When the American indoor and outdoor motocross series' have more importance on the world stage than the world championship something is very, very wrong.
That my friend is it in a nutshell. A simple answer is $$$$$$$$$$$$. When the current World Champions started to head Stateside there were numerous comments about how they wanted to race the best and to do that they had to go to America. That was total BS - at least 2 of them have admitted to me when interviewing them that it was all about the Benjamins. When Dorna took over the MX GPs they totally destroyed the prestige of the GPs and made most of the riders paupers. Loungo has helped improve some of the things around the GPs and possibly stopped them from dying completely, but the riders as a whole are even worse off.
There is a lot more to it than just that though and some of it goes right back to the origins of Supercross. Originally it was a 2 moto format and was changed to a Single Final format at the request of TV executives. I
argued discussed this quite a bit with Mike Goodwin and several others using a very basic "You Have Got To Be Shitting Me?" trend - if the ignoramuses can follow Ice Hockey or Basketball that have quarters and full of Time-Outs, or god forbid American Football which is basically TV advertisements interspersed with stoppages on the footy field they sure as hell should be able to understand Moto .... especially when the winner is handed a trophy.
Of course, the real reason was to fit the racing around adverts - but hey, what do the real fans wishes need to be taken into account when the ad execs are on a roll.
The other thing about the scene Stateside is that the Shamateur scene has sucked the lifeblood out of the system. FFS, there are 6 year olds on 'Factory' contracts and shite like that. Anyone that qualifies for Lorettas seems to expect full backing from anyone and everyone. Shit, they haven't even started paying their dues yet and want everything on a silver platter.
Fixes?
Some say it is already past fixing, but I am of the feeling that things can be turned around.
Start with classes. Kick to touch all this MX1/2/3 SX1/2/3 crap and go back to capacity classes.
125cc / 250cc / 500cc - no advantage for 4 strokes ... the class is the class. All the 450s will be in the 500cc class so that will become the Premiere class. Start off on the 125 smokers, move to the 250 chokers and then to the big bangers. If you have big enough nuts you might ride a 500cc smoker if you can find a manufacturer to build one, but I am thinking it will be a 300-360 or something similar.
That is a start - will allow the small Euro guys to build limited run bikes and race the GPs. Should see a lot of exotic and very reliable smokers come out of the woodwork.
Next the way the GPs are promoted and administered needs to be scrapped and new management put in place. Luongo and company are basically feathering their own nests at the expense of the sport. Then the tracks and the race formats need sorting out. After that we might have a good chance of having our sport prosper once again.
