End of the AMA privateers?

End of the AMA privateers?

From * w w w .amadirectlink . com /news/2008/transcript.asp

"I think that it’s important that we find a way to move to true
professionalism here. I’ll give you an example. I don’t think that one
rider, one bike, a guy getting in a van and going somewhere to race for
prize money is professional racing. In other words, the old division
used to be, if you made a little more money than you spent, or if you
had the potential to make more money than you spent, that was
professional racing. Professional racing is when you leave home and your
bills are paid for by a sponsor, and you’re representing a company."

Seems to me this is half the SB grid and a bulk of the SS and FX grids.

With no TV rights, (Speed? Umm..no), and with what TV we do have is
basically focused on the top 5 or 6 riders in the race, so the also rans
never have any camera time. Add to that there's simply little room on
the bike to show of a corporate logo. At least you can see the TIDE logo
from across the track in NASCAR, doesn't matter what place the driver
is in, and the yellows keep them all bunched up for photo ops as well.

So, where does DMG expect to get these companies that want to sponsor
these riders? What's in it for them? And where have they been all these
years? Waiting for the factories to get out and hogging all the camera time?

At the same time, we have Duhamels line about "not all of the AMA-PRO
license racers are here to race".
* roadracingworld . com /news/article/?article=31735

That talks to the same kind of thing. Duhamels vision of racing is
clearly different from the lower end of the spectrum racers. Granted, he
gets paid to have a different kind of vision. And I don't think that
Duhamel was referring to up and coming Johnny Rock Pages of the world,
but more likely the long term veterans of the privateer paddock, who
never place well, and will never place well, and they're not
perceptively trying to place well. But they race anyway, cuz they like
the race. (How many of the short end of the grid went and lost 15 lbs
over the break like Mladin, Spies, the Bostroms, etc. The front line are
all ghosts this year.)

There are certainly SOME of these riders in the paddock. Complacent
racers, for lack of a better term. Hobbyist racers who happen to be able
to qualify in SB and can afford to play.

So, I'm just curious where DMG plans on getting all of this money. I
guess it's working out in MOTO-ST, which I think will most likely be
merged with AMA next year and from which lessons will be applied to AMA.
(Combined AMA and Grand Am "challenges" here we come!)

Changes are in the wind folks...be interesting to see how this shakes out.

Oh, and Mladin is done. If he's contracted through '09, he'll stay, but
he won't race in a series that hurts his bike so that others can catch
up, that's in the wind too.

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

On 2008-03-15 14:26:43 -0400, Will Hartung <redrocks@sbcglobal . net > said:

> From * w w w .amadirectlink . com /news/2008/transcript.asp
>
> "I think that itÕs important that we find a way to move to true
> professionalism here. IÕll give you an example. I donÕt think that one
> rider, one bike, a guy getting in a van and going somewhere to race for
> prize money is professional racing. In other words, the old division
> used to be, if you made a little more money than you spent, or if you
> had the potential to make more money than you spent, that was
> professional racing. Professional racing is when you leave home and
> your bills are paid for by a sponsor, and youÕre representing a
> company."
>
> Seems to me this is half the SB grid and a bulk of the SS and FX grids.
>
> With no TV rights, (Speed? Umm..no), and with what TV we do have is
> basically focused on the top 5 or 6 riders in the race, so the also
> rans never have any camera time. Add to that there's simply little room
> on the bike to show of a corporate logo. At least you can see the TIDE
> logo from across the track in NASCAR, doesn't matter what place the
> driver is in, and the yellows keep them all bunched up for photo ops as
> well.
>
> So, where does DMG expect to get these companies that want to sponsor
> these riders? What's in it for them? And where have they been all these
> years? Waiting for the factories to get out and hogging all the camera
> time?
>
> At the same time, we have Duhamels line about "not all of the AMA-PRO
> license racers are here to race".
> * roadracingworld . com /news/article/?article=31735
>
> That talks to the same kind of thing. Duhamels vision of racing is
> clearly different from the lower end of the spectrum racers. Granted,
> he gets paid to have a different kind of vision. And I don't think that
> Duhamel was referring to up and coming Johnny Rock Pages of the world,
> but more likely the long term veterans of the privateer paddock, who
> never place well, and will never place well, and they're not
> perceptively trying to place well. But they race anyway, cuz they like
> the race. (How many of the short end of the grid went and lost 15 lbs
> over the break like Mladin, Spies, the Bostroms, etc. The front line
> are all ghosts this year.)
>
> There are certainly SOME of these riders in the paddock. Complacent
> racers, for lack of a better term. Hobbyist racers who happen to be
> able to qualify in SB and can afford to play.
>
> So, I'm just curious where DMG plans on getting all of this money. I
> guess it's working out in MOTO-ST, which I think will most likely be
> merged with AMA next year and from which lessons will be applied to
> AMA. (Combined AMA and Grand Am "challenges" here we come!)

I dunno about that Will, I'd imagine they'd be brought into the AMA
fold, but it's unclear as whether part of SB, (which I doubt) or (more
likely) as an endurance series of their own, though I wouldn't rule out
a joint weekend "sometime(s), somewhere".. ;-)

>
> Changes are in the wind folks...be interesting to see how this shakes out.

We'll prolly get bits and pieces, or try to figure out what specific
direction they'll take by who's hired and what Corps. they may link
with, but I doubt we'll get the big picture for a while, though somehow
I get the feeling it'll end up resembling something like a stockier
WSB, sans Ducati rules, spec tires and all...

>
> Oh, and Mladin is done. If he's contracted through '09, he'll stay, but
> he won't race in a series that hurts his bike so that others can catch
> up, that's in the wind too.

And we might be surprised exactly how that happens too..

Check this out, this guy could've just asked us, as most of his
manifesto has been "discussed" here at one time, or another...

* moto-racing.speedtv . com /article/ama-sbk-advice-to-dmg-2009-manifesto/

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

T3 <notme@nowhere . net > Sat, 15 Mar 2008 16:16:34
>Check this out, this guy could've just asked us, as most of his
>manifesto has been "discussed" here at one time, or another...
>
> * moto-racing.speedtv . com /article/ama-sbk-advice-to-dmg-2009-manifesto/

Funny how what he's suggesting is almost exactly where BSB has ended up.

The one piece that might be missing is some sort of reward for the
smaller teams that have less funding. For a few years now BSB has had a
second competition known as the Superbike Privateers Cup in the same
race. But to work, the organisers need to be hard on not allowing
established teams and riders to cherry pick by nominating themselves for
it.

It's going to be hard for any Superbike series to work out what to do
with the twins. WSB and BSB are taking different routes to equalising
them with the fours. So the AMA will be able to learn from that by the
time the 2009 rules are decided. I do think the Twins should be in
there. And they do need some sort of equalisation to be competitive.

The other difficulty is picking the right level of tuning allowed for
the 600s. WSS600 and BSB600 (like FX) is expensive now and we might see
this get dumbed down. But probably not as far as AMA SS600 which is
really closer to what the rest of the world calls Superstock 600.

I think he's wrong about the 3rd championship being a one make or one
model spec championship. But perhaps it doesn't matter because there
ought to be at least 3 more races after the 2 Superbike and 1 Supersport
to fill out the race day card. Pick and choose from 125GP, Supermono,
KTM Duke cup, Buell cup, entry level Superstock 1000 and 600, R6 Cup, R1
Cup, GSXR750 Cup, or anything else the organisers can get sponsorship
for. If we want carnage for the spectators, perhaps a ZX10R cup on
slicks for 17 year olds! If the MotoGP Academy is going to mean anything
there's a good argument for it being 125GP or something that leads to
that like a spec Metrakit or KTM 125 formula for teenagers.

