When to advance from C to B?

When you score enough promo points you move up

Totally up to you.It is admirable that you at least are considering moving up on your own. To me the safety factor is a big one regarding to racing with the C riders. Are you going to try to improve, do you have enough guys in B that you could hang with some of them and learn? Will your ego feel better being able to tell yourself and riding buddies that you are a B rider or does it make you happy when you do well in C and have the better result on paper? Tough call

bv, I say just go ahead and move up. I raced C for about 2 years and really just got tired of getting my bike destroyed every weekend by some idiot who thought battling for 15th place was worth a few hundred bucks in damage.

As soon as I moved up to B, the only damage that ever really happened to my bike was my own fault, the riders are more experienced and have a bit more etiquette on the track, and most importantly I got a helluva a lot faster (when you race against faster riders, you have to go at least their pace if you don't want to embarrass yourself). Pretty sure I finished last or very close to it in my first 125 B race, but after that I knew how to do my homework.

Long story short...if you feel like you're almost ready, then you ARE ready. Don't worry about the points system, it will only hold you back...unless you want to get to a point of dominating C class.

5-8th?..I don't think you are near fast enough for "B".. You should be top 3 easily in "C", and doing the majority, if not all of the big jumps at every track you go to...If you are not capable of that, the only thing you are going to do is hurt yourself, or another rider by racing against riders who skills far exceed yours. When I started racing, I was usually hovered around 5th place in the beginner class.. I got a new bike and won my next 3 races so I got bumped to "C". I crashed my brains out for the next 5months trying to run that pace.I never won C, but got several 2nds and 3rds...

The son of the track owner told me one day to slip out in the A/B practice, and try to follow him and match his pace...3 laps into the practice, I got stopped by the track owner asking what I was doing in the A/B practice and I told him.. At that point he gave me the option to become a B rider, or leave the track, so I bumped to the B class. The first 2 races I never saw anybody in my class, as they just walked away from me in every moto. Took me about a year to get to where I could run the pace of the lead pack.

Strictly from observation of watching my sons races. I'd say move up. There are less goof balls in the B class (less chance of injuries). If you are at the tail of mid pack now ( you'll advance your skills a lot faster racing that class.
TM

Move up as soon as possible. You'll be riding with better riders and you'll get faster from racing in faster company. When I was growing up most riders couldn't wait to advance. Riding in the A class was something to be proud of.

who knew that putting a B between () created an emoticon? Hmmm

This...

Just depends on if you like to race with more bikes. Around here. C class will have three to four times the entries of B and the A's are even more scarce.

If you can hang mid pack with them I say bump up.

Im just not getting where it is up to you to advance? You have to earn it. You earn it by beating the slower riders week in and week out. I know all about getting faster by riding with faster riders but that should be done when you're practicing.

You will enjoy riding the 30+ classes

I'm wondering a a similar question except from b to a. I've been doing pretty good in +25 b this year and my rpv for that class is a 15.56. Will they advance me to a next year? I do average in 250 or open b. Mid pack to top 5. Can you advance out of +25? It's under combined classes because it's been c/b and some +25 b

move up

You ride with faster riders, you will get faster. Plus, the c class is scary.

When I moved up from 125C to 125B class (20 years ago) I went from getting accidentally ran into and guys falling in front of me to getting block passed and bumped into on purpose. Not only were they faster, but much more aggressive. I went from battling for top 5 fives (out of 40) to battling for top 20 (out of 30). I actually wanted to move back down but was told I was "too fast" for C class and had to stay, even though I never even won a C class race. So I just worked on getting faster and in a few years I was a top 10 B rider with occasional top 5 finishes. Once I started racing the Vet class top 3's and wins finally came. Now I am just happy to finish a race!

Just my opinion.... Your obviously racing for the love. Just race the age group classes. 30cd and 25abcd. When I was 20 I was a solid b rider. Even then I couldn't wait to be 25 to race with guys that had to work on Monday. Something about being 20 then and battling with 15 16yo kids made it not so fun. They are fearless little dude so I would settle in 3rd if I had to push hard... but give me the idea I could could win.... I will move you. It was fun. The kids would lean on you right back. But for the joy the older guys know when they are beat. For the most part. And make racing slam ban thank you ma'am a thing of the past.

