Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

SignU~ , • to Sell JOIN THE HUNDREDS OF SUCCESSFUL, ACTIVE DEALERS WHO SEll CYCLE NEWS IN THEIR STORES. • Build WEEKLY FOOT TRAFFIC in your store • Create ENTHUSIASM for new products, latest events and trends in the sport of motorcycling • Local COVERAGE of events in your area, in addition to National & Worldwide news about motorcycles - as it happens! RETAIL PRICE $2.50jCOPY 5 COPIES PER WEEK MINIMUM BILLING PLAN A ·"You Only Pay for What You Sell" 56% Profit Margin With Returns BILLING PLAN B·"Less Paperwork· More Profit" 72% Prof"lt Margin - No Returns PREPAID BULK· "Least Paperwork· M Profit" ost 117% Prefit Margin· No Returns (Pay Entire Year Order in Advance) PLUS.. .You get afreemetal display rack and "authorized dealer" decals for your store GET STARTED TODAY! Call our Dealer Sales Manager at (310) 427-7433 24 Hour FAX Order Line (310) 427-6685 •••Because Once a Month is Not Enough / .INTERVIEW Cary Agajanian and minutes from an intersection of the 1-10 and the 1-15. We started working with them, but I can't really get into all the facts behind it . But that is now a site that Roger Penske is building a race track on. We're no longer involved in it and I can't comment on what happened. But when that happened, we had been contacted earlier by the city of Victorville which is about 30 miles up the freeway from the first location, and once the first sight was out of our hands the Victorville people contacted us again. We went up there and the site that we looked at is owned by the Portland Southwest Cement Company, a major company, and they want to build a race track, but a race track on concrete similar to what Dover (Delaware) has just done, and Bristol (Tennessee). In fact, PSC supplied the concrete to Bristol. So basically we are in a partnership with them and we are right now as we speak in a process of having our Environmental Impact Report reviewed by the city, and if it is approved, which could happen in the next few months, we will have permits for a race track. We're talking a mile and a half superspeedway, road course - a whole motorsports complex. . The $64,000 ques tion is, woul d y o u have a AMA roa d race there? Yes we would. But a lot of that depends on the promoter we have in Southern California and the protection tha t we would give him. I may be a board member of Paradarna, but if Bill Marcel and Bob Bellino (the promoters of the Pomona Fairplex National) feel that it infringes on their event then we wouldn't do it. That would be so mething that would happen in conjunction with and with the cooperation with them. I don't think it would (infringe on their event), and I hope their event is strong this year and gets stronger and then we can have two roa d races in Southern California. Bu t I would certainly want to run Superbike if I cou ld . There was once talk that with all the irons you have i n th e fire tha t your tenure at Paradama might be short and that you woul d b e leaving in a year or so. Care to comment? I had heard that you mentioned that to Tom Mueller, that there was allegedly some rumor to that effect. And if there was a rumor, it couldn't have possibly come from me because I've never said tha t nor dol think tha t, to make the record very clear. There may have been some conjecture on that point because I do have a lot of irons in the fire and (Paradama) has taken a huge amount of my time, especially with the defection of several tracks from the schedule. That was something that I was shocked at - in truth, really shocked. I knew there was a big problem in Supercross and that was put back together very quickly, although it took weeks to dot all the l's and cross all the T's . I knew that deal was back together because amazingly as bad as it got, there really wasn't a big problem. It just shows you how two parties can come to a brick wall and bounce off of it and go their own ways. All it took was kind of a fresh face and somebody who wasn't emotional wilh it. I listened to what they wanted, and they listened to what I ha d to say and everybody was reasonable and it came back together. The road race Superbike thing was a different thing. And I was still shocked, still shocked of the actions of the promoters. I got in soon enough to get all the promoters everything they ask ed for and it still didn't work. So we have gone through this long agonizing period of finding other sites and now bringing people back into the program. And il has taken a huge amount of my time...I have no intent on leaving - theoretically, I could say - forever. I don't expect it to be as busy in the future as it is now beca use to pu t two major series back together in six months or whatever it has been, has been obviously very time consuming. Once our programs gain strength, and they will, and as they gain more and more popularity, I will be able to act more as a policy-setter than as a day-today employee. I work on Paradama things on a daily basis, some days for 10 or 12 hours... I have very understanding partners in my law firm which has been nice, and they accept that, and my brothers are working on the race track projects so I can let them do some of those things. So I have been able to concentrate on AMA and I will give it some hours every day for a long time. But I see my day-to-day work diminishing as things get straightened out, and Tom Mueller will do more of the things that I'm doing now. I knew virtually all the promoters who were involved on the Supercross and Superbike levels, and it became natural for me to start doing the day-to-day things, negotiations, etc. I love motorcycle road racing, and our family has promoted more Nationals than anybody else in the history of the sport. We still promote a race at Del Mar, probably the most successful (dirt track) National in the history of the sport. That to me signaled a resurgence of dirt track racing. and in my opinion dirt tra ck racing is probably stro nger right now than it has ever been. With 24 races on the 1995 schedule and Crane Carns with us, the future looks good. With Superbike I don't think that we have even scratched the surface. I really believe tha t, We have at leas t three new facilities that I believe will be built wit hin the next year or two that have already applied for Su perb ike races. No w that th ings are settling down, in one yea r, and once we start bringing in the sponsors and the television and all the rest of it - we won't have enough dates available. I th in k then that Superbike will . then become recognized by the general public as the great sport that it is. For the last several years, Superbike racing in America has been in a state that has just not allowed it to grow, and without commenting why or why I think this way, obviously in the past few years there has been a great disruption in it - and this past year even more so. But now that it is back on track, we'll have a lo-race series this year, and next year there could be 11 or 13 races easily. Much of it will be .up to the teams and the manufacturers to make sure that's what they want. If that's what they want, I think that's what we'll be able to give them. Will Paradama promote or copromote any races in 1995? I think they'll have to . As I sit here today it looks as if two races may have to be co promoted or promoted by Paradama if we have to (since this interview, the AMA have indeed scheduled two races - at Gateway International Raceway and Firebird Raceway - which they will promote... Editor). I didn't think it would come abou t so quickly, but that's why Pa radama was formed . We have the flexibility to do that. It is not our policy nor our philosophy to be in the promotion b usiness. Our philosop hy is to make motorcycle racing success ful, and if that means that we have to put on 10

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