SuperX live on Foxtel

[smalls717]

I also went along. The track was just a 15 minute drive from home. same way I go to work every day. work only 1km further down the road from the track.
bought my $99 VIP ticket as soon as they were advertised. Sat right in front of the finish line. $10 to park the car so it wasnt a mile away. $10 for a programme.
Security guy stopped the older lady in front of me taking a coffe in as drinks were not allowed in. same went for food. He then said I couldnt bring my camera in. only digital cameras allowed? told him it was (it isnt) shrugged and let me in with it.
It was bloody windy and cold with the occasional bit of rain. The chance to see Chad Reed and some of Australias best riders made all hassles worth putting up with.
shouldnt have bothered. the racing was boring. the pro lite fields were full. the open class didnt have enough riders. I have been racing / watching motocross for a long time, and you know when you see a fast rider or something that really wants you to get out there. none of this did. I wasnt really impressed with Chad Reed. I know he,s the world champ at super x and he lapped up to fourth place but...it just didnt do it for me.
I left about half way through the open final. went home and watched the moto gp qualifying i had recorded on foxtel.
I then watched the super x on Fox. It looked better on tv than it did live. hope it goes better over east for everyone. maybe some better riders in the fields might make it better?
I was impressed with Daniel Reardon. Saw him in the pits and he was probably the only one who wasnt up himself. rides pretty good to.

[vandy010]

has anyone here watched an AMA supercross in the flesh?
i like what GD66 had to say as i think the sport still has some teething to be sorted and we should give it a decent go. if our guys can learn from all this then it'll become a fantastic stepping stone to the bigger and better overseas stuff and it'll be right here in our backyard.
i'd love to see a few more internationals in the mix and couldn't care where they came from, japan or europe? the timing of this series is damn near perfect for a rider wanting to get in shape for the AMA series.

[Gerard De Ruyter (Twistandshout)]

The guy who tops our 'Old School' class here in the ACT teamed up with three other Over-35s blokes and spent three weeks in the States a month ago, taking in the Washougal Outdoors round and the X Games.  He said he had a total total blast of a time. 

Quality guy time for sure, as they drank and partied the whole wife-free time (plus the yanks love aussies). he said the race events were just amazing.  the scale, the hype, the speed, the glitz and glam.  our nationals ain't nothin' compared with theirs.  the whole town of washougal revs up when the AMA comes to town and the party just doesn't stop till its over.  the whole town goes along - cool or what?  they had a blast at the x games, saying they had pit passes and got some quality time with patrana and carmichael (with pics of course).  how good would that trip have been.......

[VMX247]

AWESOME AWESOME BLOODY AWESOME,did I say it was AWESOME.
Fantastic road trip with our local club.
Racing was fast and stylish,can they go   
AWESOME stuff,no fear.
Go our Aussie kids of the future.
This SX series will go all the way ,by the time it comes to the last championship at Brisbane.
It will get bigger and better,not sure if we(oz) have the grunt to run this kind of series for the years too come in Aussie.
We thought the crowd was full  and packed to the rafters at Perth,but they are saying it was only 12,000,it would be mine blowing for us country folk to be in a crowd of more that 30,000,really is beyond us too image a crowd of more than 30,000.
Really be a day to take a sedative, being in line for a burger with crowds of that capacity 

[Graeme M]

Hmmm... I think tonight's was a better effort. The guys seemed more comfortable on the track and it was cool to see Chad have to come through the pack in the final. Marmont rode real well too. The track looked OK to me, the coverage was good, and they had the scrolling positions ticker working (most of the time). I think it'll only get better. As for the 5 man/lap races, I liked it. Nice and quick, and the riders didn't get so strung out it got boring.

What's everyone else reckon?

[VMX247]

Well it's two weeks after the Perth Super X and the local kids who made the 2 hours drive to the venue are still havin dreams about it.
Great stuff for the future riders of Australia to get to watch/enter and be totally in awe of the whole fantastic show.
Great stuff for Australia and Thanks to Chad Reed for puttin it all together.