--
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Webmaster: * w w w .ecademy . com / T: +44 (0)192 0412 433
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Dispose Thoughtfully

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

On 2008-03-16 04:19:22 -0400, Julian Bond <julian_bond@voidstar . com > said:

> T3 <notme@nowhere . net > Sat, 15 Mar 2008 16:16:34
>> Check this out, this guy could've just asked us, as most of his
>> manifesto has been "discussed" here at one time, or another...
>>
>> * moto-racing.speedtv . com /article/ama-sbk-advice-to-dmg-2009-manifesto/
>
> Funny how what he's suggesting is almost exactly where BSB has ended up.
>
> The one piece that might be missing is some sort of reward for the
> smaller teams that have less funding. For a few years now BSB has had a
> second competition known as the Superbike Privateers Cup in the same
> race. But to work, the organisers need to be hard on not allowing
> established teams and riders to cherry pick by nominating themselves
> for it.

I agree and another piece that might be missing is the actual race
weekend formula and that's where there's a real possibility we may end
up differing from the rest of the planet. I'm down with
de-professionalizing SSport and forcing the focus on SB, I might even
go for a Red-Bull type cup for the kids, but watch out in SB, those
races could easily end-up longer, perhaps even doubling in length at
the expense of the dual race weekend we've come to expect at many
venues, not to mention being the only race on Sunday..

>
> It's going to be hard for any Superbike series to work out what to do
> with the twins. WSB and BSB are taking different routes to equalising
> them with the fours. So the AMA will be able to learn from that by the
> time the 2009 rules are decided. I do think the Twins should be in
> there. And they do need some sort of equalisation to be competitive.

The twins will be in for sure, not only have the Duc's been missed *on*
the track, but so have those free spending Ducatista's *at* the the
track, though I'd imagine it's the 800lb gorilla's that never go to a
track that DMG will end up courting heavy and THEY ALL pretty much ride
twins, (Harley crowd) bring them back to the fold and it's a winner..

>
> The other difficulty is picking the right level of tuning allowed for
> the 600s. WSS600 and BSB600 (like FX) is expensive now and we might see
> this get dumbed down. But probably not as far as AMA SS600 which is
> really closer to what the rest of the world calls Superstock 600.

I'm thinkin' the new rule book will be full of things, things you can not do..

>
> I think he's wrong about the 3rd championship being a one make or one
> model spec championship. But perhaps it doesn't matter because there
> ought to be at least 3 more races after the 2 Superbike and 1
> Supersport to fill out the race day card. Pick and choose from 125GP,
> Supermono, KTM Duke cup, Buell cup, entry level Superstock 1000 and
> 600, R6 Cup, R1 Cup, GSXR750 Cup, or anything else the organisers can
> get sponsorship for. If we want carnage for the spectators, perhaps a
> ZX10R cup on slicks for 17 year olds! If the MotoGP Academy is going to
> mean anything there's a good argument for it being 125GP or something
> that leads to that like a spec Metrakit or KTM 125 formula for
> teenagers.

I really haven't thought about that a whole bunch, but you're right
there are a lot of options, though I'd think they'd opt for something
along the Red Bull line..

Just about everyone agrees that it's going to change, but I wonder if
it'll be a Machiavellian type deal and happen all at once, or whether
they'll ease us into it over a period of a few years. It's really to
soon to tell, but given who's now running the show and the
knowledge/experience/history they have, it could happen all next year,
but we'll see..

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

T3 <notme@nowhere . net > Sun, 16 Mar 2008 13:23:13
>I agree and another piece that might be missing is the actual race
>weekend formula and that's where there's a real possibility we may end
>up differing from the rest of the planet. I'm down with
>de-professionalizing SSport and forcing the focus on SB, I might even
>go for a Red-Bull type cup for the kids, but watch out in SB, those
>races could easily end-up longer, perhaps even doubling in length at
>the expense of the dual race weekend we've come to expect at many
>venues, not to mention being the only race on Sunday..

More than one tank of fuel and so pit stops? Really? Hell, why not just
call it an endurance championship and run 6, 12 and 24 hour races.

--
Julian Bond E&MSN: julian_bond at voidstar . com M: +44 (0)77 5907 2173
Webmaster: * w w w .ecademy . com / T: +44 (0)192 0412 433
Personal WebLog: * w w w .voidstar . com / skype:julian.bond?chat
Discontinue Use If Rash Persists

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

On 2008-03-16 14:49:26 -0400, Julian Bond <julian_bond@voidstar . com > said:

> T3 <notme@nowhere . net > Sun, 16 Mar 2008 13:23:13
>> I agree and another piece that might be missing is the actual race
>> weekend formula and that's where there's a real possibility we may end
>> up differing from the rest of the planet. I'm down with
>> de-professionalizing SSport and forcing the focus on SB, I might even
>> go for a Red-Bull type cup for the kids, but watch out in SB, those
>> races could easily end-up longer, perhaps even doubling in length at
>> the expense of the dual race weekend we've come to expect at many
>> venues, not to mention being the only race on Sunday..
>
> More than one tank of fuel and so pit stops? Really? Hell, why not just
> call it an endurance championship and run 6, 12 and 24 hour races.

I'm not saying it's for sure gonna' move that way, I'm saying it's a
recognizable format in this country and I wouldn't be surprised if
longer SB races, complete with pit stops and tire changes, were in our
future at some point...

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

> I'm not saying it's for sure gonna' move that way, I'm saying it's a
> recognizable format in this country and I wouldn't be surprised if
> longer SB races, complete with pit stops and tire changes, were in our
> future at some point...

One of the blurbs from the transcript was some mumbling about the use of
radios.

Now, I know the Duhamel has used radios in the past, and others may well
have done so.

Obviously, radios are a "big deal" in NASCAR, as it's one more channel
to monetize (plus it seems half the spectators look like Martians with
their head sets, scanners, and antennae as they try to listen in to the
crew/driver chatter).

I don't really care if radios exist or not, but I do question what the
point is. In NASCAR, they make a bunch of sense. The radios are the
extra mirrors the cars don't have. There can be a lot of chatter about
what's going on at the next pit stop, or if someone is moving up from
87th to 53rd in the field, or whatever.

But I can't see much point of it in a motorcycle sprint race. Things
either happen extremely fast (guy goes wide, rider passes on the inside,
etc.), or extremely slow (how fast is your nearest rival coming up on
you, how far behind are they, etc.) and handleable via the pit board.

I don't think as a rider I want some yahoo screaming in my ear as a
backseat driver. "HE'S WIDE HE'S WIDE GO INSIDE INSIDE" "No shit, he's 6
inches from my front wheel -- I saw it! STFU! I got a hard left coming
up." It would be like racing with your wife.

But it could be a back door in to an endurance series. 200K races, pit
stops, every possible excuse to get a pace car on track to keep the
"field competitive", whatever. In a sprint race, 2/3rds of the way
through, the race is done. Some details may not be known, but we have a
a solid idea what the top 10 will be, and good chance at guessing their
order across the line. The last 3rd of the race is to see who is in
better shape and made a better tire choice. I personally don't consider
this a bad thing.

Endurance races are fine, but they're different. Take WERA Endurance.
I've been to a couple as a spectator, and I had a good time. But it
takes patience and know how to appreciate that kind of race. And that
race is a slower race. The Vesrah Suzuki guys, lead WERA team, for
example. I mean, they're fast guys, on fast bikes, but their times
wouldn't put them on a SB grid. They ride at a different level in a 6
hour race and run different equipment. SSport times are closer to SB
than Endurance times. If I wanted to watch bikes that speed, I'd pull up
reruns from 10 years ago.

If DMG wants to kill the Saturday crowd, go ahead and run an endurance
race. The vendors will enjoy it, because they'll have time to watch the
race as well.

