Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

Opinion Let's put the RACING back in road racing My boss just walke d In and aske d m e, "What would you do to save AMA road racing?" Me? (Why me, Lord? ) No t being one to remain speechless, I imme diately suggeste d bo dily m oving Seattle Internati on al Raceway from Kent, Washin gton to th e hills north of 30 Los An gele s. That being reje cted on practical gro un d s, I figu red th at the obvio us corollar y , th at of m oving Los An geles to the foothills o f Mt , Rainier , would tri gger some sort of embargo by the Wash in gton legislature . So leavin g mountain-m oving to Mohamme d, what 's left? First you h ave to convi nce yo urself the re 's somethin g worth savin g. If t he Sixties was the decade o f th e d irt rider, the Seven ties is bec o m ing the de cade of the ro ad rider, wh at with so aring gas prices a nd changing lifesty les. And road racin g, of al l the forms of motorcycle competition, is what the new breed will most easily id e n tify wi th (If he /she iden tifies with an y form o f co m pe ti ti on at all. Th e car experience says a sign ificant n u mber will do so ). Ideall y , I' m h oping (as are the fa ctories) tha t this bo nd of rid e r/owner ide ntification will parallel that which ex ists be tw ee n hordes of dirt bike rs and the phenomenon of moto cr oss. The hooker, o f co u rse, is th at MX courses ar e far cheaper to build an d ma in tain for racin g than pave ment. So in sp ite of o u rsel ves, we 're talking abo u t fewer and more cos tl y ve nue s th at take co ns iderabily mo re effor t to promote and finance: than either a motocross or an AMA-traditional dirt track event. The mo ne y an gle is a fact , and we 're st uck wi th it , b ut m on ey issues also te nd to obscure the other half o f road racing 's problem, which is promotional. It's a two-sided di le m ma - a re the costs of promotion too large to fit the cr o wds, or are the cro wd s too small t o fit the costs o f promotion? The so lution is go ing to lie in cu t tin g the costs o f prom otion an d increa sing the spe ctator take simultaneo usl y. An o ther thi ng that ten ds to obsc ure the situation is the te nde ncy of long-tim e road race enth usia sts (my self included, I ad mi t) to vie w the Europea n situation as an att ainable: ide al, as we drool over super-exotica GP b ikes past and present, or searc h for a cad re of s u p ers tars to m atch Ago, Rea d , ll ail wood and their co nte m poraries. lI ey , le t 's fac e it, th e time is o ut o f join t . The Unite d States will be ab le t o support such a racing sce ne wh en (say) the 12 most im p ortan t in dustrial st ates in the coun tr y are each staging a GP t ha t draw s 20 0,0 0 0 p eo ple ave rag e th ro u ghou t the season . First things firs t . Firs t th in g to realize is that . ro ad raci ng is in a transitional phase d uri ng whic h p ro mo t io n co sts have t o be cu t at the same time that a b roade r base of in tere st is being crea t ed for th e sp ort. The AMA Pr ofessional Rules Committee has alrea d y tak en one st e p t o ward eas ing the co sts of pro motio n in th eir 19 76 ru les package (re po r ted in CN , 1'\0. 20 , May 27) . They 've als o done a bit for sp ect at or app eal by atte mpting to reduce th e number of classes and race day s per event. So m e thing 's still missin g, and 1 su sp ect tha t the dirt-track tradi ti ori alists who st ill run the 1\.\IA ' (e ven th ough th ey don't "understand " road racing, weep, wail), have the missing pi ec e. They ha ve known for t wo gene rat ion s that crowds go to a race t o wat ch racing, whether . the ve n ue be Costa Mesa's tiny spe ed wa y ov al or the Sacramento Mile, o r the stree ts o f Austin . Are we clear wh at I mean by racing? You can visualize it as fairi ng-d us ting, bar -ban ging, nose - t ail dr a ftin g, split-second pit strate gy , or pi cture spe ed way ride rs running ov er each o thers' feet, shor t tr ackers with their elbows in each others ' ea rs, miters b unched in 100-mp h gro up s of four-to eight, wh atever. The key fac to r in ea ch scenario is n o t the danger, or the sheer speed , but the fact th at the o utcome remains in do u b t right through the final tum. Sh orter race s is on e way to achieve th at end, but I ask yo u, in the interests o f prese rving a coup le o f classic eve n ts, if (say ) fo u r guys finish un de r the pr overb ial blanket after 20 0 mil es (or even 50 0) hasn 't the same end be en served? I mentio n this last p oin t because 1 remember th at 1'\ASCA R (th o se vul gar do o r-slam m ers) ac hie ved th at ve ry re sult by the simple trick of requ mng a st an d ar d restrictor plate to be bolted across everybody 's carbure to r, some years ba ck . This ca me at a time when all the sam e tired ol d ar guments abo u t f a ct ori es s h u n ting o ut p rivatee rs ap p lied , and th e hi gh co st of racing wa s d estroying everybody , fac tory and p riva tee r alik e. No, I'm not saying th at's the solu ti on for A MA road r a ci n g, bu t i t de mon stra tes what I'm after. I'm lo o kin g at a way to take a type of racing which. in this country a t least, degene ra tes into a semi-predictable parad e in which fo rtun es chan ge only when somebody crashes or drops o ut with mechanical failure, and turning it into a real race. One way . is to ge t away fro m dyno