The Trans-Am Series presented by Pirelli is a sports car racing series held in North America. Founded in 1966, it is sanctioned by the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA). Primarily based in the United States, the series competes on a variety of track types including road courses and street circuits. Trans-Am is split into the TA, TA2 and TA Cup (TAC) classes for silhouette racing cars, while its production classes are the GT (grand touring), SGT (super grand touring), and XGT (extreme grand touring).
As sponsorship of the series has changed, the series has also been known as the CRC Chemicals Trans-Am Championship (1981–1983), the SCCA Budweiser Trans-Am Championship (1983–1984), the SCCA Bendix Brakes Trans-Am Championship (1985–1987), the SCCA Escort Trans-Am Series (1988) the SCCA Liquid Tide Trans-Am Tour (1991), the SCCA Tide Trans-Am Tour (1992), the NTB Trans-Am Series (1998), the BFGoodrich Trans-Am Series (1999–2000), the Trans-Am Series for the BFGoodrich Cup (2001–2002), the Motorock Trans-Am Tour for the BFGoodrich Cup (2003), the Motorock Trans-Am Series (2004), and the Muscle Milk SCCA Trans-Am Series (2009).
Origins
The Trans-Am Series was created in 1966 by Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) President John Bishop. Originally known as the Trans-American Sedan Championship, the name was changed to the Trans-American Championship for 1967 and henceforth. The series has in fact gone by at least twenty different names through the years. Some were linked to sponsors, some not. It has evolved over time from its original format as a Manufacturers' Championship series for modified passenger sedans and coupés to its current form as a Drivers' / Manufacturers' Championship Series that is open to GT style racecars. Champion drivers have been officially recognized, and Drivers' Championships awarded since the 1972 season. The series was cancelled after 2006 but was revived in 2009, using SCCA GT-1 based cars.
Over the years, the series has raced on a variety of different types of race tracks (Permanent and temporary road courses / street circuits / airport circuits) all over the country, as well as at venues in Canada, Mexico, and even San Juan, Puerto Rico in 2003. Since 2015, Trans Am has been a national series (Continental U.S. only), racing at tracks primarily throughout the East Coast, South, and Midwest. In 2017, the new stand-alone West Coast Championship was added to the Trans-Am Series. Currently, there are six races on the schedule, two of which are joint, or "shared" races with the national Championship series, in which drivers from both championship series race together in the same races, but only earn points in the championship series that they are entered in. The Trans Am series also awards the Northern Cup and Southern Cup which give points in certain races of the national series for competitors who do not run the full season.
Current series format Tire suppliers and presenting sponsor In 2017, Pirelli became the exclusive tire supplier (replacing Hoosier Racing Tire) and presenting sponsor for the Trans Am Series, and all classes use Pirelli P ZERO radial ply racing slicks. The change from bias ply tires to Pirelli P ZERO radial tires has been very well received, and has resulted in faster average speeds and improved lap times in all four classes.
Schedules In late 2016, the Trans Am Race Company (TARC) announced that after a long absence, the Trans Am Series would return to the West Coast with the 2017 Trans Am West Coast Championship, partnering with the Sportscar Vintage Racing Association (SVRA). The West Coast Championship Series consists of a separate 3 race competition, plus one round that is shared with the Trans Am Championship Series at Circuit of the Americas. (3 permanent road courses / 1 temporary road course)
For 2017, the schedule was reorganized, with five race venues (Homestead-Miami Speedway, Road Atlanta, Watkins Glen, Virginia International Raceway, and New Jersey Motorsports Park) receiving new dates, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway being added, and Louisiana's NOLA Motorsports Park being dropped.
For 2018, the Brainerd, MN and New Jersey Motorsports Park races were dropped, and a race at the Pittsburgh International Race Complex was added for the TA, TA3, and TA4 classes only. There are now 12 race venues on the Trans Am Championship Series schedule (8 permanent road courses / 3 temporary road courses / 1 temporary street circuit), with the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix presented by Lear race being open to TA2 class cars only. There are actually 13 actual races on the schedule, as the TA2 cars race twice in Detroit.
For 2018, the West Coast Championship's race at Willow Springs, CA was dropped, Sonoma, CA was added, and a shared race at INDY was added, expanding their series to a separate 3 round competition, plus two shared races (3 permanent road courses / 2 temporary road courses).
The schedule for 2019 continued to be 12 races long (including two "shared events" with the West Coast Championship Series), but the mid-April Homestead, Florida race date changed to an early May event at Weathertech Raceway, Laguna Seca, California—the first time the series raced there since 2004. The early August Pittsburgh race was also dropped, having been replaced by the Memorial Day Motorsports Festival at Connecticut's Lime Rock Park, the first time the series raced there in three years, and was the thirtieth time overall. Additionally, the Indianapolis race weekend moved from mid-June to early August, and the "shared" Circuit of the Americas (COTA) race weekend moved from early November back to early October. The Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix presented by Lear moved from early June to May 31—June 2, just four days after the event at Lime Rock Park ended. The season finale at Daytona International Speedway moved up one week to mid-November.
