Ill play a little devils advocate here. While I agree, four strokes have and had their part in negatively affecting MX because of cost and complexity. However, kids starting out can still do so on PW's, used 50's, used 65's, used 85's, and used superminis. There are good ones out there that are fairly inexpensive. New KTM and Cobras aren't cheap. But they weren't cheap when am nationals had 3-4 divisions of them either, nor were the am nationals (and costs associated with it) themselves. The costs for running an amatuer national in say, 2008, were about the same as today. The local racing costs are a little higher now, but not out of proportion to fairly recent years when participation levels were still pretty high. For that matter, practice is still less expensive than racing, and there aren't a whole lot of mini's at those either.
Are there adjustments within the control of MX that can be made to improve access? Yeah. However, there an overwhelming amount of factors out of control of MX that nothing can be done about.
The real problem is the number of new kids getting in the sport. If kids really wanted to do it, they could get in like they did in the past, with similar costs of expenses and bikes. There used to be a good number of kids coming in on older, less expensive minis but I dont see that happening now. If participation numbers are dwindling only in MX, and not in other motorsports, then it would be much easier to isolate the problem within MX itself. But thats not the case.
So, IMO, even if there was an overnight switch to two strokes only, with an abundance of very cheap and good options, I still dont think we would see much of a resurgence. Adults, and kids especially, are switching their focus of entertainment from active participation to distraction. Just my .02 cents.
much ty. How to spot a paid forum poster/artificial forum traffic producer (see list of actions/phrases below):
Copius pattern amounts of phrases like “Anyone have”..., “Anybody know?”.... and their variations.
Thoughts?
Any help is appreciated!
Thanks in advance!