There are relevent points made by all above me, the most important being that when racing was the only game in town we had a captive audience but now that the Classic Dirt/Bonanza culture has become a major part of our scene along with Vinduros, the simpler option becomes the more popular.
For every 100 entries at a race meeting there's probably only 10 with a chance of winning by talent alone. The other 90% are there for the cameraderie and opportunity to ride the bikes that are such a part of their DNA. Racing's one thing but riding's the more dominant factor of their involvement so in many cases they'd rather take the non competitive, fun (
and cheaper)option than fork out hard earned dosh on entries, insurance, licence and all of the other little cash grabs that go hand in hand with racing.
Another aspect that bothers me is that I believe there are just plain too many race meetings. If you factor Classic Dirt, HBBB, both motocross Nats, the DT Nats and emerging marquee meets like Mr VMX, It doesn't leave a lot of space for multi round club championships. HEAVEN presented nine rounds this year and VIPER had seven which when added to the big events doesn't leave a lot of downtime during the year. Is it any wonder that both clubs have reported a downturn in entries?
As we've been depressingly informed elsewhere on this forum, times are a bit tough right now. To be expected to travel to bike events up to and over a dozen times a year is taxing on wallet, family comittments and even on our beloved bikes. I'm loathe to suggest to either VIPER or HEAVEN that they need to cull the number of meetings but I think that both club series', especially HEAVEN would be more vibrant and easy to manage if a few rounds got the chop. Back when I had an input into the then only NSW Vintage club, Penrith's activities we ran four motocross and four dirt track rounds and it was more than enough. Remember that with the exception of the Nats and Condo Greybeards in June (which incidentally was absorbed two (
DT & MX) of Penriths series rounds, the Penrith meetings were the only show in town. Today there's too many options for the VMX enthusiast. Cut it back to four rounds, promote two of them as marquee, must do meetings (for HEAVEN perhaps....CRC and Canowindra as the biggies and a couple more spread out throughout the season).
In a nutshell, the sport hasn't reached it's peak by a long way, it's just a little more diverse and scattered.