As the season comes to an end, something the promoters need to think about.

[SCHAFFERNOCKER]

If you have a problem with the number of classes there is a real easy solution. DONT RACE! You can practice all day at most tracks for 1/3 the price and ride with everyone from 65's to 500's. Just kill the horse already... No one cares.

 

[RobinsonRacing]

If you have a problem with the number of classes there is a real easy solution. DONT RACE! You can practice all day at most tracks for 1/3 the price and ride with everyone from 65's to 500's. Just kill the horse already... No one cares.

I agree! im also sick of everyone whining about how long race days are! Do you really make plans for after 5pm on a sunday evening on race days? If so, then maybe you should just hit the practice track instead!

I enjoy being at the track with my friends and family and doing something i love! So i have no problem being there ALL day! Hell all i do when i get home from a race is lay on my couch watching tv til i pass out anyways!! haha

 

[MalvernMX]

I find it beyond comical that Knox or anyone else believes that if we just add a couple more laps to each moto with the time generated by this limited class structure (that almoast NO ONE will like) that all the practice only guys will flock to the tracks to race. BS!!!

People either want to race or not. I have been on both sides of it over the last 20 years. First ten years all I wanted to do was race, I would not have chose a practice day if they paid me! Just not the same intensity, not that competitive feeling, no "rush". Then I spent about 7 years starting a business and raising a couple young boys that I wanted to teach to ride so almoast every weekend we were at a practice facility somewhere. Now here we are full blown back into the race scene for the last four years.

 

[ck1racerx]

i expect kick back from promoters because as soon as you talk bout eliminating classes they think their profit is going to go away. (even though it wouldn't if you have a sound business plan.. or just common sense) but it blows my mind when riders disagree with this... You are currently racing two classes for $25 each. With a billion classes you get 4 laps if your lucky X 2 moto's. +the 4 laps again if your lucky for "practice" for a total of 20 laps... / by $50 that's $2.50 a lap... not counting gate fee. I go to the track every week and here riders bitching about racing costs too much. But then as soon as your suggest the ONLY thing that could lower the overall price you say "oh, don't cut my class. I want to win the $1.75 p.o.s. plastic crappy trophy or better yet the $1.12 lame "plaque" that tracks give out.
I don't care if I am at the track from sun up to sun down as long as the guys get the seat time they are paying for.

This board has really gotten boring with all the bobble head's agreeing with everything you are spoon-fed, if you are happy with the statues quo then I guess I will just go away quietly.
Make suggestions to better the sport, not your own personal agenda.

 

[Strouble]

Not sure what happened...but this sport used to be so much more laid back and yet serious.

Now it's like cut throat.

This thread took a serious turn.

One thing I reason is that motocross is not important in the big picture of life, but is what some of us enjoy.

We take but don't give.

 

[MalvernMX]

Not to say the amount of classes thing does not concern me, it does. We are faced with that right now. Looking at 2 classes that I genuinly think would help local grass roots racing but afraid to add to the list.

#1- 125 two stroke, these bikes are cheap to buy and cheap fix(by today's four stroke standard). But people want to race them on a level playing field. Not against 250 four strokes and not against other 2 strokes with twice the motor.

#2- beginner bike class to try and get new riders hooked and not scared off forever. Or even worse, to intimidated to ever try. Strict rules for this class, no points, 1 calendar year max, maximum number of wins??,OMA can move you to C class anytime we feel you no longer belong or should have never been in the class to begin with.

 

[Woody]

i expect kick back from promoters because as soon as you talk bout eliminating classes they think their profit is going to go away. (even though it wouldn't if you have a sound business plan.. or just common sense) but it blows my mind when riders disagree with this... You are currently racing two classes for $25 each. With a billion classes you get 4 laps if your lucky X 2 moto's. +the 4 laps again if your lucky for "practice" for a total of 20 laps... / by $50 that's $2.50 a lap... not counting gate fee. I go to the track every week and here riders bitching about racing costs too much. But then as soon as your suggest the ONLY thing that could lower the overall price you say "oh, don't cut my class. I want to win the $1.75 p.o.s. plastic crappy trophy or better yet the $1.12 lame "plaque" that tracks give out.
I don't care if I am at the track from sun up to sun down as long as the guys get the seat time they are paying for.

This board has really gotten boring with all the bobble head's agreeing with everything you are spoon-fed, if you are happy with the statues quo then I guess I will just go away quietly.
Make suggestions to better the sport, not your own personal agenda.