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

On 2008-03-16 16:39:14 -0400, Will Hartung <redrocks@sbcglobal . net > said:

>> I'm not saying it's for sure gonna' move that way, I'm saying it's a
>> recognizable format in this country and I wouldn't be surprised if
>> longer SB races, complete with pit stops and tire changes, were in our
>> future at some point...
>
> One of the blurbs from the transcript was some mumbling about the use
> of radios.
>
> Now, I know the Duhamel has used radios in the past, and others may
> well have done so.
>
> Obviously, radios are a "big deal" in NASCAR, as it's one more channel
> to monetize (plus it seems half the spectators look like Martians with
> their head sets, scanners, and antennae as they try to listen in to the
> crew/driver chatter).
>
> I don't really care if radios exist or not, but I do question what the
> point is. In NASCAR, they make a bunch of sense. The radios are the
> extra mirrors the cars don't have. There can be a lot of chatter about
> what's going on at the next pit stop, or if someone is moving up from
> 87th to 53rd in the field, or whatever.
>
> But I can't see much point of it in a motorcycle sprint race. Things
> either happen extremely fast (guy goes wide, rider passes on the
> inside, etc.), or extremely slow (how fast is your nearest rival coming
> up on you, how far behind are they, etc.) and handleable via the pit
> board.
>
> I don't think as a rider I want some yahoo screaming in my ear as a
> backseat driver. "HE'S WIDE HE'S WIDE GO INSIDE INSIDE" "No shit, he's
> 6 inches from my front wheel -- I saw it! STFU! I got a hard left
> coming up." It would be like racing with your wife.

I picked up on that little nugget too, hence my pit stop musing. Of
course, he could've just been talking about DIS, but I think it went a
little deeper than that. An intercom type deal might not be too bad, as
it for sure would help come pit time, or if there's a specific problem
that can be addressed in the pits, but other than that they're pretty
much universally considered a distraction and probably not too useful
in a sprint race environment..

>
> But it could be a back door in to an endurance series. 200K races, pit
> stops, every possible excuse to get a pace car on track to keep the
> "field competitive", whatever. In a sprint race, 2/3rds of the way
> through, the race is done. Some details may not be known, but we have a
> a solid idea what the top 10 will be, and good chance at guessing their
> order across the line. The last 3rd of the race is to see who is in
> better shape and made a better tire choice. I personally don't consider
> this a bad thing.

I understand, but a lot of folks do consider it a crowd killer, take
the last race for example. Mat gets the holeshot, the others got all
racy and he cruised, end of story. Yeah, it was a shortened race, but
would the outcome been different if it weren't? I seriously doubt it.
Now, through in a fuel stop and tire change and I'd almost bet it would
be different..

>
> Endurance races are fine, but they're different. Take WERA Endurance.
> I've been to a couple as a spectator, and I had a good time. But it
> takes patience and know how to appreciate that kind of race. And that
> race is a slower race. The Vesrah Suzuki guys, lead WERA team, for
> example. I mean, they're fast guys, on fast bikes, but their times
> wouldn't put them on a SB grid. They ride at a different level in a 6
> hour race and run different equipment. SSport times are closer to SB
> than Endurance times. If I wanted to watch bikes that speed, I'd pull
> up reruns from 10 years ago.

Endurance races are just plain confusing, too many asses in too many classes..

>
> If DMG wants to kill the Saturday crowd, go ahead and run an endurance
> race. The vendors will enjoy it, because they'll have time to watch the
> race as well.

It'll be interesting if nothing else...

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

On Mar 16, 4:39 pm, Will Hartung <redro...@sbcglobal . net > wrote:

> I don't really care if radios exist or not, but I do question what the
> point is. In NASCAR, they make a bunch of sense. The radios are the
> extra mirrors the cars don't have. There can be a lot of chatter about
> what's going on at the next pit stop, or if someone is moving up from
> 87th to 53rd in the field, or whatever.
>
> But I can't see much point of it in a motorcycle sprint race. Things
> either happen extremely fast (guy goes wide, rider passes on the inside,
> etc.), or extremely slow (how fast is your nearest rival coming up on
> you, how far behind are they, etc.) and handleable via the pit board.
>
> I don't think as a rider I want some yahoo screaming in my ear as a
> backseat driver. "HE'S WIDE HE'S WIDE GO INSIDE INSIDE" "No shit, he's 6
> inches from my front wheel -- I saw it! STFU! I got a hard left coming
> up." It would be like racing with your wife.

During practice for the Moto-ST Daytona 300, we were sorting out our
radio communcations, and at one point we had a problem with the Moto-
ST official's "feed" being piped into my headphones inside my helmet
while I was on track. At first I almost crashed, thinking it was my
crew and they were trying to talk to me, and then it bacame an
incessant distraction, and then they "stepped on" my crew when they
really were trying to talk to me. It sucked.

That was all ironed out by the race, but with us missing most of the
race with mechanical problems, the radio's usefulness was marginal at
best. I expect they'll be more useful (for the Moto-ST endurance
format) at tracks we are unfamiliar with.

I can't see any usefulness for them in sprint races.

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

tomor...@erols . com reports:

> During practice for the Moto-ST Daytona 300, we were sorting out our
> radio communcations, and at one point we had a problem with the Moto-
> ST official's "feed" being piped into my headphones inside my helmet
> while I was on track. At first I almost crashed, thinking it was my
> crew and they were trying to talk to me, and then it bacame an
> incessant distraction, and then they "stepped on" my crew when they
> really were trying to talk to me. It sucked.

That is the exact same experience we had setting up crew to rider com
for our team in AMACCS endurance races.

In 1984


Go fast. Take chances.
Mike S.

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

On Sat, 15 Mar 2008 11:26:43 -0700, Will Hartung
<redrocks@sbcglobal . net > wrote:

> From * w w w .amadirectlink . com /news/2008/transcript.asp
>
>"I think that it’s important that we find a way to move to true
>professionalism here. I’ll give you an example. I don’t think that one
>rider, one bike, a guy getting in a van and going somewhere to race for
>prize money is professional racing. In other words, the old division
>used to be, if you made a little more money than you spent, or if you
>had the potential to make more money than you spent, that was
>professional racing. Professional racing is when you leave home and your
>bills are paid for by a sponsor, and you’re representing a company."
>
>Seems to me this is half the SB grid and a bulk of the SS and FX grids.
>
>With no TV rights, (Speed? Umm..no), and with what TV we do have is
>basically focused on the top 5 or 6 riders in the race, so the also rans
>never have any camera time. Add to that there's simply little room on
>the bike to show of a corporate logo. At least you can see the TIDE logo
> from across the track in NASCAR, doesn't matter what place the driver
>is in, and the yellows keep them all bunched up for photo ops as well.
>
>So, where does DMG expect to get these companies that want to sponsor
>these riders? What's in it for them? And where have they been all these
>years? Waiting for the factories to get out and hogging all the camera time?
>

That was pretty much my immediate reaction to the press conference and
the comments made there as well (the "Daytona 200...spoilers" thread
from 3/9).

>At the same time, we have Duhamels line about "not all of the AMA-PRO
>license racers are here to race".
> * roadracingworld . com /news/article/?article1735
>
>That talks to the same kind of thing. Duhamels vision of racing is
>clearly different from the lower end of the spectrum racers. Granted, he
>gets paid to have a different kind of vision. And I don't think that
>Duhamel was referring to up and coming Johnny Rock Pages of the world,
>but more likely the long term veterans of the privateer paddock, who
>never place well, and will never place well, and they're not
>perceptively trying to place well. But they race anyway, cuz they like
>the race. (How many of the short end of the grid went and lost 15 lbs
>over the break like Mladin, Spies, the Bostroms, etc. The front line are
>all ghosts this year.)
>
>There are certainly SOME of these riders in the paddock. Complacent
>racers, for lack of a better term. Hobbyist racers who happen to be able
>to qualify in SB and can afford to play.

There's probably a lot of bimbo poontang to be had by being able say
"I'm a professional motorcycle racer in the AMA Superbike series" even
if you finish last every time!

