Well, first off, street racing (to me) isn't "serious" racing. If you were serious about racing, you'd be at a track. I don't think having money bet on it, changes things.

With that being said, I agree to some extent about it simply being a numbers game. It pretty much is. Personally, I like to know what I'm racing against, for 2 reasons. 1) I don't think there's ANYBODY who doesn't know what my car has, to begin with. I think it's only fair that both people involved either do, or don't know. And 2) I personally have more fun with a good race, than I do winning. Winning by 8 cars is more disappointing to me than losing by 2. So often times I'll ask what people have, to gauge what kinda race I'm up against. Just like right now, I know a guy with a Cobra who has almost identical w:p ratio as I do. I can't wait to race him, because no matter who wins, it will be a good race.

But to elaborate on my personal views of racing, I never in my life thought I'd do it as much as I do now. I'm more of a car enthusiast, than a racer. I just enjoy my car, period. My favorite races were the totally random ones....where I'd be driving down the road, and some guy would get up next to me and we'd start playing around. What happened with me was, my new car is actually faster than pretty much anything you are normally gonna come across while cruising around (not trying to brag, but it is true). So I got together with a group of "car guys" and it all snowballed into me actually going to car meets, places where street racers would gather, and actually setting up races. I used to street race all the time when I was younger, and not once was it ever planned out, or did I agree to a predetermined location and condition(s). Things were way different then, though. Most cars had anywhere from 180 - 400bhp. So the gap of performance wasn't all that big. Anyone with much more horsepower than that, just raced at the track. It was mostly bolt on Mustangs and Camaros who all cruised in one location. Now, cars have SUBSTANTIALLY higher horsepower, even in stock form. And kids have tons more money than they used to. I think these two things have kinda killed the "casual racing" that used to be so fun to me, and that's why you see a lot of what you are describing in your first thread.