Something that you are missing is that even in a perfect world where you got the exact same seat time on a race day as a practice day (what you are asking for in more laps/less classes...) it is still going to cost you $100+/- for a race day versus $25 on a practice day.

Those same guys are still going to say racing is "too expensive"

 

[BriarcliffMx]

i expect kick back from promoters because as soon as you talk bout eliminating classes they think their profit is going to go away. (even though it wouldn't if you have a sound business plan.. or just common sense) but it blows my mind when riders disagree with this... You are currently racing two classes for $25 each. With a billion classes you get 4 laps if your lucky X 2 moto's. +the 4 laps again if your lucky for "practice" for a total of 20 laps... / by $50 that's $2.50 a lap... not counting gate fee. I go to the track every week and here riders bitching about racing costs too much. But then as soon as your suggest the ONLY thing that could lower the overall price you say "oh, don't cut my class. I want to win the $1.75 p.o.s. plastic crappy trophy or better yet the $1.12 lame "plaque" that tracks give out.
I don't care if I am at the track from sun up to sun down as long as the guys get the seat time they are paying for.

This board has really gotten boring with all the bobble head's agreeing with everything you are spoon-fed, if you are happy with the statues quo then I guess I will just go away quietly.
Make suggestions to better the sport, not your own personal agenda.

Ummm, you are getting the same seat time wether you are watching your boy ride for 8 minutes or 15 minutes.....

 

[hershey]

Any way.....

Line us all up, I don't care. I LOVE RACING. I couldn't care any less who is gated when or where. Gate some slow guys in front of me....I feel like a pro when I catch the back of the pack. Gate me in front of fast guys....I can TRY and learn some lines. It's all racing, who cares who is on the track???? Go to qualifiers if it's that important to you....because there it is. You are actually racing to advance to the regional then to LL.

And I agree with Knox. Less classes for more seat time. Given the choice I would race a track offering 10 lap motos instead of 4. That's what I'm there for. And yes, this old guy can hang for 10 laps.

 

[Mercer]

I just rejoined this site because this is a coversation I want to join finally. After not racing or even throwing a leg over a bike for 10 years + till this year, I have been highly disappointed in the local scene (aside from a few places). By "Local" I mean Central to Southern Ohio. Originally being from Northwest Ohio growing up racing everywhere across the country I did always look forward to the couple hour drives south to the District 11 stomping grounds.

I purchased a new bike 3 days before the LL Area at Briarcliff, 2 weeks later off to Red Bud and I was on my way to LL in 30+. After the Nationals I have been hitting the SOMX series because of the Contingency that I really didnt even know exsisted and stumbled upon on accident.

Although racing is racing, and any day at the track is a good day to me some of it has been dissappointing. The once awesome tracks of 10 years ago have lost their luster, and prep. The turnouts were "fair" but not great. I don't mind being at the track till dark but why have 4 50 classes, a 25 & 30 Plus A class (both my classes), and all these other meaningless classes on a "series" where contingency is involved? Wouldn't it be better, look better, and offer better longer racing if their were less classes which in my opinion would increase rider turnout across the board plus entice factories to put more contingency back in next year.

What's the point of Suzuki offering Contingency if the series and promoter can not even get 5 riders in that class? Sure, I am willing to bet there are a good handful of guys in the normal 25 & 30 plus class that wouldn't want myself or a couple of these other guys in their physical class but all it is going to do is make the racing and the day more fun and look like a stronger more lucretive series. Especially to outside riders from other states who are traveling to race the best of the best to get better?

How many up & coming fast riders in Ohio are staying in Ohio every single week like they used to? Pushing each other? Willing to bet in the mid to late 90's & early 2000's Ohio had the FASTEST crop of riders from 65's to Schoolboy week in and week from 1st to 10th in every single one of those classes, along with Michigan. Now I watch these classes and no offense but it is like the class was created just to give a participation award.

Limit the classes:
50 4-6
50 7-8
65 7-11
85 7-11
85 12-15
Supermini
Schoolboy
College Boy
2 Stroke
250 C
250 B
250 A
Open C
Open B
Open A
25+
30+
40+
50+
Women 13+
Girls

That's 21 classes, guaranteed more full gates. Better racing. More potential outside sponsorship. Bigger contingency payouts because of less classes so they can allocate that money elsewhere. More time to Prep the tracks, as their will be bigger and better drive of anticipation to produce a better racing environment.

Either way I am still racing, just my 2 cents.

 

[GeorgiePorgie]

Practicing sucks. If I'm practicing it's because there wasn't a battle race or another high turnout event available to race that weekend. (Within distance)

Practicing I find myself just dilly dallying around, wasting hours on my piston.