On the 2019 West Coast Championship schedule, the season is one race longer (6), and opens a couple of weeks earlier at Willows, California's Thunderhill Raceway Park. The shared event at Laguna Seca took place in early May, with Sonoma moved from early June to mid-June, replacing the shared event at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The shared event at Circuit of the Americas (CoTA) moved from early November to early October.
For 2020, the season finale at Daytona was dropped due to unresolvable scheduling conflicts, and after a two-year absence, the race at Brainerd, Minnesota was reinstated to honor the late Jed Copham, the track's co-owner and part time Trans Am Series driver. The season's grand finale in both series was to be now be the shared event at Circuit Of The Americas (CoTA), with that race initially being moved from October to November. The Indianapolis race was the only planned event that would have been open to all competitors who were registered to race in the Trans Am Championship series, or either of the regional sub-championship series. In the West Coast Championship series, the season was to start one month earlier (mid-March) at Sonoma Raceway, which would have for the first time ever hold a second race in late August to make up for the Auto Club Speedway race being dropped. Other than this and minor reordering, the schedule remained at six races, with Laguna Seca being planned as the other shared event with both series racing together.
On March 17, 2020, the Road Atlanta round was postponed due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. This was the start of a series of postponements and cancellations that lead to a revised schedule being announced on April 7, 2020. In this schedule, the Detroit round was dropped reducing the series to an 11-round championship. Unfortunately the planned restart of the series at Indianapolis Motor Speedway was also postponed and eventually canceled with the series resuming at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course instead. The rounds at Watkins Glen and Lime Rock Park were the final casualties of the outbreak with late cancellations leading to double headers at Virginia International Raceway and Road Atlanta.
In 2021, for the first time since 2017, the series would return to Homestead-Miami Speedway. Trans-Am would also be having its first ever race at the newly renovated Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval and a TA2-only round at the inaugural running of the Music City Grand Prix on the streets of Nashville. No double-headers were scheduled to return following their appearances in 2020; however, all tracks that were featured on the preliminary 2020 calendar were scheduled to return for 2021. For the first time in series history, Trans-Am instituted a drop-round system where competitors would choose to drop their two worst round results including non-appearances that took place before August 1.
Car classifications
Tube-frame / silhouette body TA
TA class cars are high-performance Grand Touring race cars with a tubular chassis and a Cadillac CTS-V, Chevrolet Camaro (Gen 6), Dodge Challenger (Gen 3), or Ford Mustang (Gen 6) full-scale replica body built by Advanced Composite Products or Derhaag Motorsports. All body types are eligible from the first year of production of the street car to five years after production ends. After each body model's full eligibility ends, each body will be partially eligible for an additional five years, and may be used in up to five races per year of eligibility. Cars may use a single-element rear wing.
Older body styles may continue to be used in the West Coast Championship, Northern Regional Cup, and Southern Regional Cup for an additional 10-years after partial-eligibility for the National Championship has ended. Cars using a Trans Am approved body model with bodies from alternate manufacturers that are approved to run in the SCCA Club GT1 class may be approved to run in the West Coast Championship, Northern Regional Cup, or Southern Regional Cup on a case-by-case basis.
Power comes from overhead valve (two per cylinder), pushrod, naturally aspirated, carbureted (single 4-barrel) 366 cubic inch (5.99 L) V8 engines producing 850+ horsepower. The minimum base weight is 2,780 pounds. Current rules allow for the use of leaded gasoline, whereas all other classes except XGT must use unleaded gas. Automatic transmissions are prohibited, and manual transmissions must have no more than five forward gear ratios, as well as a functional reverse gear. Sequential shifting transmissions are permitted, as well as commercially available No-Lift Shift (NLS) systems, and also "auto-blip" RPM matching systems for downshifting. Traction Control systems or devices that function independently of the driver are strictly prohibited, as is ABS (Anti-lock Braking System).
TA2 TA2 class rules specify a tubular chassis built by Howe Racing Enterprises, Mike Cope Racing, M-1 Motorsports, or Meissen Enterprises, and a Chevrolet Camaro (Gen 5 & 6), Ford Mustang (Gen 5 & 6), Dodge Challenger (Gen 3) body (full-scale replica) or Toyota Camry built by either Five Star Racing Race Car Bodies (Gen 6 Camaros / Mustangs), or Howe Racing Enterprises (all other eligible cars). The minimum base weight (including driver and any driver gear) for all cars is 2,830 pounds.