>
>So, I'm just curious where DMG plans on getting all of this money. I
>guess it's working out in MOTO-ST, which I think will most likely be
>merged with AMA next year and from which lessons will be applied to AMA.
>(Combined AMA and Grand Am "challenges" here we come!)
>
>Changes are in the wind folks...be interesting to see how this shakes out.
>
>Oh, and Mladin is done. If he's contracted through '09, he'll stay, but
>he won't race in a series that hurts his bike so that others can catch
>up, that's in the wind too.

Restrictor plate racing? At least they did promise no "Motorcycle of
Tomorrow", but wouldn't it be a hoot if at some point they make every
bike have to have the same frame and bodywork, same height off the
ground when the suspension isn't compressed, etc., and the only thing
the manufacturers are allowed to put in are the engines?

"Hi! My name is Jake Zemke and I race motorcycles. You probably know
me as number 98. But before I fill up the tank of my bike with gas to
go racing, I fill up MY tank with Kellog's Frosted Flakes. They're
Grreat!"

I guess Yates will be sponsored by Viagra, because he's a dick... <G>

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

Will Hartung wrote:
> From * w w w .amadirectlink . com /news/2008/transcript.asp
>
> "I think that it’s important that we find a way to move to true
> professionalism here. I’ll give you an example. I don’t think that one
> rider, one bike, a guy getting in a van and going somewhere to race for
> prize money is professional racing. In other words, the old division
> used to be, if you made a little more money than you spent, or if you
> had the potential to make more money than you spent, that was
> professional racing. Professional racing is when you leave home and your
> bills are paid for by a sponsor, and you’re representing a company."
>
> Seems to me this is half the SB grid and a bulk of the SS and FX grids.
>
> With no TV rights, (Speed? Umm..no), and with what TV we do have is
> basically focused on the top 5 or 6 riders in the race, so the also rans
> never have any camera time. Add to that there's simply little room on
> the bike to show of a corporate logo. At least you can see the TIDE logo
> from across the track in NASCAR, doesn't matter what place the driver
> is in, and the yellows keep them all bunched up for photo ops as well.
>
> So, where does DMG expect to get these companies that want to sponsor
> these riders? What's in it for them? And where have they been all these
> years? Waiting for the factories to get out and hogging all the camera
> time?
>
> At the same time, we have Duhamels line about "not all of the AMA-PRO
> license racers are here to race".
> * roadracingworld . com /news/article/?article=31735
>
> That talks to the same kind of thing. Duhamels vision of racing is
> clearly different from the lower end of the spectrum racers. Granted, he
> gets paid to have a different kind of vision. And I don't think that
> Duhamel was referring to up and coming Johnny Rock Pages of the world,
> but more likely the long term veterans of the privateer paddock, who
> never place well, and will never place well, and they're not
> perceptively trying to place well. But they race anyway, cuz they like
> the race. (How many of the short end of the grid went and lost 15 lbs
> over the break like Mladin, Spies, the Bostroms, etc. The front line are
> all ghosts this year.)
>
> There are certainly SOME of these riders in the paddock. Complacent
> racers, for lack of a better term. Hobbyist racers who happen to be able
> to qualify in SB and can afford to play.
>
> So, I'm just curious where DMG plans on getting all of this money. I
> guess it's working out in MOTO-ST, which I think will most likely be
> merged with AMA next year and from which lessons will be applied to AMA.
> (Combined AMA and Grand Am "challenges" here we come!)
>
> Changes are in the wind folks...be interesting to see how this shakes out.
>
> Oh, and Mladin is done. If he's contracted through '09, he'll stay, but
> he won't race in a series that hurts his bike so that others can catch
> up, that's in the wind too.

Hey, Will, good to see you back. On this subject, I think you might have
it backward, are we about to see the end of the real pros? It seems as
likely that the new management is probably going to attack the issue of
toio much professionalism, in the form of Mladin, Spies, Yosh and
Suzuki, before they do much of anything to lift the low end of the grid
out of its amateur status.

It seems like one of the fundamental problems, if you want to call it
that, of the AMA championship has been that it's two things
simultaneously - a production-based factory-supported championship that
has been overall as good as any in the world in terms of front-running
quality, and at the other end of the scale pretty much just a national
club racing championship. That's been the case because the factories
spend a lot on this championship, but beyond that no one spends all that
much.

Now there are no good answers regarding helping the latter, it seems,
other than some vague notions that more competent people with more of a
budget will somehow make the series bigger than it is now. What most
people seem to have are ideas about how to slow the fastest guys down,
which strikes me as damned peculiar and really kinda scary. The article
Tom links is typical of this sort of thing, and here are some examples:

- Spec tires: He makes the case that Dunlop gives the fast guys better
tires than the slower guys, which is absolutely true. But has any rider
ever lost a SB race because he didn't get the "factory tires"? I really
doubt it, the guys who get the production tires generally don't have the
machinery or the riding talent to win at that level anyway. So what will
spec tires do? It will slow the factory guys down some, because spec
tires will always be worse than the more experimental, cutting edge
stuff provided to a more limited pool of riders, but they would still do
all the winning. Slow privateers might finish two laps down instead of
three. Maybe.

- Equalize the bikes: He says they should both dumb down the bikes,
make them more stock, and try to outlaw "unobtainium". What that means
is mandated kit bikes, because the factories will have to make available
to everyone any part that they want to use. Like spec tires it devalues
the R&D aspect of racing and makes it more expensive for the factories,
because they have to manufacture parts for people who may or may not buy
them. If they charge the true cost it will make them prohibitively
expensive for privateers, so what happens then? Does the series
determine a price, forcing the factories to subsidize privateers? Or do
the factories have to back down the parts, essentially having to run
only what low-budget privateers can run? Do we end up with SS instead of
SB because that's the only thing a 30-rider grid can afford?

He also talks about emphasizing SB more, and suggests this would result
in teams like Erion and Attack running SB. But he forgets that these
are heavily factory-supported teams, and what do those factories support
them for? To win in support classes that the factory team doesn't
contest. Will they do this if those teams are challenging their factory
teams in SB and nothing else? There has to be real doubt that they
would. He does recognize that the factories essentially pay for the
professional aspect of the series now and that you have to respect the
factories or run a serious risk if they turn on the series. But he makes
absolutely no suggestion about how to do this, given that almost
everything else he suggests may not be entirely to their liking.

To me this kind of thinking is absolutely backward. Dunlop wants to
invest in this series, to have it as an R&D vehicle, because they are no
longer in WSB, MotoGP or BSB. So let them. The best thing about the AMA
SB championship are the factory or factory-supported bikes and riders,
which are for the most part at a very high level. Don't do anything to
drive them out or discourage top talent from coming or staying here.
Instead try to help the others catch up to them. If these new guys are
so good at bringing in and making money, have them bring in a big series
sponsor and then increase SB purse money by a lot, a huge amount. Or
share the series income with the SB teams under a franchise-like
scenario like MotoGP. Make running SB very desirable from an income
standpoint and people will come to race. Make it worth even more to do
well and they will invest in winning, or at least running at the front
of the non-factory field. Make finishing 10th in SB something to throw a
party over. And materially limit the field, so not making the grid has a
big cost, thereby incentivizing the backmarkers even more. Really
perform or go home. Find ways to help people climb the mountain, don't
just tear down the mountain.

Non-industry sponsors will only come to individual teams when there is a
reason to, and that simply doesn't exist today. Nor will it anytime
soon, pretty much no matter what the NASBike boys do. First comes basic,
organic growth, more fans at more events and more watching TV. I do
think that takes good racing, but it's not like Mladin vs. Spies has
been boring. Will dumbing down SBs cut into the perceived Suzuki
advantage? Look at SStock for clues - I guess not. Do they really have a
huge machine advantage? Look at Tommy Hayden for clues - I guess not.
Both Mladin and Spies may be gone after this year, so why even think
about wasting time on that issue? Bigger fish to fry.