Racing is where it's at. But I don't want to race 4 people. And it's a damn shame our local racing sucks (less a few well run big events).

This year I found myself practicing harder (actually working on problem areas of mine---riding longer when I was a bit tired, working on technique) because I planned on racing the battle series, because I knew competition would be fierce.

For people to say don't race and go practice. Screw you. I want to race. And screw you for slamming every attempt/ idea to make it better. Atleast we got a few people passionate enough to try and say not so popular things to get balls rolling. People might hate ck1. But the guy makes valid points.


Then you got giys like mercer. Living off the grid for years and bam....wants to come back to racing and finds out it sucks. So he's pushed to live back off the grid or travel elsewhere to race. How many guys out there are like him that could be pulled back into racing ? There has to be a ton because when I raced as a kid (91-04) the gates were damn near ful all the time. Those kids are now adults. Entice them to come back.

 

[John250]

SWOHMX races 125 b/c.

The problem is Loretta Lynns. Everyone thinks that for some reason, every local track should race every LL class. I disagree. I personally feel 25+ and 35+ covers all the vets for a local race. I also believe a 450 B/C and 250 B/C at most locals covers all the B and C classes. The 65 extra class, 85 extra class, 50 open......get rid of all them. Girls, most races have 1 or 2 girls. Have them race the boys. They used too. Hell, Kelly that post on here does well in the Vet classes.

I like Mercers more old school list, but I would even go further with the Vet classes, and just do 25 and 30 plus locally.

 

[GeorgiePorgie]

Oh god a b/c class ? That can't work!!!!! Now if that's not a dead horse that was beat to death before the thing event got to the starting gate.....

 

[ck1racerx]

Thanks for chiming in mercer. Makes it better when more people voice their opinions. Your class list is basically what we have now in somx. It's not bad but I believe we would be better off cutting it a little more. 75% of the races run this year had 3 or less in the A classes. This is a no brainer and the promoters should be All over this... Combine them and make 1 A class. Less pay back so they make or keep more money. Then double the laps from 5 to 10 for that A class. Those guys are trying to make a living (or atleast break even) so running more laps will help them when they race larger events and pro races. That is a win win. Next, the B classes. Also have few in each so why not combine into one B class? The riders will save big money since they will not have to buy two bikes. Again add laps to help them get better.
C class, track owners are going to hate this but combine them also. Yes they have big turnouts in each class but I would bet most of them would also enter an age class so your net is the same. This would help the C rider because they would be running against B riders in the age group.
Youth classes. Two 50 classes at a MAX. If you get 10 kids show up on PW's then fine. Add another. But the current "oil injection" class is nothing but 50 jr Same kids on the same bikes. No way a Ktm jr should be in the same class as a PW

 

[BriarcliffMx]

Been there and tried 1 A class, didn't work, they wanted 250A too. Guess why they wanted two classes? For the same reason you claim it is a benefit to the promoter to run 1 class; Money. If A guys don't think you are getting a turn out, and you only got 1 class, then they get out the handy dandy calculator app on their phone and crunch some data. Hmmmm, that's a crappy purse.....ummmm NO. Now if you have 2 A classes and pay at least 200%, and they have a relatively good idea that the gates will be fairly full (ie battle), then they show up. I had nearly 10k wrapped up in A class payout for Battle. Pretty good payday for local A guys I thought.

I guess given that, how does cutting the A guys out help grow local motocross? Your explanation's on how this will help sound like you are trying to sell me on running snake oil in my vehicles btw. When do we get the video of you running your vehicle without oil for 16 hours straight, with no problems, after using your product??

 

[GeorgiePorgie]

JO I don't think he means cutting an A class when you have large turnouts.

"5% of the races run this year had 3 or less in the A classes". That ain't racing. That's you paying to practice with a gate drop and a pretty checkered flag.

The battle series is fine for the most part. I don't mind being there all day. Every OMA track hit it out of the park for the battle races. I haven't had so much fun RACING since 2000 until this series.


A riders can be staggered with anyone. And if people are worried about laps, let the a guys race until the leader of the slow stagger finishes. That way everybody gets their laps. Win/win.

Realistically if we tried an A and BC format you could have one gate drop at the small events. Like a malvern Saturday night or a mx213 day race for example. Or any track not singling out anyone.

