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If you add factors such as cold winter weather and how spread out throughout Western Europe the Euroe teams are, you understand why SX is not popular in Europe.
GO Calimerooooo!
sometimes it isn't quite as simple as looking at the results on a website, in order to determine how 'fast' someone is...
i think Simpson, on home territory... and fully recovered from the fractured collarbone which he raced with last weekend... should have a good battle with Metcalfe.
The 2008 calendar has been approved by the UEM and it foresees the new entry of France other than the confirmation of all the 2007 locations.
The UEM Supercross Series is going to start: the first event, organized in collaboration with “RCS SPORT” (“La Gazzetta Dello Sport”), will be at the Datch Forum in Assago (MI), on the 19th and 20th of September.
The 2007 season had been the definitive consecration of such a Championship, that actually represents a reality after the first two years of settlement. The great riders who took part at the Series, the extraordinary public participation, the amazing and important locations and consequently all the audience results of the TV broadcasting have showed the validity of the project, which is going to start its second phase.
The main objective is to enlarge the adhesions to all over Europe, with each National Federation joining such a Championship, that need to be placed at the end of the World Motocross Championship.
Its realisation will permit a fulfilment of the whole discipline gaining more and more possibilities of development and increase of activity in Europe:
- All the riders will be able to improve and hone their individual technique, through Supercross races;
- A new catchment area will increase the existing one;
- The new opportunities will guarantee a general sporting and commercial development.
Until now, the expressed activity represents just a little portion of the real total potential. In fact there are some locations in Europe that, in dimensions usability and public potentiality terms, could give touchable results real similar to those reached in thirty years in United States. This must be considered absolutely reachable as our final objective.
The 2008 season has the possibility to surpass all the objectives reached last year and for this reason we will take care of these points:
- To increase riders participation;
- To improve the Media programming and the World wide distribution .
- To develop the events organization in order to reach a larger public target.
It has been and it will be fundamental the collaboration of UEM and of each National Federation that will host such events in their countries in the next future and have helped this discipline from the beginning.
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UEM SX SERIES CALENDAR 2008
Date Country Venue Home Class
19 September I Milan Datch Forum SX1 SXJ
20 September I Milan Datch Forum SX1 SXJ
12 October E Bilbao Bizkaya Arena SX1 SXJ
17 October FR Marseille Palais du Sport SX1 SXJ
18 October FR Marseille Palais du Sport SX1 SXJ
08 November SM Milan Eicma Motorcycle Fair SX1 SXJ
22 November I Genoa Palafiera SX1 SXJ
12 December D Munich Olimpiahalle SX1 SXJ
13 December D Munich Olimpiahalle SX1 SXJ
General Rules and Terms 2008
• The UEM SX Series is also open to non-European Riders;
• SX1 Class may be allowed only for motorbikes of 125/144cc.-2 Strokes and 250cc.-4 Strokes. In the future strokes and displacement can be changed because of sporting and commercial developments of general interest;
• In the season 2008, there will be the SXJ (Junior) Class as new category to be included in the UEM Sx Series, only for motoerbikes of 85cc.-2 Strokes;
• The final starting grid will be with no more than 12 Riders;
Just to show you how much the european riders actually care for a supercross championship.
"...three main reasons for which supercross is not nearly as big in Europe as it is in America, in his own words:
1.) Status quo of the sport in Europe.
Whereas in the U.S. the supercross championship is the one on which media and sponsors invest most of their resources, in Europe manufacturers and sponsors invest - in the World Championship. (Giuseppe) Luongo clearly expressed the message that Youthstream plans of transforming the MX World Championship in what F1 and the World Championship in road racing are: the only game in town. And things will most likely remain the same until Youthstream will decide to run a supercross championship too. As a consequence, the top riders are not motivated to even put in the effort to develop supercross skills.
2) Lack of a prestigious FIM sanctioned series.
There is a European supercross championship and it is the one in which (Tony) Cairoli participates, but this championship doesn’t have any media coverage: as a consequence it doesn’t attract any big sponsors and the teams and the riders are not interested in participating in it. Cairoli races the series because he wants to improve his skills for when, if ever, he will come to the U.S.
