This is your guide through the semi-controlled chaos that made up the 2007 USCC. Remember, we don't just give away the title of the Ultimate Street Car-it has to be earned. Hard data and cold numbers can be found in the spec boxes for each event, but nothing is as simple as it sounds.
Even something as straightforward as base price can be controversial. To keep things fair (and look like we know what we're doing), we devised a thoroughly complicated points system to score the event. Here we attempt to decipher the results and hopefully explain how a car takes the USCC crown.
With 15 competitions being squeezed into just two days, we had to keep a tight schedule to even stand a chance of pulling this thing off. Similarly, there's a lot of info to pack into this story.
Base Price
It sounds simple enough. Based on what a car costs, it's awarded a certain number of points. Done. But there's no easy way to determine a vehicle's true cost. Is it based on what the car is worth today, or what it cost when new? Where does the pricing information come from? And what if the car was never released in the US?
Last year, we developed a pretty good formula. Sure, it caused some bickering, but nobody was hospitalized. Based on that success, we've used the same formula this time around. That is, we got the base price of the car, when new, from MSN Autos.
And that's exactly why Groma Fabrication's BMW 2002 caused such a fuss. Last time this car was new, the year was 1969, and it went for $4286. The little BMW smashed the competition and earned a full 110 points. The price differential was so great between the old BMW and the modern cars that Dave Dunn's second-place Acura Integra was only able to mop up 68 of the 110 points possible, with a price of $19,850.
Dunn was lucky to make off with second place-his mid-engine, H22-powered Integra with the hand-made metal widebody is hardly stock and would be one of the more expensive contenders if we put a dollar amount to the time and labor he put in while modifying it.
The numbers fall into place predictably enough after the Integra. A trio of cars in the $32,000 to $33,000 range scored between 50 and 52 points and the rest filled the gap between Blacktrax's 300ZX and Steve Ruiz's Corvette Z06. Put that Chevy down for last place (10 points) with its $52,185 window sticker.
As is always the case with JDM cars, pricing Jacko Luong's 1999 R34 Skyline GT-R V-Spec proved to be a hassle. Using the current yen-to-dollar conversion, the car was priced at $47,250 in 1999. Fair enough, but everyone in attendance knows you can't get one in America for less than $80,000. But that's the point, isn't it? You can't have any of these cars at the price we've reported.
Skyline controversy aside, the story is unquestionably Groma Fab's 2002, responsible for the biggest walkaway victory we've ever seen in this category.
-James Tate
The unveiling of the base price results kicked off the competition early on day one. Coffee and donut time was over in a hurry. Suddenly, conversations went from: "Hey, it's so great to be here with all these other car people" to: "Dude, the 'Vette is down 100 points to the Bimmer. Yank off the exhaust, we're up next on the dyno."
The better part of the first day was spent at K&N Engineering's massive R&D facility in Riverside, California. Several tests were going on simultaneously. But, with the possible exception of the Girlfriend test, nothing gets the blood churning like the Dyno challenge. With the calm-smashing noise, plumes of exhaust gas, and the possibility that something might blow up, the two K&N dynos provided the perfect ambiance for the day.