 

[BriarcliffMx]

So limited classes at non battle weekends, the races already struggling to hit 250-300? I suppose the next knowledge dropped is that 150-200 entries is a great turnout too. The limited class structure is a great theory and I was hooked for awhile, but the truth is that the large majority of racers (the day to day racers that show up) aren't on here, and don't agree with it.

 

[pasimp57]

Geez. When we ran C class, everyone was calling for cutting the C class. Now we run A class, folks are calling for cutting the A class. You guys crack me up.

 

[team186]

It's the weirdest thing, most mx guys I know can't wait to get to track on weekend then once they get there they are in hurry to get race done and get home?

I personally like being at any race any track way better than my 8-5 weekday option so I find it comical how many people are in hurry to pull out Sunday. They bitch all day Sunday about every thing they think is making day long.

It is stupid.

And fyi, I have run trackside for 10 years I can make any track a race order with staggers with no conflicts before race starts. It really easy when you have atv classes in same order but doable without. Ballance mx ran 32 local classes our Bluegrass series had 36 and when SAS series came to town victory sports had close to 46. Once order worked I just flipped week to week or rotated down one or two places. Victory would send us stuff before event with canned practice and race orders for weekend.

And if you don't believe it watch victory sports Facebook page they will have race order posted before practice on raceday and normally hits Facebook while your in sign up.

Here's sept 13 race posted at 7:33am. Most riders signed up sat more were signing up Sunday so rider count is bigger by race time and gate picks not posted until sign up closes. But race order does not change. They been doing it this way for 25 years (sans Facebook side) for 700 to 1,200 entry days. It works try it, early posting also fixes a ton of issues before practice ends. If any track wants me to email them some canned race orders or wants me to set one up for their track email me, I do it for free. Good luck with the rest of your race season.

Stevehunter186@gmail.com

 

[TowerGal]

It's the weirdest thing, most mx guys I know can't wait to get to track on weekend then once they get there they are in hurry to get race done and get home?

I personally like being at any race any track way better than my 8-5 weekday option so I find it comical how many people are in hurry to pull out Sunday. They bitch all day Sunday about every thing they think is making day long.

It is stupid.

And fyi, I have run trackside for 10 years I can make any track a race order with staggers with no conflicts before race starts. It really easy when you have atv classes in same order but doable without. Ballance mx ran 32 local classes our Bluegrass series had 36 and when SAS series came to town victory sports had close to 46. Once order worked I just flipped week to week or rotated down one or two places. Victory would send us stuff before event with canned practice and race orders for weekend.

And if you don't believe it watch victory sports Facebook page they will have race order posted before practice on raceday and normally hits Facebook while your in sign up.

Here's sept 13 race posted at 7:33am. Most riders signed up sat more were signing up Sunday so rider count is bigger by race time and gate picks not posted until sign up closes. But race order does not change. They been doing it this way for 25 years (sans Facebook side) for 700 to 1,200 entry days. It works try it, early posting also fixes a ton of issues before practice ends. If any track wants me to email them some canned race orders or wants me to set one up for their track email me, I do it for free. Good luck with the rest of your race season.

Stevehunter186@gmail.com

I have used Trackside for 20 years and I agree, I COULD do a running order before racing as well, if we knew we were going to have full gates and every class was going to get their own moto for the most part! For the Battle, I have used 1 or 2, then modified them. But we aren't talking about races with 700 riders - We are talking about 200. I don't think many people want a "canned" running order that "IS WHAT IT IS" at these smaller races, which means longer nights. They want you to consider who is racing and THEN make your race order as efficiently as you can. I have had racers come up and say "SWEET" we loved racing with blah blah blah" and then I have had riders who say "What the hell is wrong with you?" lol I see several things in this race order that I wouldn't do - It's all about preferences, track, and riders at the event. For example: 2 Stroke Amateur and 250D AND +60?? So Zack Rogers and Jordan Beadling and the 250D class, PLUS 60 year olds? I just couldn't do that.. fire me.. lol A "canned" race order makes it easier for signup until they are sharing bikes, father/son racing, weather, etc.. as I explained above.. It is cool Steve that you do that, but I will take my chances and specialize it based on that day. I love challenges!

OH by the way: 1 of the lowest points in my career was using a "canned" race order at a Battle last year. Because it was canned, I didn't pick it apart and I didn't realize that the numbers in a combined class had grown to the point where THEY should have been separated! Guess what race that was? The Plus 40 and Womens at Briarcliff, which caused a s**t storm b/c of staggers and name calling and stupid crap... ALL OF THAT COULD HAVE BEEN AVOIDED by a FRESH race order.. I would have NEVER combined them had I started from scratch. Lesson Learned!