QVMX go Pre '90

[Harro]

Ah Magoo I was tipped off by Firko that the Narellan pub mafia was meeting last night and I would have liked to have been there but short notice prevented that and I see you still have the skills to start a riot on the forum as per this topic do you have a vinduro toy yet?
As for you 67 Husky the XC is going to my swedish mate for sorting out so I am sure it will be starting a hell of a lot easier on the next outing
Harro

[TM BILL]

You have to admire the WA club in sticking to their guns and resisting any newer era classes  Makes you wonder weather pre 75  would be stronger in other states if they had resisted also 

[magoo]

Hey Harro you dopey fork, use commas will ya. My brain hurts reading your posts. (much the same as talking to you I guess).
I was telling 67 Husky last night that the last time I saw you you were in the back of my wagon (with 8 others mind you) singing "play that funky music white boy" at the top of our lungs. Your mate Damo reckons that was one of his highlights of his young life.

[magoo]

True TM Bill, but where will vintage be in WA in 10 years time. Gone completely I reckon.

[asasin]

Ive come into this a bit late most things have been said. The love of dirtbikes is ageless I have a 61 Greeves ( which is older than me)and 10bikes in between up to a pre 86 rm 250 also a couple of modern bikes. I agree with bill that the latter bikes are pretty much modern bikes ,A good piolet on my pre 86 would hold his own very well on any sunday motocross ,so they are not pureist ( in the contempory sense).We need to agree that there is both a place for those who want to ride their bikes and those that want to race the bikes.The racers are generally younger and will gravatate to the newer bikes .The tracks dont need to change .if they are pre 75 friendly and a pre 86/ pre 90 rider dosent like it he can vote with his feet and not attend , start his own club etc,as this is what the majority (pre 75-pre 81) want. most of us are older and dont want sky jumps ,rows of woops etc.I think it is a bit early for the intoduction of pre 90 as pre 86 is just starting to get more bikes as the riders decide that Modern mx vets class is too hard on them,but it does need some considerations as we are all going to die one day and our memories of great race days in the dawn of MX will be forgotten just like the guys from WWII who rode and raced around the desert on old AJ's etc are of no memory to most of us now.
We still have a wee way to go in filling the current classes but a drift back from latter bikes is currently taking place with slightly bigger feilds in the earlier classes( in NZ )
My comment I suppose is  "make haste slowly"
cheers

[GMC]

Lot's of good argument on both sides of the fence.

Vic has had Pre90 for what must be close to 10 years, the sky hasn't fallen in but we have fragmented into 3 clubs/orginisations.
Viper generally run post 75 meetings & even run a modern class as a support class. Nobody whinges that the 2009 models arn't vintage, they're obviously their to make the day viable.

WA keeps getting thrown up as an example but I heard recently that their meetings are a mixture of races & non competative ride sessions. Maybe someone form WA can confirm, deny or explain this?

"Stinkin four strokes ruined MX as we knew it"
Last weekend I attended a Diamond Valley Club reunion. A lot of the old original members from the 60's got together & I felt like a kid again amongst them.
They were whinging to me that the 2 stroke ruined MX as they knew it. MX in the 70's just wasn't the same for them any more & they opted out of the scene just before I joined the club in 75/76.
Sometimes life goes full circle.

You can please some of the people some of the time.

[Nathan S]

Nathan, how does not wanting a pre90 class become irrational? Please explain the "concept" of VMX as you see it, because my modern 2006 bike has radiators(watercooling) with plastic shrouds, a safety seat up to the petrol cap, disc brakes, linkage suspenion, if it was a 2 stroke it would have a powervalve. What are the differences with your pre90 bike??

An '84 Husky XC has two rear shocks, air cooling, drum brakes, non-USD forks, no exhaust power valve, a metal tank, a non-safety seat, etc - just like any pre-65 bike you care to name.
Does it make them remotely similar in performance?
Does it make them remotely similar in performance, even if you ignore the only real difference in spec (being the suspension travel)?

Now, if we were to compare my 87 CR125 to your 06 YZF, I can promise you that the YZ will stop a lot better, go a lot better, be easier to ride in the slop, have hugely better suspension, much better ergonomics, etc. And remember that the CR is one of those stand-out bikes that remained competitive for several years after it was first made - so its not like its a selective comparison, designed to prove a particular point.