I'll just say that when it was my time to move from C to B I wasn't extremely dominant but was winning most O/A's at most of the tracks I went to. I got the high points at the end of the year and then went from there.

BUT.....it can be a tough decision , because it's not always " Your own speed " that should determine weather you should move up. Like you said.....the Junior class can be crazy hectic. In the B class....yes they are going faster , but they are usually riding smoother. That in itself can make you faster as well.

They say ( and I believe it to this day ).....riding with faster guys , will make you faster.

Everyone is different though. You have to make that call on your own....because once you move up....that's it. Around here you are not allowed to move back down unless you stop racing that class for one full year.

X a million.

We all have to go to work on Monday! haha.

I would say it depends on what you want out of yourself.

If your committed to becoming a decent top 10 B rider then make the move. You will not learn the speed as easy in a slower class. As you say a bad start riding with riders that zig zag over a track can hurt confidence and really slow your overall race down with no chance of making top 5.

If you do go the B route though analyse and practice your weak points as much as you can. You said corner speed was the ultimate limiting factor which is the case with the majority of us regardless of class. So concentrate finishing out the season in C's but cut your race schedule down a bit. The days your not racing spend some time and money on a rider coach and practicing the drills specifically for corner speed, braking and line choice. Within a few months I would bet you will pick up 4-5 seconds a lap maybe even more. I personally about 10 years ago went from a mid pack B rider to a mid Pack A rider in 4-5 months. The progression then slowed down as my speed went up but on average I would say based on lap times from previous years (A&B times) I gained 10-12 seconds a lap and was now a good 3-4 seconds faster than the top 3 in the B's.

I focussed on tons of corner drills, braking and line choice to maintain momentum. After a few months of this it was onto line choice where I would do moto's where each lap I would change the line in every corner so that I would do a 10 lap moto hitting the inside and outside lines 5 times each. This helped race craft and the ability to keep fast lap times whilst going inside or out if a pass was needed.

Then I went onto sprint motos where it was 4 lap sprints x 5 for shear speed followed by a 30 minute moto with every lap within 4 seconds of my fastest average 4 lap sprint to work on stamina. Finally from there it went onto practicing like race day.

- 4 lap warm up and setting 2 fast laps to get a base time for the day
- 2 x 12 lap motos with the first 4 laps sprinting the remaining 8 within 3 seconds of the base time worked out in warm up.
- 1 x 15 lap moto focussing on line selection, braking and trying be super smooth within 5 seconds a lap of base time.
4 hours at the track then home.

See it a lot in the UK where a rider starts using there brain and wants to elevate their game. They seam to disappear from all the racing for 3-4 months and come back a lot faster after working on technique and speed for a few months. Unfortunately not all of us have the natural ability to work out what we are doing wrong. So many spend money on their bikes instead on investing the money, time and effort into themselves.

I barely ride anymore due to working away from home, but when i get the chance I can still run with the boys I used to race against in the A's and certainly run top 3 B speed for 5 or 6 laps before I start getting a little tired. After a few weeks at home on maybe 5 or 6 days on the bike I am back to being able to do 10 lap motos and riding pretty well.


If your not as serious as that then continue on in the C class and wait until your pushed up or find a friendlier class that has less beginners in it such as the 30+.

Ride with A and B riders til you start winning C races or titles or the Org moves you up. If your running mid pac in C your going to be in way over your head in B class, I dont see much fun or motivation in that. If you really want to move up find a local upper level rider that can help your riding even if you have to pay for training.

Just wait until you are 30 and then start riding 30B. That usually tends to be a pretty good class that has decent numbers. You will see alot of the track stupidity drops off significantly in the over 30 classes.

Most of the time the bottom 1/4 to 1/3 of the B class are the same morons who were mid-pack C riders that thought they needed to move up to B.

I would also say that if you can't come through a C class pack regardless of other riders you aren't fast enough to be competitive in B. If you are just looking to avoid the C class crazies and don't care so much about results, B class is all around safer.

This ^
250B is a super-competitive class and it sounds like you would be putting yourself and other rider's at risk. You mentioned battling for 20th- If you were ready for B you would put 20th behind you in a hurry (even with a bad start). Honestly, 5th-8th in C class are really not very good finishes. If you wait until 30+ B the lap times will drop significantly from that of 450B. I would just avoid racing and practice alot until you are elible for the Vet class.