Is there the potential to have a spectacular European supercross championship? YES!!! Between October and November Europe hosts enough supercross events (in alphabetic order: Barcelona, Geneva, Genoa, Madrid, Paris, Sheffield, and the German supercrosses) to assign a championship. If the promoters were to agree on race format and class (I would opt for Lites-only class, even though this may keep away top guns like Reed, Stewart, etc.) it could become a sort of international Arenacross as it would be run in Palasport like Bercy by both European riders and the American riders who want to test for supercross or are engaged by European teams to run the whole European series. Probably top American lites riders wouldn’t ride the whole series and this would leave space to second-tier American riders and European riders too. As for the Top Guns, I am positive Reed will invite a bunch of them to race his Australian SX series: everybody will be happy. Do I think it will be easy to coordinate the European promoters? Absolutely NO.
3) Various Factors
There are several other issues that get on the way of having the European based riders putting efforts in supercross:
– The fragmentation of the European motocross scene and its consequence on the teams’ budget and overall efforts. Whereas most American teams and riders are based in SoCal and Florida (areas that are mostly flat and where you can ride all year long), the European teams are scattered throughout Europe in areas (Belgium, Germany, Northern Italy, Netherlands, the UK) where it is difficult to train in winter time; also, some of the top riders (Coppins, Rattray, Swanepoel, Brown, Hamblin) are from extra-European countries and go back home once the World Championship is over.
--The geographical fragmentation (when you go from Spain to Romania, you go to different countries with different food and different weather conditions, and this adds more stress to riders and team personnel then going from, say, Anaheim to Daytona) has an impact both on the teams’ budget (they require the teams to stay aways from their shops longer than it happens in the US as they need to go testing in Spain or in the Netherlands, let alone the traveling during the regular season) and the top riders’ condition so I believe nobody is thrilled about the possibility to spend more time away from home AND in the cold. The fact that Searle run only the Sheffield SX, that Pourcel run only at Bercy, and Cairoli in Italy seem to me an evidence that costs and distance between the venues are indeed a factor in a team’s decision of whether or not racing a supercross event.
SUGGESTION: set up a FIM-sanctioned arenacross-style championship that starts in Southern Europe, so that the teams and the riders can train on arenacross-style tracks outdoor, begin the championship there and then move to Northern Europe for the remaining rounds. This would make the European riders more comfortable with race format and riding technique: also, if it is a Lites only class, there will be a higher involvement of younger riders, who are hungrier and more eager to pursue a new challenge than the accomplished factory riders of the motocross class.
-- Unavailability of stadiums. Most of the places available in Europe in winter time are palasports as the stadiums are busy due to the schedule of the national soccer championships. As a consequence, the supercross events run in Europe are more similar to Arenacross events than supercross, and the European riders, already not very comfortable on supercross-style tracks, are even more concerned of getting injured at the end of the year, and that would affect their preparation for the following season (which has priority over supercross). – Little depth of the talent pool.
Europe is an area comparable to the U.S., hence a European SX Championship would make sense, but single national supercross championships do not make much sense at pro level, as there is just not enough qualified competition, I believe. Also, consider that adverse weather conditions in many countries with strong motocross culture, a longer World Championship, the priority given to National motocross championship… There is little space for National Federations to set up dates for a national supercross championship in which amateurs and pros can race against each other.
P.S. I apologize for the very long (and seemingly self-celebratory post), but I think it covers most of the points raised in this topic.
You exactly stated how i feel about such a championship in europe although i can't say it that good lol. Guess i'm a louzy writer :D
I for one however don't see such a championship in europe coming off the ground in the first years however but ok. Only time will tell
Pit Row
Simpson was riding that race with a broken shoulder.
Geoff
Apparently, you don't know anything about european motocross...
Not true. Especially not in France. But everybody know that.
Supercross is killing Motocross in America, why would we want to follow that lead in europe.
Geoff
But over here in Belgium almost nobody cares for supercross. There is not a single sx event hosted in this country simply because no riders attend...
Simple : 20 years of french SX national championship...
You should see what a disaster it is over here in Belgium. Almost no money for young mx talents, tracks closing down everywhere because of noise problems and enviroment people. I think it's a wonder we still have young talents like VanHorebeek, Roelants and Desalle. The politic leaders of Belgium do everything to kill the sport. It's just incredible...
Like De Dycker, Priem, and of course Desalle, Roelants or Van Horebek...
What's that ???
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