Is a Yamaha twin leading drum a better brake than a pre-75 Maico drum? But they must be the same, they're both drums!
Is an old Cotton cobra as fast as a YZ250G? But they're both air-cooled, non-power-valved 2-strokes, they must be the same!
Etc.

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The irrationality statement comes from the lack of tangibles in the "against" argument. I've got no problem with the "I don't like it" line, 'cause its a statement of opinion. But all of the reasons given for why it would be bad for the sport are hollow - like I said earlier, they're all the same arguments that have been trotted out twice in the past, and have twice proven to be baseless.
Hell, look back at my big long post from yesterday. I really made an honest effort to take an un-emotional look 'how did we get there, and how did we end up here', and its been met with a deafening silence. You all know that I've made a lot of sense, but because I'm arguing against emotion*, its all too hard, so its easier to ignore. Shit, that probably sounds conceited... but if the internet has taught me anything, it taught me that when people disagree with you, they'll be ultra quick to jump on any mistake you make.

-------------------------------------------------------

My concept of VMX? Old bikes being used as they were intended.
Arguing the toss about whether a particular specification/era is "VMX enough" bewilders me.
Why is someone who talks passionately about Leisk on an RC500, or Bell on a MYDT YZ250T, any less valid as an old bike enthusiast that the bloke to talks about Flood on a Bultaco or Gunter on an RM400?
Really, both blokes have the memories of a long forgotten era - they have more in common than they have differences. And they'd certainly be looked at as outcasts in the modern crowd.
But when the established VMX crowd talk about the idea of pre-90, apparently those two blokes couldn't possibly co-exist at a race meet.
It makes no sense to me, and if its true, then it genuinely makes me sad.



*Indeed, its the irrationality that is frustrating me, moreso than the issue itself.

[magoo]

I've got a serious problem here. Since this thread started 500 pages ago, I'm yet to disagree with anything my old sparring partner Nathan has written. Agree with him or not, he articulates his point perfectly.
Keep going young fella, you're playing strong.

[firko]

Indeed, its the irrationality that is frustrating me, moreso than the issue itself.

Nathan, myself and others have offered up opinions that we feel are valid but because you disagree you are calling us irrational. Your opinion is well articulated but holds no more rationality than mine, DJs or any one else. Because we have different opinions to you does not make us irrational. I think I articulated my reasons against a pre 90 class reasonably well. Ditto quite a few others. Disagreeing is fine but calling our arguments irrational shows an inability to accept differing opinion.

[mx250]

 

[Nathan S]

This is so detrimental to the vintage racing movement it actually maked me quite angry. This is another victory for the self interest factions who have no interest in the long term health of the sport as long as their selfish wants are addressed. How long is it going to be before some self absorbed ''what about me'' dickhead calls for a pre 2000  class because he's got a YZ400F sitting around the shed doing nothing. All of the sheep will say "Yay, What a great idea" and put another nail in the coffin of all of the earlier under subscribed classes. 

I have no problem with the gradual introduction of new divisions as long as it's done without damaging the growth potential of earlier classes. New divisions should only be introduced when the existing class starts to show a decline in entry levels and interest. Despite Nathan calling it nonsense, the pre '85 class hasn't had a chance to establish itself yet and now it's being gazumped before it even has a proper space in the rulebook.

First of all, I can't see any reasoning given to why you think it will be detrimental to "the sport" as a whole.

Based on your later comments, my understanding is that you don't believe that it will harm pre-75/70/65 (and, by extension, pre-78).
Its clear that the Evo category is the strongest category, in most states, so you mustn't be talking about it as an under-performing class.
So I can only assume that you're talking about pre-85.

So let's have sensible look at why pre-85 is "under-performing":
1. It was introduced too late. By the time it was on the scene, the 'target market' riders were too old to flock to the class en mass.
2. It gets virtually zero mainstream coverage (unlike the regular coverage that used to be in ADB and Dirt Action).
3. There's a relatively limited number of bikes that can compete (four years worth of production at the most, and less for most manufacturers), so there simply aren't the depth of bikes out there.
4. I'm pretty sure that more MX bikes were sold in the years 72~74 than in 81~84, again reducing the pool of available bikes (and this will definitely apply to pre-90 too).

