What Nationals would you ride if they were split?

[Rossvickicampbell]

I cannot agree with Firko's coments re age groups more - exactly where I am now.  I want to race with similar old farts - give the sheep station guys and young kids a miss.

However - one question - lets say you were to have a pre 78 Nats this year and a BIG meet for the pre 85 (90's) same year - isn't that really the same thing as 2 Nats meetings.  If you were to try and accommodate how much more effort just to make the two Nats meetings per year?

Rossco

[SAABCOMBI]

Age group classes are a must at all levels, At club level events specially us with 6 rounds  plus helping and running a vinduro meeting it become to must, back in the olds and l always refer to that era, the colac motorcycle club would run one round of the western centre championship meetings per year, the western centre championship meetings was made up of 6 rounds at 6 different tracks. In todays standard if clubs here in victoria got together and worked together and run one or two of there best tracks over a calender year  then the  2 National meetings would fit into that calender year.

[firko]

If you were to try and accommodate how much more effort just to make the two Nats meetings per year?

Ross, perhaps you missed the key words...."Big Club Day". By holding the event as a club day the big permit and licence fees and strict championship style official wants and demands are largely bypassed. In the past the big club day format has seen the Condoblin Greybeards event become an event even  bigger in scale than the Nats, attracting well over 200 entries in the events bigger years. Heavens Crawford River Classic and other big events in Victoria and Queensland have shown that these type of meetings are more than viable.

 Let's not get too sidetracked from the main point however, the splitting of the pre '75 and post '75 eras and the reintroduction of capacity age groups in both eras. The "big club day" and bi yearly Nats are good discussion points but should be discussed after MA makes the decision on the split proposal.

This is your second attempt and it really still doesn't make much sense

Sorry Dave, I'm with Brad on this one. Whatever you're trying to put accross doesn't make a lot of sense. Why remove the 4 stroke class? Just because historically they all rode together means diddley squat in vintage racing. The class was introduced in the very beginning during an era when the two stroke reigned supreme to give people to experience the sound of a stroker and offer another cheaper entry machine to the sport by utilising the myriad of XL Hondas that were laying dormant. From day one the class has been successful so whay change something thats worked fine for 20 years? Ditto your mystifying revamp on the era cutoffs. Pre 1980 to replace Evo? Why remove class that's proven to be popular and in no need of changing? A pre 68 class was trialed for two years and proved to be unpopular so why bring it up again? You have age classes stuck on the end of your program, so in your perfect world is there capacity age group racing or do you just want all in capacity age group races at the end of the day? It might be time to have a rethink Dave.

[firko]

Why?

[worms]

Brad and Firko are spot on, we dont need to mess with the class's just how the event needs to be run, I for one would have to think more consideration needs to be balanced to those running the event, after being envolved last year and having an understanding of the logistics and costs, a lot of stress is placed on those running the event to make sure of a profit, more races for seperate era's is the most likely, positive outcome for smaller clubs to have a go running the Nationals. the 2 club idea is worth more consideration.

Cheers trev

[SAABCOMBI]

AGE GROUP CLASSES, ALLPOWERS, FOR ETC\
UNDER 30 ALLPOWERS
30 TO 39 ALLPOWERS ETC, ETC,

[Nathan S]

What does 18.13.1.2 mean,
Is it MA that pick the club thats only willing to do both.
Noel

Way I read it, a host club MUST run the older era bikes, and can choose to include or exclude the newer era.
But if you want to run newer era only, then you're (currently) poop-outta-luck.

Under the current system, it would seem that any club that puts in a half-way decent proposal to run an all-eras Nats, will always beat a club that wants to run 'older era only' Nationals.

I agree with what Worms and Firko have been saying.

Although, I honestly wonder how important the age group races (as opposed to age-group point scores) are nowdays? Really, there's very few young guys in VMX (I'm told that CDT is a different story, but we're talking about VMX here), and very few of them are crazy.
When you factor in the fast 'old bastards' like Brad, Rusty and Boagy (etc etc), I wonder what's really gained, other than depleted fields?

[worms]

without major sponorship in 2009, the event would have run at a very close loss, even with 197 competitors. If we spilt the event are we all going to pay per class entry, not by how many machines you enter, say if either event pulls 130 competitors , so how do we make sure clubs are better off and not solely reliaing on sponorship monies, people jump up and down allready about entry fees, so are we all prepared to pay up to $50 more to host club for spilt events, taking on other support class's is not the go I think, I dont want to watch modern 4strokes doing laps at VMX event just so organizers can make ends meet.

Cheers Trev

[VMX247]

having an understanding of the logistics and costs, a lot of stress is placed on those running the event to make sure of a profit
Cheers trev

oops left lane exit -hijack
Does it have to be about making a big fat profit or just coming out even ?, as the host club would only run it every 8-10 yrs.Just another thought for the process.
Some days you can make more money on a wood raffle or a lamington drive  
cheers

[frank jnr]

I'd Race at both event's, but would like to see age groups.

[worms]

all clubs are entitled to make a profit from such an event and should, because every club I know puts the money back into the club, but if you have clubs running the event at a loss it's hard to swing them and their members to do it again. Profit is not a bad word, just miss-understood.

cheers trev

[JohnnyO]

What does 18.13.1.2 mean,
Is it MA that pick the club thats only willing to do both.
Noel

Way I read it, a host club MUST run the older era bikes, and can choose to include or exclude the newer era.
But if you want to run newer era only, then you're (currently) poop-outta-luck.

Under the current system, it would seem that any club that puts in a half-way decent proposal to run an all-eras Nats, will always beat a club that wants to run 'older era only' Nationals.

I agree with what Worms and Firko have been saying.

Although, I honestly wonder how important the age group races (as opposed to age-group point scores) are nowdays? Really, there's very few young guys in VMX (I'm told that CDT is a different story, but we're talking about VMX here), and very few of them are crazy.
When you factor in the fast 'old bastards' like Brad, Rusty and Boagy (etc etc), I wonder what's really gained, other than depleted fields?

Nathan there are plenty of younger guys racing VMX in Qld and at last years Nats and for that reason i support having age groups in pre 78, evo and pre 85.

[worms]

i for one agree John, i want to race guys my own age with the same fears, not the young guns and that's including my son, as much as i want him envolved in the sport the age groups would allow the older guys a greater feeling of achivement, I will still wind up racing you, Brad and Rusty and Squirt and get whipped.

cheers trev

[Rossvickicampbell]

yep - same here - we have a fair share of our riders are young guns!

[Nathan S]

Yeah, but my question is why is it bad to race the young guys?

If they're faster, then they're faster - same as blokes your own age.
If they're slower, then they're slower - and it gives you more to gloat about.

As someone who is neither fast, nor shockingly slow and neither old nor young, I really don't care who I'm racing against - and riding around the track by myself is one of the least enjoyable race scenarios I can think of. So I wonder why anyone would want to cull the fields, and reduce the chance of having someone to race against?
I fully understand the value in rider-age point-scores, but specific races seems a bit pointless to me.

Imagine that we had a decent VMX rider grading system.
Would you prefer to race against other guys of the same speed/ability (regardless of age),
or
Would you prefer to race against other guys of the same age-group (regardless of speed)?


Why?