problem out of the equation for the higher powered cars.
I for one have been thinking about these cars ever since that meeting. I have said On IOW several years ago that I wished someone would bring this formula to Southern Indiana. It looks as if Jay may be doing that right now.
Bob you would be amazed how well the Mini Sprints and stock block cars race aganist the National Midgets. They are capable of racing straight up with a 10 year old National motor and not getting in the way of the newer motor packages. The argument that Mini Sprints are faster than the stock block cars and on the other side the stock block cars are faster than the Motorcycle cars are just that an argument. On any race night a properly prepared and driven car of either design can win.
So back to the question how to make the cars more competitive to one another. Number one would be pick the race track. Stay to tracks 1/4 mile or smaller. Number two limit that right rear tire. Even with a Mini Sprint it is possible to overpower that 12" RR tire on a slick race track, not so much on a heavy track. Races are won by the driver and set up that gets the most performance out of that RR tire.
Right now why not switch to an 79-80" RR or better known as the left rear tire (they are even cheaper). It has a 10 inch tread making it easier to overpower either by a Mini Sprint or the latest late model Midget motor that chooses to run for the purse that these cars will be racing from. I have been talking to some tire people about digging out an old RR mold with the 10" tread, if they do we will have our spec tire to race on.
Honest Dad himself
