Love the last line of this article

Agreed! and it's why I cringe every time I hear some one talk about "how do we make our sport bigger?".

X1000 I agree 100%

And the line below. Anything else reeks of judged ice skating.

the quickest rider over one lap starts from pole, the quickest rider over 25 laps wins the race and the rider with the most points at the end of the season wins the championship.

That's a really good point. I like it. One of the things I love about two wheel racing of all kinds is that (for the most part) it's very dependent on the rider. Once you get in the bike, it doesn't matter where you're from, how much money you have, who your family is, etc. It's you.

Thanks FTE. That whole last paragraph was one of those "Why can't I come up with paragraphs like that when I write" moments. The last line of it was perfection. I'm not a big follower or fan of MotoGP, but I love Mat Oxley's writing style.

I think the F1 guys should be more worried about Formula E, with all the rubbing, stuffing and crashing going on there they are bound to lose viewers.

"Just because motorcycling’s premier class keeps growing and becomes more mainstream doesn’t mean it will get any better. In fact I’ve always found the opposite: bigger TV figures mean more bullsh*t, more media hype and more people in the paddock who know or care nothing about bike racing but know how to sniff out a moneymaking opportunity.

And with these people come private jets full of (mostly) irrelevant celebs who totter about on the grid, desperately trying to bask in the reflected glory of the riders."

Semi related-
I don't follow road racing too much but I know some here do. Remember when Jordan got involved with racing? (Is he still?) I recall so many people trumpeting "OH MY GAHHD! DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH MONEY AND ATTENTION THIS WILL BRING TO THE SPORT?!!"

Did that ever occur? How did his involvement pan out? (Don't get me wrong; I thought it was great he was
putting resources into something he was interested in!)

OK

Chip, I still see the team hauler from time to time and it still has his logo on it.

Sweet!

That reminds me, is Randy Moss still involved in a NASCAR team?

edited

100% agree with the whole article.

This pic is a trip! Puts the "Moto" in MotoGP

We need to keep this sport just as the way it is. The only thing that need to get bigger are the jumps.

Look to the coming changes to the World Super Bike Series - the 'effing' around with the grid positions dependent on first race results. The sport doesn't need that sort of shit.

It's a start towards further BS - but, as DORNA now owns both MotoGP, and WSBK .......... well, they seem intent on 'playing with their Toys'.

This is the paragraph I like the best, im sure the guys at Pulp MX wont.

"MotoGP stays old-school: the quickest rider over one lap starts from pole, the quickest rider over 25 laps wins the race and the rider with the most points at the end of the season wins the championship."

No bullshit rules in place to make the championship race fake or misleading or play into the hands of riders who have misfortune. Simply the best rider wins, which is even more true in SX / MX as the bike plays a lot less of a roll in the off-road world compared to the motoGP world.

Thats why I like 'sippi hole racing.

So at the end of the day, "we", directly or indirectly, have to decide:

Is dirt bike sucess is defined by the best player winning

or

the total income to all the riders is maximized.

The above is sort of in your face to two groups of people but
recently I clicked on some like "Top ten net worth of nascar dirvers".
I was stunned by the dollar valus.
especially since the sx/mx drivers are more likely
seriously injured than nascar drivers.

Easy fix, im a hardcore fan of ALL of it!!!

Add me to this list, every time I see "______ is good for the sport" I cringe. Is there any other sport where fans on a forum are so obsessed with somehow thinking they are going to be it's savior a from whatever the hell they think it's going to be consumed by? That article absolutely nailed it, the bigger and more corporate it gets, the less it's going to be about the racing and more about lining pockets and media hype. We're already on that slippery slope, just depends on how far people want to take it.

I remember, because I worked for Michael/the team in 2009. He put in 10 years as a team owner before the team disbanded a few years ago. They won the 2008 Superstock Championship with Aaron Yates and in the last few years of the team won some Superbike races also.

Google "Jordan Suzuki"


Funny that article quotes Niki Lauda as saying 'the cars are too easy to drive and the motorbikes are still raw' because in the MotoGP circles the old school riders (Rossi, Stoner, etc) lament the days of the fire-breathing tire spinning wheelie machines 500's, 990's, and much more simple electronics. The electronics now are insane and the bikes are 'easy' to ride compared to 10 years ago even. You can literally wack the throttle wide open at max lean angle and be okay. It started to get so bad that DORNA moved to a spec electronic package for 2016 to help simplify things a bit, though they are still very advanced. Wheelie control, traction control, auto fuel maps, maps changing depending on what corner of the track you are on (yes it knows), launch control... the list goes on.