Eliminating more classes doesn't help either. Event promoters seem to
like the Saturday SB race as it bumps the crowd, and I think it would be
a big mistake to eliminate it. So if you are left with three finals on
Sunday, one or two of which may not be viewed as terribly compelling,
that's not much of a show for the fans at the track. The obvious
alternative to this is to make the feature SB race a Daytona-like
semi-endurance two hour race. But then you're not going to run one of
those on both days, and you've moved beyond what is perceived as sprint
racing worldwide. That's not only very, very risky, but it disconnects
American racing from the rest of top-level racing around the world,
which does the same thing to the riders - will an American rider ever
race at the world level again? Will riders from elsewhere stop coming
here? Unfortunately, if these guys are going to try some radical change,
this is probably it.

What I would prefer to see is more distinction between classes using the
same basic equipment. Have literbike and middleweight SB classes doing
sprint races, but then have a SSport class for newcomers or non-pros, or
have this semi-endurance class as a support class, run on Saturdays. But
don't mess with the main show.

Of course, what are the chances that this will happen? Not that great,
looking at Edmondson's and the Frances histories and the nature of this
situation. This is now an entirely commercial venture run for the
financial benefit of a very small group of people, and we no longer have
any concept of stewardship of American racing. The best I can say is
that we're unlikely to end up with a bunch of midgets as the show...

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

Mark N wrote:
> Hey, Will, good to see you back. On this subject, I think you might have
> it backward, are we about to see the end of the real pros? It seems as
> likely that the new management is probably going to attack the issue of
> toio much professionalism, in the form of Mladin, Spies, Yosh and
> Suzuki, before they do much of anything to lift the low end of the grid
> out of its amateur status.
>
> It seems like one of the fundamental problems, if you want to call it
> that, of the AMA championship has been that it's two things
> simultaneously - a production-based factory-supported championship that
> has been overall as good as any in the world in terms of front-running
> quality, and at the other end of the scale pretty much just a national
> club racing championship. That's been the case because the factories
> spend a lot on this championship, but beyond that no one spends all that
> much.

Well, that's the trick. The "Pro-Am" nature of the series, where the top
tier is spending literally 1 to 2 orders of MAGNITUDE over the others is
difficult to reconcile.

For me, it's always been difficult for me to grok the "economics" of
racing. I understand why riders ride, I get that. I barely understand
why someone is willing to pay them to do so.

For example, Larry Pegram. He's a good guy, he can spin two wheels
around a racetrack. Lot of respect for him, and I use him as a example
of a "professional privateer". But you look at his pedigree (10th,
12ths, etc., consistently) and I have to wonder how do you go to someone
and say 'I can get in to the top 10 sometimes' and have them eagerly
sign over a check? Again, it's no slight meant against Larry, it just
more shows the reality of the system. He's the kind of rider that's on
the second step, with the factories on the first step.

He's hoping to run well against the Hondas in FX this year, and I hope
he does. He had all sorts of power on the Duc last year, but I guess
just couldn't get it to turn.

The Larry's of the paddock on down epitomize the culture of the AMA, the
"-AM" nature of the game. The "comraderie and fellowship" in the
garages. If you listen to the Matt's and Miguels of the paddock, you can
see their opinion of the second step of the paddock, and they're
nowadays pretty far separated from that "community".

But are the Bostroms and Haydens of the AMA willing to take the pay cut
necessary to be "equitable" with the rest of the field? Because, we
certainly have talent in the paddock. Apparently not enough for the
factories that they look overseas for talent, but the AMA guys can ride.

But that talent isn't getting paid what the top talent is being paid. If
they were, they'd have better machinery, because their salary isn't
what's keeping the rider off of the podium. So if there were some kind
of spending cap, would the top riders be willing to take the cut in
order to play. When you're running million dollars worth of machinery,
the salaries "work", but if you're stuck with a $50,000 race bike, is
the rider worth so much more than the equipment, for a $5,000 purse?? As
Al Luddington quipped, the rider is the most important part of the
motorcycle, and the easiest to replace.

> Now there are no good answers regarding helping the latter, it seems,
> other than some vague notions that more competent people with more of a
> budget will somehow make the series bigger than it is now. What most
> people seem to have are ideas about how to slow the fastest guys down,
> which strikes me as damned peculiar and really kinda scary.

> - Spec tires

Tommy's bad year and Jamie Hackings great year showed us last year that
what makes the Suzuki guys fast is not, necessarily, the motorcycle.
Suzuki makes a good bike, but they're not doing swimmingly in WSB. And
say what you want about spec tires, the Dunlops may not be the same down
the grid, but American Honda, Yosh Suzuki, Monster Kawasaki and Graves
Yamaha are on "spec tires". They all have the same tire. They all are
getting exactly what they want from Dunlop. The Rick Shaw's of the world
may not, but the factories are, and the Suzuki's still got away from the
field.

And the DOT tires in SSport still managed to put the factories on top,
well ahead of the rest of the field.

> - Equalize the bikes

Or worse, you just end up with "the Suzuki cup", like SStock is this
year (2 Hondas and Yamaha are all that raced at Daytona). It's Yate's to
lose this year.

Back when SStock was 750's, again it was the Suzuki cup -- And I paid
little attention to it. As a spectator, I don't really care how well
Rider A does against Rider B. I can't judge how well R. Pietri is doing
against D. Weber. (Who?) I CAN judge how they're doing against the
"celebrities" that I know, the personalities that I follow, as I can't
follow the entire field.

I've always said that to watch racing, you need to care about someone in
the race. Anyone. Because in that context the race makes sense. How are
they doing, are they doing better, who's catching up to them in the
championship, how does todays results affect them long term, etc.

Other wise it's just watching a parade of colored shapes (or legos if
you watch the crap that we get on Speed, zig zagging smudgy blobs that
look almost, but not quite, completely unlike motorcycles...) followed
by "oh, it's over? Let's go get a drink...".

The Cogniscenti will watch and rate everyone in the support classes,
find the up and comers, but I don't have that much patience. Ben Spies
didn't show up on my radar until he showed up in Superbike, where his
mettle could be best measured, against yard sticks I understood. But I
am a mere consumer of the this show, not one looking for new talent. And
it doesn't do me any good to invest in a rider that's not "made it yet".
The factory choices tell me, as an "uninformed consumer" who to watch
and who should perform well, because they have a lot more invested in
that choice than I do.

> He also talks about emphasizing SB more...

To do this they'll have to increase the number of events. There are too
few chances for "stuff to happen" as is in the AMA. WSB has the double
header format as well as a long calendar. AMA has a really short
calendar, giving early races a much larger impact to the season. One DNF
and your season is pretty much done in the support classes if the
leaders don't also suffer one. Look at what happened to Eric in FX two
years ago when he lost to Hayes. He was fighting back from the Barber
DNF (Second race in the season) to the last lap in the last race, and
barely lost the championship. (This could be addressed by the point
system, I'm sure. I like Josh Hayes, but Eric is the one who "won" FX
two years ago, IMHO.)

And the double header nature of the SB class can be parades with little
difference between the two races. At least they're over two days so the
weather can change. WSB has almost 1/2 again more races in the season.
GP even more.


> Non-industry sponsors will only come to individual teams when there is a
> reason to, and that simply doesn't exist today.

If you only focus on SB for media, there's even less reason for sponsors
to support the support classes. But, if you dedicate an hour of TV to
the "SB practice and qualifying", that gives SB sponsors another chance
to get the Taco Bell-Clorox-Massingil Suzuki it's 2 minutes of screen
time, as long as it doesn't interfere with any NASCAR programming natch.
Speed would love to cut 2 hrs of TV from bike racing, so they could
run another 1/2 mile dirt track from NASCAR South at the Clarkston
county fair, or whatever.

