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looking forward to your response, Jeremiah...and sorry to stress you out, LOL
Hello USAC!
also, what is this "goatshed" trail you speak of?
i've lived and ridden here four years and have never heard of a trail by this name.
01) The insurance is a pretty big thing. With USAC they offer the promoter insurance and the rider insurance in case of an injury/crash during the event. Remember, without proper insurance a venue can shut down!
02) We also put up $5,000.00 pro cash purse at most of our races. That would not be possible without a sanctioning body providing rules and officials.
03) Racers. USAC always has racers. Having racers at our event is a great benefit! Example: when we do our event at Bootleg the numbers of racers are almost double of the other non sanctioned races there.
There will always be pros and cons with USAC. I do not agree with splitting up the gravity from the other disciplines, I am with you there!
Regarding 2 - Why could you not offer a prize purse without a sanctioning body? Post your own rules and enforce them.
Regarding 3 - I think this is a matter of event marketing, which (beyond a fairly hidden listing on their website and the occasional email blast) USAC does very little of. It's up to the promoter to do all of their own event marketing.
#3: Yes it is up to the promoter to do their own marketing. We have just had luck with our USAC races being worth big qualifying points. However, without a nationals what good are qualifying points! Okay you got me there! I just see low turn outs at all the other non sanctioned events except the U.S. Open where money talks! If we could put up 40 grand cash purse the riders certainly would show up!
#3: Yes it is up to the promoter to do their own marketing. We have just had luck with our USAC races being worth big qualifying points. However, without a nationals what good are qualifying points! Okay you got me there! I just see low turn outs at all the other non sanctioned events except the U.S. Open where money talks! If we could put up 40 grand cash purse the riders certainly would show up!
As a CAT 1 racer, I personally would rather race an event that will have the opportunity to take my CAT 1 classification and earn points to move into the PRO category. I definitely understand the frustration with USAC. If there was a different sanctioning body out there that had enough members to create large turn out events, I would be all over it. Unfortunately, there are none in the country that I am aware of. When you compete in a sanctioned race with USAC, you are working towards a certain goal...eg: CAT 1, PRO, US Champ, Worlds, and World Cup qualification.
Downhill Mike puts on great races at Bootleg. I live in Las Vegas, and ALL of the races that I have been apart of at Bootleg have been horribly done. Except Mikes races! I have my gripes about USAC for sure, but I am still willing to race their races and be thankful that there is somebody out there giving the opportunity. If they weren't here...who would do it? Hopefully they will give us "Gravity" riders a little more respect in the future, and make us a priority. Just look at Europe.....they have a HUGE "Gravity" scene. And, bring in a lot of money and big name sponsors.
......just my 2 cents-
Northstar is a great venue but I think the NW soil is what makes that region so amazing. Washington needs to step it up and host a really big event with both DH and 4x.
...And I digress to the original conversation, USAC needs to figure out making Nationals at Sun Valley for all Mountain Bikers. Stop jerking everyone around and get your act together, it is just bicycle racing put away your egos.
Unfortunately, a national governing body is required for the legitimacy of our sport...
According to the "Supported Riders" Section: "USA Cycling maintains development programs across many levels and disciplines of the sport including: men’s and women’s (U25) road programs, men’s and women’s junior road programs (both 15-16 and 17-18 age divisions), men’s and women’s mountain bike (U25), endurance and sprint track programs, men’s and women’s BMX development camp programs as well as a regional development camp system." So nothing for gravity, unless USAC is footing the bill to Betterride and those regional camps, so I should be able to attend those, right? I'm not being developed.
I looked in the riders list, couldn't find a single person that went to Worlds for gravity, not a junior, not a Pro, nothing. I even looked for Barry Nobles because he's a AA BMX Pro that also went to Worlds, couldn't find him. So who am I supporting?
Another thought, why do I have an ABA membership if if USAC is developing BMX racers, shouldn't my BMX license support BMX and my MTB license support MTB?
Someone call the whambulance.
As DH grows so does our power and influence. Ski ares are not called "ski ares" for nothing. the winter is the money maker for them. Big surprise right? Well that’s the advantage that DH has, its the only form of cycling that mimics the ski season. Whats the benefit of XC to a ski area? They ride on trails without charge, and the XC trails still should be maintained by the resort, they bring their own food in most cases, and never buy a lift ticket. Wow lets bend over backwards to make sure they’re happy! But i don’t want sit here and just bash on XC that isn’t fair ether. I would rather concentrate on making DH better.
