Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Autocross and Open Track autocross choice

so...if you had to decide on a car to buy relatively cheap that would stay street legal but was strictly an autocross car, what would it be?

Depends how competitive you want to be. If you're not determined to go national: Miata, hands down. I'd look for a 94-95, but any year would be a good car. They're relatively inexpensive, very reliable, always competitive in their class, and a lot of fun. Also: tons of aftermaket parts, easy to work on, and a lot of great resources for info.

Other good considerations:

Integra: Type R is hard to find, but great FWD car. Kinda ricey.

MR2: again, more rare than the Miata, but mid-engined nimbleness and unique.

'89 Civic Si: actually, a few different old Hondas are good. They'll never feel as balanced as the other cars, but can be competitive in STS for cheap.

Contour: not competitive, expensive to mod, hard to work on, but you get a lot of looks when you make it go fast.

I'm sure I'll post more when I think about it. Check out the SCCA forums for TONS of ideas.

It might be tough to find one in decent condition but the '91-'96 Escort GT's get pretty good reviews over at SCCAForums. A guy out on the west coast runs one quite successfully in STS.

That's my heavily Ford-biased suggestion, but the Miata would be a better option out of the box.


Randy

also the mk 2 chassi VWs are good and dirt cheap.

honestly if you run a BONE STOCK CSVT its a GS class car. and if i would have been smart and not had a open element filter i would have been the KC GS champion in 02

The problem is that without camber adjustment and a rear swaybar, any decent Mini Cooper S driver will own you. GS is only getting more competitive.

Depends on size of track and if the mini guy is any good. I won GS with my Cougar....back when it was stock, and I didnt have much problems with the Minis might have just been the driver or the size of the courses.
one thats a [censored] to beat in GS is the old ('93) audi S4's esp if in good shape....that car should NOT be in GS. but remember in stock you can still do any struts (just not springs) cat back exhaust and most importnatly ANY tire compound you want including race rubber. those 3 things give you a nice advantage!

It's not any race rubber you can use in stock. It needs to be DOT legal (hoosier make some non-DOT legal racing slicks that would throw you into prepared/mod class if you used them).

What year and what club did you run with?

You also can also replace the front sway bar in stock class.

They only give you an advantage if the other people in your class are not using them.

Also the 05 mini is even faster than the prior mini's because they can now get an LSD stock.