They couldn't find 2 hrs to run an Isle of Mann summary show last year
for crying out loud!

> What I would prefer to see is more distinction between classes using the
> same basic equipment. Have literbike and middleweight SB classes doing
> sprint races, but then have a SSport class for newcomers or non-pros, or
> have this semi-endurance class as a support class, run on Saturdays. But
> don't mess with the main show.

I don't want to come on Sunday to watch 1, 1hr race, at no doubt higher
ticket prices. I don't want the paddock sealed off to keep the "pro's"
away from the "masses". I have no interest in watching a bunch of kids
running around on 125s. I never watched the 250's in the past either.
There was just no "there" there for me. I appreciate it can be a more
technical race for the riders, and I can understand their zeal for it.
But it's not really interesting to me (I don't watch 250 GP either).

Racing as a spectator takes an investment: a rider, the industry, the
whole market, whatever. Whatever it is that you go to the races to see
perform. For me, it's the riders. The guys on the podiums. I feel for
folks coming to SB in the past couple of years where all we had were the
Suzuki guys, and with the great disparities. I came before that and
have an "investment" in the mid pack. To capture me as a viewer, you
need to be racing with the guys I'm already invested in, to catch my
eye. So I can curse your name, or laugh at your failures, or say "ya
know, he's not bad".

Otherwise, ya know, I'll head out to Willow a couple times a year and
watch them race. Find new riders, riders close by. Riders I can walk up
to and say "good job".

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

Will Hartung wrote:

> For me, it's always been difficult for me to grok the "economics" of
> racing. I understand why riders ride, I get that. I barely understand
> why someone is willing to pay them to do so.
>
> For example, Larry Pegram. He's a good guy, he can spin two wheels
> around a racetrack. Lot of respect for him, and I use him as a example
> of a "professional privateer". But you look at his pedigree (10th,
> 12ths, etc., consistently) and I have to wonder how do you go to someone
> and say 'I can get in to the top 10 sometimes' and have them eagerly
> sign over a check? Again, it's no slight meant against Larry, it just
> more shows the reality of the system. He's the kind of rider that's on
> the second step, with the factories on the first step.

Interesting that you mention the Worm, because he got his big break when
Ferracci decided he wouldn't/couldn't pay the "superstar" riders and
conducted tryouts for the 1996 season, and he ended up on a Ducati.
Didn't have a great year, but that got him a Yosh ride the next couple
seasons, and then back with Eraldo in 1999 (and his only SB win). After
that it was that Competition Accessories deal he put together with
Ducati, a not-quite-factory setup. Since then he's kept up his contacts
with Ducati and it's paid off. He's not a factory rider but he must do
fine for a "privateer".

> The Larry's of the paddock on down epitomize the culture of the AMA, the
> "-AM" nature of the game. The "comraderie and fellowship" in the
> garages. If you listen to the Matt's and Miguels of the paddock, you can
> see their opinion of the second step of the paddock, and they're
> nowadays pretty far separated from that "community".

I really don't believe the factory guys have any issue with someone like
Pegram. Rather it's guys like Page that they're concerned with, guys who
struggle just to make the 108% cutoff, guys they have to work by two or
three times in a race and countless other times in practice. Guys who
are on the grid because they can afford to be, and not much else. Guys
who just want that $1500 purse check so they can buy gas to get home.
And I don't blame them.

> But are the Bostroms and Haydens of the AMA willing to take the pay cut
> necessary to be "equitable" with the rest of the field? Because, we
> certainly have talent in the paddock. Apparently not enough for the
> factories that they look overseas for talent, but the AMA guys can ride.
>
> But that talent isn't getting paid what the top talent is being paid. If
> they were, they'd have better machinery, because their salary isn't
> what's keeping the rider off of the podium. So if there were some kind
> of spending cap, would the top riders be willing to take the cut in
> order to play. When you're running million dollars worth of machinery,
> the salaries "work", but if you're stuck with a $50,000 race bike, is
> the rider worth so much more than the equipment, for a $5,000 purse?? As
> Al Luddington quipped, the rider is the most important part of the
> motorcycle, and the easiest to replace.

The factories want to win, they want to show well, and that certainly
takes riding talent. At a baseline level the factories want to pay their
guys enough that they don't have to have a second job, so they can train
and show up at all tests and publicity gigs, etc. You don't want a guy
falling asleep in the garage because he had to drive all night to get to
the track after working the day before.

Beyond that it's all about results, and winning pays off big. Look at
Mladin - six championships and twice the SB wins of any other rider in
AMA history has made him the 2nd-highest-paid rider in the world, and
probably in the top five all-time. That certainly could pay for a lot of
lesser riders, but then you also lose Mat, as he goes elsewhere if the
money's better. So do I want to watch Mladin race or see some nicer rigs
in the hands of a half-dozen privateers in the paddock? I'll take Mat
every time - I don't go to see good-looking mediocrity.

> Tommy's bad year and Jamie Hackings great year showed us last year that
> what makes the Suzuki guys fast is not, necessarily, the motorcycle.
> Suzuki makes a good bike, but they're not doing swimmingly in WSB. And
> say what you want about spec tires, the Dunlops may not be the same down
> the grid, but American Honda, Yosh Suzuki, Monster Kawasaki and Graves
> Yamaha are on "spec tires". They all have the same tire. They all are
> getting exactly what they want from Dunlop. The Rick Shaw's of the world
> may not, but the factories are, and the Suzuki's still got away from the
> field.

Correct.

> And the DOT tires in SSport still managed to put the factories on top,
> well ahead of the rest of the field.

Correct.

>> He also talks about emphasizing SB more...
>
> To do this they'll have to increase the number of events. There are too
> few chances for "stuff to happen" as is in the AMA. WSB has the double
> header format as well as a long calendar. AMA has a really short
> calendar, giving early races a much larger impact to the season. One DNF
> and your season is pretty much done in the support classes if the
> leaders don't also suffer one. Look at what happened to Eric in FX two
> years ago when he lost to Hayes. He was fighting back from the Barber
> DNF (Second race in the season) to the last lap in the last race, and
> barely lost the championship. (This could be addressed by the point
> system, I'm sure. I like Josh Hayes, but Eric is the one who "won" FX
> two years ago, IMHO.)
>
> And the double header nature of the SB class can be parades with little
> difference between the two races. At least they're over two days so the
> weather can change. WSB has almost 1/2 again more races in the season.
> GP even more.

Not quite as bad as you say. This year the AMA has 11 events, 19 races,
same as last year. WSB has 15 events, 30 races, which is two more events
than last year, although Sentul is expected to be dropped. MotoGP is at
their self-imposed 18 event/race cap. In the AMA the two Laguna rounds
really add up to one, with SSport being the only class that benefits
from the "split round". They certainly could add two or three more
rounds, as always. We do pretty much know Daytona will be added as a
"decider" at the end of the year, probably with something that makes it
that - Daytona just has to be the defining show to these people and it's
all part of manufactured competitiveness - but that might well end the
2nd Laguna round.

SB has enough races with the double-header format, but ten is a small
number for the support classes. The real problem in terms of the
championship is the points system, which has sucked from the day the AMA
started using it back in '95. Will NASBike use the international system?
I don't know what they use in Moto-ST, but my guess is that they won't,
they'll more likely come up with something as convoluted as Nascar, with
no championship being decided prior to the Daytona "decider".

>> Non-industry sponsors will only come to individual teams when there is a
>> reason to, and that simply doesn't exist today.
>
> If you only focus on SB for media, there's even less reason for sponsors
> to support the support classes. But, if you dedicate an hour of TV to
> the "SB practice and qualifying", that gives SB sponsors another chance
> to get the Taco Bell-Clorox-Massingil Suzuki it's 2 minutes of screen
> time, as long as it doesn't interfere with any NASCAR programming natch.
> Speed would love to cut 2 hrs of TV from bike racing, so they could run
> another 1/2 mile dirt track from NASCAR South at the Clarkston county
> fair, or whatever.
>
> They couldn't find 2 hrs to run an Isle of Mann summary show last year
> for crying out loud!

