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Then I see around 20+ people coming to races with $50000 dollar trailers (Jayco basestations and work and play's) and people are winging that it is too expensive. WTF. It can be the cheapest form of motorsport if you want it to be, and you can still be competitive or win.
Another comparison, a Ford Ranger here is around uSs50.000. Not even close in quality and equipment overall near a basic F150.
Now you can guess why soccer is so popular here!
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Also, just a random note, many car dealers own multiple car dealerships, even if they compete against each other. Which they don't really do. More like collusion. Went to a Toyota dealership to look at cars. Wasn't happy with my trade in offer. Threatened to go across to the Ford dealership. Guess what? Same folks own both fuckin dealerships lol.
Something wrong with that.
A local track announced that because of low rider turn out they would be increasing the prices this year? Do they know anything about business? The only time you increase prices is when demand is high! If the track has low turnout then increasing the price is only going to reduce the rider turnout even further!
I keep my bikes pretty much stock. I have never bought an aftermarket pipe or silencer in the 20+ years I've been riding.
I carry our motorcycles on a three rail open trailer I bought about 16 years ago for $800. We stay overnight at the races in my $100 Coleman tent (that I've owned for at least 15 years) I have the most ghetto set up at any race we go to but we have just as much. I call this affordable racing.
In this day in age, stock suspension is the best its ever been, yet more peolple are sending their suspension off (before they even ride it too) than people did when stock suspension wasn't very good.
I had a buddy with a heavily modded $$$ CRF ride my 15 KX250F a couple years ago. He was blown away with it. He said the suspension and motor was head and shoulders above his. Should have seen his face when I told him it was all stock
Some people think you MUST have a brand new every, truck, etc
Other people are just fine riding an 11 year old YZ125, going out and just killing it.
Let the vets and people with money buy new bikes. Weekend warriors like my self just don't NEED a 7-8k bike to go out and race C class.
2 things a Kawasaki always needs in my book......the aluminum foil handlebars and the Mac truck silencer replaced. Other than that if you can outride a stock kxf450, your a bad dude!
lol.
The problem with the moto scene that I see is that nobody in any of those big dealers make enough money to moto comfortably anymore. It used to be I would head into a dealer and halph of the techs would ride moto, and halph of the sales guys also. Back when you could live on $60,000 a year and have money for an expensive hobby. But today unless you are some department manager I think it's pretty hard to make it on a mechanics or sales guys income. Because they all make the same money as back in the 80s.
So sorry guys for the rant. The point to my first post was that when I see the dealers getting very slow in sales, in my experience the economy is about to start to slow down. That usually means that motorcycle dealers are going to see it even worse. Because as we all know you don't need a motorcycle, this shit is mostly just for fun, and to give us a reason to drink beer with our buddies afterwards.
Pit Row
That's the reason my KTM sits. Why go pay $30 for entry, burn fuel, be gone all day, maintenance to complete, to ride like 75 minutes total when I could hop on my MTB and fucking shred for hours and be home by lunchtime?
I don't care one bit that my Yeti MTB cost about $10K, it's the freakin' time issue. I have money, time I do not have.
A young teen, whose parents aren't into moto, basically has no gateway to get involved. Sure, he could buy an old 125, but there is no one teach him the ropes, how to repair his stuff, and he likely can't ride from his front door.
Motocross is not part of any school program. And very few of us take the time to help the neighbor kid grow more than a passing interest in the sport. We are in it for ourselves, for our own enjoyment.
The progression of the bikes and tracks outright terrifies a lot of people. This has always been part of the appeal, but there is a big difference between Bob Hannah dancing over natural terrain, to the easy 100-ft jumps that an average B-rider now does. Get the physics wrong and you can end up dead.
This aspect carries over to the racing aspect - few will even line up for a C-class unless they have some sort of "program". Not many people trying a race for fun nowadays.
The sport's costs, while still modest compared to other motorsports, have gutted the 15-25 year old class that used to be the bread and butter.
We are in the long tail of a decline that began 15 years ago.
There's not too much an individual can do, other than help out that local kid, and support your local track and shop.
I think I am more excited than they are about them getting into it.
Anyone who rode in the 60's can tell you the bikes were FREAKING HORRIBLE and expensive. Not until the mid seventies did cheap and plentiful dirt bikes show up but hey guess what, off the show room floor they were absolutely horrible but they were "cheap". Ya ya they were $900. So what? Did you forget that minimum wage was $1.35? That means a person had to work roughly 670 hours to buy a bike that literally would fall apart between races or needed to be completely modified to be raceable. Today Minimum wage, in the birthplace of MX SoCal, is $10.50 per hour so in relative dollars the same effort/hours will buy you a (drum roll please)..... SEVEN THOUSAND DOLLAR DIRT BIKE.
It will also buy you a dirt bike that will last years, is waaaaaayyy better than you are and doesn't need to be modified AT ALL to race. People don't ride for many reasons but the "cost" of motorcycles is not the reason. If you want to ride, you'll figure it out.
The percieved "hassle" of going riding, availability of less expensive and less dangerous alternatives and the fact that the country is pretty much topped off with a pussy snowflake generation is far more likely the answer.
Most people begin riding offroad, and many of those people never make it to a starting gate.
Honda has been making a versions of the entry level XR's for about 50 years, so relatively cheap and reliable entry level bikes are available. But IMO unless a dad/mom without a lot of ties to motorcycling can get junior to a safe place to ride within a 1/2 hour of home, it's crazy to think the sport will sweep in a lot of new participants. Availability of riding areas IMO is going to be what tests whether OEM's continue to invest in producing any sort of dirt bike.
I do think you need to get people involved in recreational riding generally before you can leverage that into better participation in racing.
The breakdown in marriage may be a big factor in not having someone there to fund the fun and drive them to the fun!
I have not read this whole thread, but the reason ive been riding my mtn bike and playing hockey more so than motoing has everything to do with access.
I have bonelli park 4 miles from my house and a hockey rink 2 miles away
moto= 1hr away for milestone/gh/ etc
moto freeride = Hour and a half almost 2 to get to stoddard wells or sagus for legit freeriding (with no hassel from cops).
Back to the main point, recession or not, the single biggest issue dirtbikes have is the places to ride them
because of dust/noise/enviromental dickheads/ general mean people who dont like motorcycles
we need to cultivate huge easy access freeriding locations.. free being the essence and block peoples ability to sue.
people + motorcycle + no common sense on abilities = suing and ending freeriding locations
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