My experiences are based on NORBA and MSC mostly. I maybe dating myself but does anyone remember the roost master shootout in Durango (90-95)? Maybe I was just young and impressionable but I would love to see a race series with that kind of vibe. If the forest service and ski ares saw the revenue potential of DH new ski ares would asking to be apart of our sport. New Mexico has a fantastic riding season, with many ski ares that have incredible potential, some of which just outside of real cities not ski towns.
That being said interbike would be a tight fit in Albuquerque’s convention center but in October the weather great and the riding is really good around here. Sorry to write a novel and to end off topic but that's my two $0.02 and I've got at least a dollar more but i'll shut up now.
-Vince
"I am both a race co-promoter and an avid amateur downhill racer and I am frankly fed up with USA Cycling's mishandling of the entire gravity discipline. I will have to renew in order to race USAC-sanctioned races next year; but, believe me, you will NOT get a penny from me until day-before the first race of the season!
The fact that you let a venue (Sun Valley) bid the National Championships (which I intend on finally competing in this year) SANS GRAVITY DISCIPLINES leads me to the inevitable conclusion that you folks don't give a sh** about gravity. It is a slap in the face to the entire sport of mountain biking to have done this.
If someone cares to respond to this missive, I encourage it; but, sadly, I fear nobody cares enough to do so."
Anyway, onward. Lo and behold, today I got this reply from Micah Rice at USA Cycling. I notice that it was also CC'd to Kelli Lusk. They are listening, folks, and it appears they are trying to help:
"Hello Doug and thanks for your email.
I am sorry you are frustrated with the splitting up of gravity disciplines and cross country disciplines for USA Cycling Mountain Bike National Championships next year. Contrary to your suggestion, we actually made this decision on behalf of the gravity members who have been pushing for stronger gravity venues. Many gravity riders were frustrated with what they considered always having to play second fiddle to the cross country riders, so we created a stand-alone championship in a quality gravity venue so that the gravity community had a top-notch venue all to themselves.
We sent out two bid packages at the same time—one for gravity and one for XC. We were very clear on those packages that we would consider a bid for both disciplines or either one.
We will be announcing the location of gravity nationals very soon and I think you will be pleased with the outcome of this plan. For the first time ever, the gravity community will be able to come together in one great gravity venue and the media can focus on just them."
2006 - Sonoma
2007 - Mt Snow
2008 - Mt Snow
2009 - Sol Vista
2010 - Sol Vista
Second fiddle to XC riders? Gravity champ locations have been good ever since Sonoma. I think it's more likely that the XC riders complained that they had to ride a technical race at Sol Vista.
"Hi Doug –
Thanks for sending your note back in response to Micah’s email. We are getting very close to making a final decision on venue and date. The date will not be the same weekend as XC Nationals because we wanted to make sure we had enough staff resources to cover both events properly.
Please stay tuned to the USA Cycling website for updates and details. Thanks for your patience!"
I also encouraged Micah to check in on both this thread and the one on RM so that they can know what's being said. I also suggested he might want to post in them so we can get a dialogue going. We shall see . . . .
here's USAC's response to my concerns...
"Bob,
Membership forwarded me your questions, and I will do my best to answer. You are quite correct in your assessment - Since the gravity events, and cyclo-cross as well, are not Olympic disciplines, we do not offer as much in the way of support for these riders.
USA Cycling does provide a great deal of support to the gravity riders who are attending Pan American and World Championships in the way of team organization, transportation and race support. But when it comes to actual funding from the Foundation, the only thing we are providing is funding for travel through the Burke Fund for Cycling Development. Riders may apply for funding to attend World Championships through this program, and we actually award that money directly to the athlete.
Your annual racing license actually does support your sport in many ways, but particularly through the insurance component. If we did not collectively have 70,000 license holders across the racing disciplines in competitive cycling we could not afford to purchase the insurance which is utilized by both the promoters and the riders each year. Our collective bargaining power with the members and the 3,000 plus racing events each year allows us to keep the cost low, and the actual insurance product of a high caliber. And certainly maintaining our insurance capabilities is critical for the gravity riders, promoters and events.
I know this is a frustrating topic for gravity athletes and I appreciate your concern. Unfortunately we have a tough enough time raising the money we need for development programs in the Olympic cycling disciplines. Hopefully the Foundation will eventually reach a point where we can provide more funding for developing athletes in both gravity and cyclo-cross. If you would like to donate to the Foundation, you could ask that your gift be dedicated to the Burke fund specifically for a Gravity athlete, and we will hold those funds until we have an athlete who requests assistance, and they will be guaranteed funding thanks to your gift.
Let me know if you have other questions, and good luck with your off-season sports!"
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