TV is a function of popularity and what advertisers will support, and
that's Nascar in spades today. In the shorter run I doubt we'll see much
more, bike racing isn't underappreciated today because it doesn't get
enough TV time. The Nascar folks certainly have influence with Speed and
could arrange for more, no doubt, but what they need is broadcast TV, or
even basic cable - paying extra for Speed means a lot of folks who might
watch won't. But I still think it builds from the live events, you need
bigger crowds and more of them.

> I don't want to come on Sunday to watch 1, 1hr race, at no doubt higher
> ticket prices. I don't want the paddock sealed off to keep the "pro's"
> away from the "masses". I have no interest in watching a bunch of kids
> running around on 125s. I never watched the 250's in the past either.
> There was just no "there" there for me. I appreciate it can be a more
> technical race for the riders, and I can understand their zeal for it.
> But it's not really interesting to me (I don't watch 250 GP either).

Agreed.

> Racing as a spectator takes an investment: a rider, the industry, the
> whole market, whatever. Whatever it is that you go to the races to see
> perform. For me, it's the riders. The guys on the podiums. I feel for
> folks coming to SB in the past couple of years where all we had were the
> Suzuki guys, and with the great disparities. I came before that and
> have an "investment" in the mid pack. To capture me as a viewer, you
> need to be racing with the guys I'm already invested in, to catch my
> eye. So I can curse your name, or laugh at your failures, or say "ya
> know, he's not bad".

What's funny about that is if all people cared about, would anyone care
that both Mladin and Spies were on Suzukis? And is that why they were
out front, like, say, Fogarty an Co. during the Ducati heyday, when it
basically took a race special twin to have much of a chance in WSB? No,
it's pretty clear that much of the edge that those guys had was because
of what was inside those leathers and helmets and not under them.

What's unfortunate is that there haven't been more guys racing at the
very front, more guys winning, and that is in part the bikes, more
specifically what the other teams have to work with. Yamaha doesn't do a
lot of SB work in Japan any longer, and that shows. Kawasaki's program
probably is dwarfed by what they do in GP, and that is starting up from
almost nothing a couple years ago. For cost reasons American Honda has
rejected the HRC approach, which probably isn't what it once was anyway,
and has chosen that featuring grizzled Duhamel, ten years beyond his
prime, instead of a younger, hungrier guy is a better business decision.

There's only so much the rules can do about that, however, as Suzuki
invests more on SB racing than anyone else, and even more so here than
in Japan. Mladin-Doyle have been together even longer than
Duhamel-Luddington, and Mat's hardly over the hill. No, the only way to
do much at all is shit like horsepower caps and restrictor plates
designed specifically to slow Suzukis or something of that sort. And
attacking a specific factory for making the effort and being successful
is just as bad as attacking all of the factories for that.

Anyway, it's going to be interesting to see which way these guys go. My
guess is that we won't know for some time, it won't be all different in
2009. But I am very concerned, I really, really doubt it will all be good.

Re: End of the AMA privateers?

On Mar 16, 10:56 am, Mark N <menusb...@NYETSPAMearthlink . net > wrote:
> Will Hartung wrote:
> > From * w w w .amadirectlink . com /news/2008/transcript.asp
>
> > "I think that it's important that we find a way to move to true
> > professionalism here. I'll give you an example. I don't think that one
> > rider, one bike, a guy getting in a van and going somewhere to race for
> > prize money is professional racing. In other words, the old division
> > used to be, if you made a little more money than you spent, or if you
> > had the potential to make more money than you spent, that was
> > professional racing. Professional racing is when you leave home and your
> > bills are paid for by a sponsor, and you're representing a company."
>
> > Seems to me this is half the SB grid and a bulk of the SS and FX grids.
>
> > With no TV rights, (Speed? Umm..no), and with what TV we do have is
> > basically focused on the top 5 or 6 riders in the race, so the also rans
> > never have any camera time. Add to that there's simply little room on
> > the bike to show of a corporate logo. At least you can see the TIDE logo
> > from across the track in NASCAR, doesn't matter what place the driver
> > is in, and the yellows keep them all bunched up for photo ops as well.
>
> > So, where does DMG expect to get these companies that want to sponsor
> > these riders? What's in it for them? And where have they been all these
> > years? Waiting for the factories to get out and hogging all the camera
> > time?
>
> > At the same time, we have Duhamels line about "not all of the AMA-PRO
> > license racers are here to race".
> > * roadracingworld . com /news/article/?article1735
>
> > That talks to the same kind of thing. Duhamels vision of racing is
> > clearly different from the lower end of the spectrum racers. Granted, he
> > gets paid to have a different kind of vision. And I don't think that
> > Duhamel was referring to up and coming Johnny Rock Pages of the world,
> > but more likely the long term veterans of the privateer paddock, who
> > never place well, and will never place well, and they're not
> > perceptively trying to place well. But they race anyway, cuz they like
> > the race. (How many of the short end of the grid went and lost 15 lbs
> > over the break like Mladin, Spies, the Bostroms, etc. The front line are
> > all ghosts this year.)
>
> > There are certainly SOME of these riders in the paddock. Complacent
> > racers, for lack of a better term. Hobbyist racers who happen to be able
> > to qualify in SB and can afford to play.
>
> > So, I'm just curious where DMG plans on getting all of this money. I
> > guess it's working out in MOTO-ST, which I think will most likely be
> > merged with AMA next year and from which lessons will be applied to AMA.
> > (Combined AMA and Grand Am "challenges" here we come!)
>
> > Changes are in the wind folks...be interesting to see how this shakes out.
>
> > Oh, and Mladin is done. If he's contracted through '09, he'll stay, but
> > he won't race in a series that hurts his bike so that others can catch
> > up, that's in the wind too.
>
> Hey, Will, good to see you back. On this subject, I think you might have
> it backward, are we about to see the end of the real pros? It seems as
> likely that the new management is probably going to attack the issue of
> toio much professionalism, in the form of Mladin, Spies, Yosh and
> Suzuki, before they do much of anything to lift the low end of the grid
> out of its amateur status.

Wow, this is a first. I agree with most everything you wrote in this
post :) Yes, they will do their best to de-throne the Suzuki team.
They have already said that you should not know who the likely winner
will be before the race starts. The only way they can currently do
that would be to somehow stack the deck. And it is much easier to
bring one team down than to bring all the others up to their higher
level.

> It seems like one of the fundamental problems, if you want to call it
> that, of the AMA championship has been that it's two things
> simultaneously - a production-based factory-supported championship that
> has been overall as good as any in the world in terms of front-running
> quality, and at the other end of the scale pretty much just a national
> club racing championship. That's been the case because the factories
> spend a lot on this championship, but beyond that no one spends all that
> much.
>
> Now there are no good answers regarding helping the latter, it seems,
> other than some vague notions that more competent people with more of a
> budget will somehow make the series bigger than it is now. What most
> people seem to have are ideas about how to slow the fastest guys down,
> which strikes me as damned peculiar and really kinda scary. The article
> Tom links is typical of this sort of thing, and here are some examples:

What they want to do is convert racing to a show, which is what happen
with NASCAR. The main objective of a race is to find out who is
fastest. The objective of the show is to keep as many people as
possible interested right up to the end. Doing that means limiting
possible advantages and making the whole thing more of a crap shoot.

> - Spec tires: He makes the case that Dunlop gives the fast guys better
> tires than the slower guys, which is absolutely true. But has any rider
> ever lost a SB race because he didn't get the "factory tires"? I really
> doubt it, the guys who get the production tires generally don't have the
> machinery or the riding talent to win at that level anyway. So what will
> spec tires do? It will slow the factory guys down some, because spec
> tires will always be worse than the more experimental, cutting edge
> stuff provided to a more limited pool of riders, but they would still do
> all the winning. Slow privateers might finish two laps down instead of
> three. Maybe.

