Get serviced for 300 Euros
By TMX Archives on 22nd Apr 09
The MX3/ EMX2 Handlebar Festival at Hawkstone Park is an event that asked a lot of important questions many of which still need answers! THIS week you can see on the opposite page that ACU/ UEM official Eddie Herd has joined-in the great debate following the great non turn-out of fans at the MX3/ EMX2 Championship MX at Hawkstone Park, which was run as the Handlebar Festival. Please read it, there's some interesting stuff in there.
The one point brought-up by Eddie that I'd like to sling in my two pennyworth regards the ‘surprising' lack of entries for MX3/ EMX2 this season. We are all aware of the current economic situation and I agree that riders are loathe to cross the channel – at least in this direction. But it's Eddie's third reason, the introduction of a ‘service' fee, payable by all riders for the privilege of riding the series, that really woke me up. So, the first question is: "How much is this ‘service' fee?” £20? £50? £100? If only. Hang onto your hats people – the ‘service' fee that a rider pays for a wild-card ride in the series is – wait for it – 300 Euros per round. That's some service fee. Eddie says we should look at it in a positive manner and maybe we should although for 300 Euros I'd also expect some pretty positive and demonstrative ‘service.' And the chance to have your sponsor's logo – possibly covered in mud – flicker on TV at 4am or even broadcast non-stop forever more in Asia, does not, to me at least, constitute 300 Euros well spent. If you feel differently please tell me.
I think it's safe to say that we've found the real reason why the riders aren't queueing-up on the start line.
I'll repeat again that I thought the EMX2 class (I'm deliberately leaving MX3 out of this, maybe for another day) at Hawkstone was brilliant and I'm happy to agree that the class exists for all the right reasons, ie it is a perfect feeder series leading to the MX2/MX1 Grand Prix. But I ask in all seriousness – does it really warrant a ‘service' fee of 300 Euros per rider? To get a quick answer I conducted an ad hoc telephone straw poll of British team managers and the odd rider who have or at least should have an interest in the series.
To say this was touching a raw nerve is to very much underestimate the case. Holding the phone at arm's length I listened through several tirades of anger and frustration which culminated at best in a quote of ‘crazy' and I couldn't possibly print the rest. You guessed, no-one wants to hand over 300 Euros per rider per event in a ‘service' charge – which is on top of the event entry fee!
I've said this before I know and while those with enviable budgets (how many are those are there now?) violently disagree. I just don't agree with blindly following Bernie Ecclestone's much-envied path.
Everyone and his dog wants to ‘do a Bernie' and make their fortune out of promoting sport.
The big problem is that Bernie has the sponsors' millions with which to do it, plus a few quid left over for himself. And good on him. To run an event on Bernie's lines – a huge multi-coloured circus, lots of people shouting into headsets, a line of hospitality suites, banks of computer screens for hangers-on to stare at, etc., etc., – is great if someone else is paying for it.
Find a suitable sponsor – from outside the sport – and I'll put up with all the corporate shirts in the world. But if you are asking the RIDERS to pay for the fantasy set-up, which unless I'm missing something is clearly the case here, then is there any wonder there are depleted grids?
We all know how hard it is for a young rider to make it in motocross anyway and, to be brutal, you are never going to get there without some kind of financial clout anyway. To nip across to Bernie's side of the fence, look how many millions it took to engineer Lewis Hamilton straight into the top drive in F1.
By all means push the MX1/MX2 scene as far up the corporate scale as possible, with the worthwhile aim of letting the world see the very best riders compete on (hopefully) the very best tracks.
But underneath that elite, surely the sport should be cutting its coat according to its cloth, not attempting to force youngsters to pay what they clearly can't afford, especially for something for that they can see no benefit.
The Euro series is clearly an important step up the career ladder but the opportunity to compete surely ought to be available to as many riders as possible which, to me anyway, means making access as affordable as possible...