racetracks that co mputers co uld race on, and go to true road circui ts th at place rider ski ll at least on a par wi th horse power. There are p lenty suc h ci rc uits in the U . S ., gat he ring cobwebs . The restructured AMA purse /p o in ts program should help bring such places as Ken t , Sears Point , Road Am e rica, Danville , Summit Po int, Road Atlanta, (he ll, eve n that mish mash at Mar lboro 1 re member wi th a cer tai n fo ndne ss) back into t he mainstream. Not to me ntio n city street circuits like Austin . The lim ited-purse, poin ts-paying rac es should be viewed as "developmen tal" race s, so mething to give the rac e rs track time an d the promoters a chance to prove they 're worth y o f the name . In five years th e program should have de veloped at least five ad d it io nal venues capable of hosting an AMA Grand National, hu m ongo us pu rse an d all. If it doesn 't, it 's a flop. A sec on d way to make a race a race deals wi th equipmen t, and it 's go t to be p urs ued rig h t along wi th th e fi rst. Yes, it's t im e t o tum th e world upside -down o n the facto ries agai n. I'm not talkin g about jiggeri ng th e formula in so me po litical move to " get Yamaha " or " get " an y body els e in p articu la r, In So here 's m y suggested ro ad race claim in g prices : He avyweigh t Expert, $3 0 0 0. Lightweight Expert, 5 20 0 0. Ligh tw eigh t Novice , 5 12 0 0. Productio n, list p rice p lu s $ 2 00. The n u mb ers are n 't cast in conc re te, but the underlying co ncep t is. If it means the Experts r ace on TZ250s wh ile t he Novi ces race on a gaggle of di r t-bi ke derived 3 6 0c c sing les, far out. If it m ean s we quit playing gam e s ov er wh o 's production and who 's cheati ng , better ye t. If the fac t ories h uff and p uff and say they can't possibly provide cheap er , simpler racers, tell 'e m to see the chaplain. To see wh y I ad o p t this stance, lo ok to dirt tr ack. You see fa r m or e peop le showing up to ride than can possibly make the m ain event. Yo u go throug h qualifyin g, heat s, a nd se mis t o weed the fiel d o ut. Yo u the ore ticall y ob ta in the faste st , most competitive o f the lot, an d you thro w as m an y of th em as the trac k will safe ly han dle in to a m ain even t. The resu lt is racing, and it keeps th e fans involved fro m th e tim e they find t heir seats u n til the last fl ag fa lls . What th is m ean s is, 100 guys sh ow up t o race and m a y be 25 of th em go ho me with money. The only reason they come back to try agai n is th a t the cost of the m otorcycles is n ot devastating them and their sponsors. If it we re, dirt tr ack wo uld wither . It is no t withering. Road ra cing is withering. Q.E .D. So 1\.I\IA has do ne two-thirds of th e saving o f road racing al ready. The re struc tured purse-p oin ts p rogram le t s the promoters st ay in the game at a price they can aff ord until (o r if) the spectator take allows grander things. The d irt ·tr a c k eve nt structure, com bined with a m en ab le vie wing ar eas (wh ich m an y ro ad race ven ues still lack) can draw and h old sp ec t ators. Now we need to dras t ica lly limit th e cost o f t he m achinery so the riders can affo rd t o st ay in the gam e , too. Sure, we migh t mi ss one o r two particular m odels if the m anufacturers -----.._- . . .: _- _._. fac t, I t h in k t he li g h t w eigh t / he avyweight form ula we hav e now is just fine th e way it is. 1 d o th ink it 's d umb to be trying to limit th e numbe r o f cy lind ers or n umber of ge ar box sp eeds to try to hold cos t /complexity down. There 's a better way. The mos t powerful tool th e AMA has in it s rulema king arsenal still lie s ne glected - the clai min g rule. I thi nk t he A 1\IA h a s be en downrigh t wishy-w ashy in using it. As it stands now, the fac tories say, "Hey, AMA, du e to inflation i t now costs us 10 percent more to p ro d uce the Bowango ZZ750, so y ou go tta raise the claimin g pri ce." An d M IA du tifully rai ses th e claim ing p rice . Horse-p uc key l I 'm n ot even sure there's J. com pellin g reason to m a ke th e cla im ing p rice for a heavy we igh t road racer $5000 while th a t fo r a heavywe igh t dir t tracker stands at 53 0 0 0. That's a hell o f a lot of m on ey , inflat ion o r n o in fla tio n . de ci de t o pull them ou t fo r reasons of co st or st ubbo rnness. If t he racin g itself is stron g a nd via ble , they 'll be back. The co m pe ti tio n wi ll force them back. I m igh t add tha t th e an swe r to high co st is vol u me . T aking the TZ 75 0 as an exa m ple , Yamaha co uld build one he ll of a lot of street-legal, sligh tly de tuned TZ750s between now an d 197 8 , whe n Cali fo rnia's e m issio n lim it s will come down on all big two strokes. They co uld sell the stree ters fo r aro und $3000 even today, and wi th the vo lume, th ey su re co uld afford to sell a few race bikes fo r $3 0 0 0 as well. Facto ries are not strangers to taking a los s on racing machine ry if the lo ss is justifiable. The AMA Co n gre ss m ee ts nex t mon tho If you riders agree wi th at le ast th e spirit o f what I've said so far (if no t t he sp ecific numbers) tell you r A.'\l A Con gres sm an. You 've got a powe rful tool to use in yo ur o wn best in te rests, if y o u 'll just use it. See y ou at the ra ces. Lane Campbell

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