It is often said that racing improves the breed, but that goes out the
window if you eliminate competition. If they want to eliminate the
"factory tire" problem they could require the tire companies to supply
the same tires to anyone that wants to buy them. It would be a simple
matter to have an official check the numbers on all the tires and then
shuffle the tires to prevent the sneaking of specials to certain
teams. If one make of tire does do significantly better than the
others it will become the defacto spec tire, but will have to keep
improving if it expects to hold on to that status.

> - Equalize the bikes: He says they should both dumb down the bikes,
> make them more stock, and try to outlaw "unobtainium". What that means
> is mandated kit bikes, because the factories will have to make available
> to everyone any part that they want to use. Like spec tires it devalues
> the R&D aspect of racing and makes it more expensive for the factories,
> because they have to manufacture parts for people who may or may not buy
> them. If they charge the true cost it will make them prohibitively
> expensive for privateers, so what happens then? Does the series
> determine a price, forcing the factories to subsidize privateers? Or do
> the factories have to back down the parts, essentially having to run
> only what low-budget privateers can run? Do we end up with SS instead of
> SB because that's the only thing a 30-rider grid can afford?

They may try making the bikes closer to stock but I think that would
be counterproductive to their goal of equalizing the teams. Purely
stock bikes are not equal. The main reason Honda chose to compete in
FX rather than Super Sport was because their bike would not win in
SS. The FX class allows enough modifications to equal or better the
competition.

If they were to go with allowing modifications they could require the
replacement parts to have a manufacturers number and be avialable for
say no more than five times the cost of the stock part it replaces.
That would certainly cover the cost of manufacturing the part.

> He also talks about emphasizing SB more, and suggests this would result
> in teams like Erion and Attack running SB. But he forgets that these
> are heavily factory-supported teams, and what do those factories support
> them for? To win in support classes that the factory team doesn't
> contest. Will they do this if those teams are challenging their factory
> teams in SB and nothing else? There has to be real doubt that they
> would. He does recognize that the factories essentially pay for the
> professional aspect of the series now and that you have to respect the
> factories or run a serious risk if they turn on the series. But he makes
> absolutely no suggestion about how to do this, given that almost
> everything else he suggests may not be entirely to their liking.

One possible way of emphasizing SB would be to make that the only
class where direct factory teams are allowed. The factories would
then be required to compete directly against each other rather than
each owning an individual class, and it would be all the more reason
for them to back teams like Erion and Attack in the support classes if
they want to have a presence there.

> To me this kind of thinking is absolutely backward. Dunlop wants to
> invest in this series, to have it as an R&D vehicle, because they are no
> longer in WSB, MotoGP or BSB. So let them. The best thing about the AMA
> SB championship are the factory or factory-supported bikes and riders,
> which are for the most part at a very high level. Don't do anything to
> drive them out or discourage top talent from coming or staying here.
> Instead try to help the others catch up to them. If these new guys are
> so good at bringing in and making money, have them bring in a big series
> sponsor and then increase SB purse money by a lot, a huge amount. Or
> share the series income with the SB teams under a franchise-like
> scenario like MotoGP. Make running SB very desirable from an income
> standpoint and people will come to race. Make it worth even more to do
> well and they will invest in winning, or at least running at the front
> of the non-factory field. Make finishing 10th in SB something to throw a
> party over. And materially limit the field, so not making the grid has a
> big cost, thereby incentivizing the backmarkers even more. Really
> perform or go home. Find ways to help people climb the mountain, don't
> just tear down the mountain.

Agreed, the purses should be much larger and extend all the way down
to last place. The teams are putting on the show and should be paid
for doing so even if they don't win. The fact that the field size
would be limited would keep those with no chance of making the show
from collecting much. That would also make it so the team sponsor
wouldn't have to kick in such a huge amount just to keep a team going.

> Non-industry sponsors will only come to individual teams when there is a
> reason to, and that simply doesn't exist today. Nor will it anytime
> soon, pretty much no matter what the NASBike boys do. First comes basic,
> organic growth, more fans at more events and more watching TV. I do
> think that takes good racing, but it's not like Mladin vs. Spies has
> been boring. Will dumbing down SBs cut into the perceived Suzuki
> advantage? Look at SStock for clues - I guess not. Do they really have a
> huge machine advantage? Look at Tommy Hayden for clues - I guess not.
> Both Mladin and Spies may be gone after this year, so why even think
> about wasting time on that issue? Bigger fish to fry.

Non-industry sponsors will only come to individual teams when there is
a large enough audiance to justify their advertizing dollars. The DMG
might be able to help jump start this by getting the races TV time.
Letting the camera crews know they are not to show just the lead bike
would help to. Showing a good four way battle for fifth place gives
more sponsors air time than showing the leader riding around alone,
and is more interesting to boot.

> Eliminating more classes doesn't help either. Event promoters seem to
> like the Saturday SB race as it bumps the crowd, and I think it would be
> a big mistake to eliminate it. So if you are left with three finals on
> Sunday, one or two of which may not be viewed as terribly compelling,
> that's not much of a show for the fans at the track. The obvious
> alternative to this is to make the feature SB race a Daytona-like
> semi-endurance two hour race. But then you're not going to run one of
> those on both days, and you've moved beyond what is perceived as sprint
> racing worldwide. That's not only very, very risky, but it disconnects
> American racing from the rest of top-level racing around the world,
> which does the same thing to the riders - will an American rider ever
> race at the world level again? Will riders from elsewhere stop coming
> here? Unfortunately, if these guys are going to try some radical change,
> this is probably it.

I'm not a big fan of having two SB races at the same event and it goes
counter to the idea of emphasizing SB more. With two races each one
becomes less important individually. They are talking about dumping
the Super Stock class, which would make sense since they are so
similar to the SB class. And it might be a good idea to dump the
Super Sport class to put more emphsis on FX for the same reasons. Two
sprint races over the course of a weekend just isn't much racing.
And it certainly wouldn't hurt to have something totally different
from the existing classes. The Red Bull series would fit right in and
showcase some of the up and coming riders, and there would be no
confusing the bikes. And it wouldn't hurt to have some sort of twins
class. Taking a que from the Moto-ST they could specify some hp limit
that can easily be obtained by most any make and a minimum weight
limit that can easily be met, and pretty much let the teams modify
anything their heart desires. To provide more racing for the fans
each race could have two heat races to pare the field down to the
allowed size. Heat races are much more entertaining to watch then
timed laps. It would also provide justification for paying "start
money" to any team that makes the effort to enter.

> What I would prefer to see is more distinction between classes using the
> same basic equipment. Have literbike and middleweight SB classes doing
> sprint races, but then have a SSport class for newcomers or non-pros, or
> have this semi-endurance class as a support class, run on Saturdays. But
> don't mess with the main show.

With two full days of racing building up to the big race on Sunday
there is no option of using Sunday as a rain date like they have been
doing at Daytona. And calling an event due to rain will kill future
attendance in short order. So IMO the races should all be held rain
or shine. If club racers can do it there's no reason pros that are
supposed to be better riders than club racers can't do it as well. It
would also fit in with the not knowing in advance who is going to win
concept. It will also assure the teams that the purses will be paid.
Until those mega sponsers are lined up some of the teams will need
their start money to cover the expenses of getting to the event. One
or two rain outs could sink a team.

> Of course, what are the chances that this will happen? Not that great,
> looking at Edmondson's and the Frances histories and the nature of this
> situation. This is now an entirely commercial venture run for the
> financial benefit of a very small group of people, and we no longer have
> any concept of stewardship of American racing. The best I can say is
> that we're unlikely to end up with a bunch of midgets as the show...

I'm just hoping they don't start hav