Cycle News

SENIOR DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS - SUPERCROSS, MIKE MUYE P50 Interview AMA nor the FIM has any mini- mum race guidelines. You date back to the first [Supercross championship] and there were only three [races]. It's not some- thing that we want to do. Neither Ken [Roczen] or Eli [Tomac] or Justin [Barcia], any of those guys, any of the 250 guys, none of them went into Daytona with the mindset that this would be their last race. So, it's not fair to them. It's not fair to the fans. It's not fair to the teams or partners or anybody. So, that's very, very last resort that that option would even be considered. And it hasn't yet. When this whole coronavirus thing first started happening, there was a lot of talk about races happening without spec- tators. Is that something that you would consider if it came down to it? Yeah, of course, it would. Again, it's important to all involved to carry out the races. There would still be a television com- ponent with our partners at NBC that's integral to the sport. So, it is something that we would con- sider. We would prefer to have fans in the stands, but it's going to kind of come down to what the CDC [Center for Disease Control] and the President all suggest as that time kind of rolls around. It is something being discussed. Again, if it came down to it, would there be any chance that the Monster Cup would pay points toward the champi- onship? We're still kind of working through most of that. Kind of cir- cling around what options are with the Monster Cup. Major League Soccer plays in that same stadium [Dignity Health Sports Park] in Carson, California. So, with their season somewhat in limbo at this point, we'll probably start to have conversations around that event, as well. To say it is part of the conversation right now and be a points-paying race, I think is prob- ably a stretch, but it is part of the conversation into that timeframe, and somewhat of what we're looking at. Are you concerned that crowd attendance might be down when racing returns because people will still shy away from large crowds? Yeah, of course. It's going to take a little while for everybody to kind of get back to a certain comfort level of being in public spaces. We work with some of the best stadiums in the world, so Will the year-end Monster Energy Cup end up paying championship points this year? Not likely, but anything is a possibility at this point. "WE'RE OPEN TO LOOKING AT OTHER NON-TRADITIONAL VENUES. FOR US AND THE TEAMS AND RIDERS AS WELL, IT'S IMPORTANT TO GET THESE RACES [IN]."

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