[Wombat]

I remember we discussed the proposed Australian Super X last year so I went looking for the thread.
There was a piece on the telly one year ago; so here's what was proposed back in Nov 07:

I saw an interview with the Supercross Promotor the other night (MXTV on the Aurora channel - Tue nights at 8.00pm Qld time).
He says many Promotors have been burned financially in their attempts at Supercross in Australia.
In his own words "Supercross is nowhere" in this Country; it hasn't grabbed the Aussie public at all.
He had a few concepts and his vision is to see Supercross promoted as 'entertainment' more so than 'motorsport'.
He believes 'man on man' races would be exiting - that's two people in the race.
Races in general would be much shorter; consisting of only a few laps.
This would raise the intensity of both the competitors and the crowd.

He noted 'Crusty Demons' as a good example of what stadium crowds like to see.
This concept has taken off and Supercross can and should follow this lead.
He went on to say Chad Reed would return to OZ in the next few years and Chad is also keen to lift the profile of the sport in this Country.
He believes Chad would smoke the field in the first season but the locals would rise to the challenge and lift their game over the following seasons.
History shows that certainly worked when the Europeans raced in the U.S. all those years ago.
The Americans lifted their game and look at them now.

He had some good ideas and they were all 'outside the box'.
Supercross has about fifty too many jumps and fifty too many corners for my liking.
It's not my cup of tea (I'm a traditionalist) but I can see my young bloke would love it. 

I haven't yet caught the Super X on the telly, but I'm wondering how close is the concept to the Promoters original idea?

[Graeme M]

It's pretty close I think. They have a range of different formats- some traditional heats/finals, some shorter sharper races like in Adelaide last weekend, and some man on man stuff. They've had big crowds and they've included the Australian FMX championships in with it.

Is it any good?

Not sure really. It's not as exciting to watch as the US SX which features fast riders and bigger than big presentation. So far the two rounds I've seen still lacked a bit, and have suffered through being held in daylight. Adelaide's round featured some good rides and even some racing and I thought it was a better spectacle on TV than the Perth round. Hopefully the formula will keep getting better.

As to how the spectators and the industry like it, I don't know. They've had good crowds tho...

[firko]

As much as I'd hoped that the South Aussie Super X round would have been an improvement over the Burnswood event, It turned out to be yet another let down. The production and camera work is too choppy and that bloody announcer standing next to the track annoys me even more. As good as the local riders like Daniel Reardon and the rest are, the superiority of Chad Reed is a little embarrasing. The track seemed OK but the late afternoon time with cameras pointing into the sun caused flare that gave the production an amateur look. No serious TV network would have a camera position that allowed that. By mid way through the telecast I was channel searching to see what else was on. It just didn't grab me unfortunately.

I'm attending the Parramatta event and live in hope that it'll improve by then.

[Graeme M]

Yeah, I have to agree. the camera work is a bit average, especially the angles that don't seem to catch the action as well as it might. That announcer - well, I don't like it much either, but then again, it's all a bit Steve Irwin and I think young people might go for that sort of thing. I reckon it'd gain a lot if a croc actually grabbed him tho. Maybe a quick death roll through the whoops would really set the night off.

[kaw440]

5 LAP FINAL and they want how much to go. If this all we can do here 5 laps no wonder we dont meet international standard racing sprint racers if it stays like this its all down hill for us aussie riders hey

[MX125B]

We are going down to Geelong for this week ends Supercross, and  we are taking our bikes down for a ride day at Barrabool the day before ( friday) I know our bikes are not vintage, but us riders are!

[Maico31]

It's got me buggered why they are running in the daylight. The track dried out and became dusty and in the 450 final the riders were  riding into the sun in some sections. Supercross is a much better spectacle under lights at night. The 450 heats had only 5 or 6 riders each race and the field rapidly spread out. I'm glad the final was only 5 laps, fortunately Reed got a bad start and it was a pretty good race with him coming through the pack. Hopefully each round will get a little better as they sort it out.

[Wombat]

Geelong SX this weekend?
What day/time pls - I'm determined to catch it on the telly this time!

[Graeme M]

I think they said that some venues don't even have lights. They wanted big enough places to run larger tracks, but some didn't have lights as well. Also timing I think for telecasts. I suppose Australia doesn't have the crowds/audiences at sporting events to generate the money needed for the sort of infrastructure the Yanks enjoy.

According to the guide, it's live on Fox from 4-7 PM this coming weekend. I think that means it's in daylight again...