Posts
576
Joined
4/20/2012
Location
Waterloo, IA
US
Edited Date/Time
5/13/2016 4:36pm
We are seeing numbers drastically declining in Iowa and I've been hearing the same in the surrounding states. Biggest thing I've noticed (I've been around since 1990 before the Internet era) the massive down hill spiral of social media ruining the sport. We now have practice days on top of race days, C riders and even mini riders publicly bad mouthing tracks, promotors who get so frustrated by what they read on the media outlets about their hard work. Question is what can we do to turn this around? Or is there anything we can do? I know the price of bikes and having the best equipment is pretty much out of the question for most 20 year olds hell Im in my 30s and can't afford to do it like I use to.
I'm an offroad guy but I go to local tracks somewhat regularly. I get the impression the offroad scene is a lot stronger than what it use to be around here.
I also think that more people are starting to switch to off-road/xc type riding in my area because at a lot of places it's free to ride versus $20-$30 for a practice day at the track with maybe only 3-4 sessions on the track. And for hare scrambles, you get triple or quadruple the ride time for about the same money you would spend to race at the MX track.
I also think injuries appear more prevalent, possibly "scaring off" parents, and also the working family-man who can't afford to get hurt and be out if work, or fear of being paralyzed or death.
Just my thoughts.
The Shop
But I will come out and race special one off races, like GP Moto-scramble type things. And NateP I was going to race the Urbancross in Waterloo this weekend, but had to bail for many reasons. I should still be down to watch though.
Kidding. But I spend way more than 100 to go practice. Much much more to race (havent raced seriously in 10 years).
The local scene around me is pretty strong. When I say local, I mean the tracks with their own race series (night tracks etc). It seems to be as strong as ever. I havent been to an AMA race or am national in 10 years, but I have heard that particpation in that level of the sport has dropped off noticeably.
Pit Row
Racing on the other hand is expensive because for the average consumer racing is little more then endless amounts of cash dumped without return into a bottomless pit of money grubbing vipers. There is no profit in racing unless the persons involved are corporations using racing as a means to advertise a product. Corporations paying representatives to sell products by masquerading as athletes doesn't count as a profitable racing either. In that situation those representatives are selling products regardless of how many berms they rip, jumps they hit or finish lines they cross in their work day.
but I agree C class is getting out of hand too. working at a track you wouldn't believe some of the stuff people try to pull at sign ups. fake names, changing numbers, switching classes after race order was posted just to get in a smaller class. I was working staging and caught one kid that was changing number plates and racing B class and D class. the give away was his front number plate didn't have a number only a bunch of stickers. caught on to him in second moto. looked for his number/name and only saw it in one class. when he came up for second moto b class I told him to kick rocks he was disqualified.
years back I had a frustrating time even trying to get the kid into racing. I asked around a lot at bike shops, on forums etc..... people were really hush about the when and where. yeah I know everything in online but a 100%newb doesn't know what to make of things. I finally showed up to our first race with a CRF50 and tried to get in the flow of things. we would get to staging 4-5 motos early and try and talk to other parents. no one wanted to say a thing until they saw my kid was slow and not a threat to their sons trophy.
eventually we got to know everybody and made some good friends but for an outsider to try to come in its not a very inviting scene.
There have been plenty of times that my friends and I have switched classes to race against more people.
I always race 30+, but for my second class, if the turnout is small, I will switch from 25+ to 250cc or Open class.
Personally I would like to see number of classes cut in half and run 10 lap or 20 minute motos for anything above beginner class.
On the other hand, the tracks wouldn't be making a profit if they cut out half of their signup money and I don't think a lot of racers actually want longer motos. A lot of guys fade after 3-1/2 or 4 laps.
I know people personally that are B class fast and racing C to try to get to the RANCH. Its annoying. I raced C class for 1 season and 2 races the next won my last C race by a minute plus with a broken collarbone. Moved up to B like any right minded racer would and was average top 3-5. Now I have a 10 acre practice track that is free to go to and I go and race Vintage class on my 9 year old 2 stroke for fun. I see a ton of people realizing that paying 25$ per class 10 to get in Gas money for truck and bike food and whatever else and getting in 2 5 lap motos and a 3 lap practice. I have considered all spring, switching to GP races or HS races for more race time for the money. I still want that race feeling. I also have watched about 10 high school kids that ride at my place all go out and make their parents buy them 4 strokes which is all fine and dandy but when 5 out of the 10 blew them up all of the sudden they are trading them for older 125s just so they can ride because their parents don't want to pay 1500 bucks to rebuild blown up 4T bikes. MX is getting harder for the blue collar folks IMO.
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