Given those factors, I don't think that its even slightly realistic to expect pre-85 racing will ever be able to rival Evo in popularity.
What's the bar that pre-85 racing must measure up to, before its "good enough" to have a younger brother?
If, in 2011, pre-85 is in much the same state as it is now, will it be used as an excuse to delay pre-90 for another 3 years?
Where would it stop?

Point #1 is a huge part of the reason why I'm so keen to see pre-90 up and running sooner rather than later. The longer we put off its introduction, the less chance the class has of success - delaying it until 2012 virtually ensures that it will fail.


As an aside, some home-spun forum philosophy:
Opinions cannot be anything but valid - they're just as exempt from the rules of logic as emotions are - they belong to each individual, and do not need to be swayed by the laws of reason. For that reason, you will not see me attack someone's opinion. Although I may take the piss, in a light hearted way...What else are Bultaco riders for?.

The reasoning process and the actions that follow, however, must withstand the scrutiny of logic. Eg: If an argument has been proven worthless in three very similar situations in the past, then its going to be worthless this time too. This is also why I seem to be making so bloody many long posts - I dare not presume that I will ever sway anyone's opinion without also explaining why I've come to the conclusions that I have.

[VMX247]

So let's have sensible look at why pre-85 is "under-performing":
1. It was introduced too late. By the time it was on the scene, the 'target market' riders were too old to flock to the class en mass.

Too old     shit Nathan how old do ya have to be
so many young riders coming into VMX now.

go to bed it's passed ya bed time 

[Rossvickicampbell]

this is fantastic - we haven't had a debate like this on here forever - Magoo you've done it again

Like I tried to say earlier - what people want to ride they will ride end of story.  In WA we have pre 75 (mainly club days but all spirited racing in ability classes) and the BSA club hosts the "trying" to emerge EVO class - we dont have enough riders for anything else so really an opinion doesn't matter - you could turn up to modern motocross and ride an 89 Honda CR500 if you wanted with no need for a club!!  If there are enough to run a class then so be it it will run - I said earlier what I like and my only concern with this concept is that somehow they have to run all together - aint ever going to happen as there aren't enough hours in a day.  If we end up with an old bike era and an older bike era or a not so quite old era running at different times if numbers permit then great because I can ride what I want (which doesn't go past per 85) when I can.

Really we are getting down to arguing about peoples opinions which will never end

Bring on the 09 Pre 75 Nats and I will be happy as Larry!!

luv yas all

Rossco

[firko]

Nathan that still doesn't make your opinion any more rational or valid than anybody elses. You've used a lot of big words and long sentences but I still think the sport isn't ready for pre 90. So be it. That's my opinion. I couldn't be bothered arguing the point any more. You have your opinion, others and I have a different opinion but I'd never call your slant irrational as you have ours. It's merely a different opinion to mine. The only answer as to who is right will be time. Let's just see how popular pre 90 is in 2 years time. I sincerely hope I'm wrong and the class is booming but I fear that I'll be right.

Meanwhile I'll concentrate on my genuine vintage bikes and leave the moderns to you guys to sort out.

[Nathan S]

The "young" guys who are coming into VMX, are typically second generation (Bulmad24, Tom, etc), or have otherwise been persuaded by an existing racer.
This is great, but it will never be able to create the big fields of riders that we all aspire to.

But the more I think about it, the more I think that a lack of main-stream promotion is a big part of the reason why we're all pining for the good old days of vintage.
When there was (at least) one full page of ADB each month (and ADB was literally the only dirt bike mag on the market), nobody had an excuse to not know that things were on.
Not to mention that at 13 years after the fact compared to 22), it was more likely that people still had the old bike in the back of the shed and/or were still interested in bikes generally.

I wonder how many main-stream dirt bike people even know that we exist nowdays? I'll bet that its a lot less than it was back in the early/mid 1990s. We ARE a niche sport, there's no doubt about that - but if every dirt biker knows that there's a solid VMX scene, there's gotta be a lot more conversations that start with "You know, they race those old dungers! I read about it in Ay Dee Bee! Yeah, its all these old blokes like you - you should give it a go dad!".