Short Moto's @ Budds Creek

[Pete Payne]

This seems to be an ongoing issue : Short Moto's"
The area qualifier was at the infamous Budds Creek last weekend 3/11/06 and 3/12/06 . There was record attendance right around 1000 riders. So it was packed to a pro national like weekend .

Now the owner opened the gates on Thursday afternoon to let the early birds in , there was an organized practice all day Friday then the racing stared on Saturday (stock classes ) and Sunday ( mod classes) .

The expert and pro sport classes got 4 laps . Now if you have seen Budds Creek ya know that the starting gate is on one side of the valley and the finish line is on the other side of the valley . so the first so called lap ends 1/2 way around the track and the the finish line that is on the opposite side of the valley from the start . this takes the expert guys roughly 1min and 20 seconds to make it to . then the second laps start.( I hope you can follow my rambling ). so laps times are around the 3 minute mark , give or take a few . So the total Moto time is 10 - 11 minutes .

So at the going rate of sign up $$$$ , this guy is making some serious $$$$. Now I know you go into business to make $$$$ . But and "a"class racer lasting under 15 minutes .

I think we need more track time , longer moto's . Separate the men from the boys.
I know track promoters try to please everybody , This is why there are so many classes. There is a class for everybody:
I think a few classes need to be dropped but they are afraid to hurt anybodys feelings, (Political correctness)
At last check there was only 24 hours in a day.So I think we need to drop a few classes and give all the riders more track time for there Buck. Give the guys time to do an endurance check and have a good battle , or catch up to the guy you were going to pass before you fell . , or maybe the promoter doesn't want to have to drag off to many 4-strokes when they drop a valve in the long moto's , (just kidding , you 4-stroke guys).

Tell me what you think .
Is it the same in other areas ?

 

[MXSparx]

I remember reading about this same thing on several other boards last season about Jonathan short changing riders like that. Its a rotten deal considering how far some guys travel to race there.
Seems he needs to revise the set up some how? Maybe different classes on different weekends?

 

[Pete Payne]

There was one guy , in the mini 85cc class that came from Washinghto state to race this qualifier .....

 

[bclapham]

go race REM saturday MX at Glen Helen. The int/pros get 20 mins + 2 laps, and everyone else gets 15 mins + 1 lap. Plus, the guy puts on a Pro open class for free, so all the pros get to run their extra class for free.

1st practise is at 9 am, and you are usually done by 2pm. Plus, you get to ride with more national riders than you can imagine....thats where they go to get into shape.

the problem i see everywhere else is that they run so many different classes so that everyone under the age of 16 can get a trophy and not feel left out. the secret is to combine classes and run two gates per moto. and get rid of the damn quad classes also.

 

[Masterphil]

I have been saying this locally, seems like forever. Combine all the classes of the same bike size, 125 A/B/C/D and run them all on one gate. If you look at the speed difference between RC and the last place finisher in a national, I gaurentee that the time difference between the winner of a local A class race and the last place finisher of the local D class race will be less. Besides, doing it this way will make it much easier to catch the sandbaggers, because they'll be forced to run with everybody. I'd like to be in a race and know that the only way I'll see the overall winner after the first turn is when he laps me. That's got to be how 38 of the 40 rider gate are going to feel this year at the nationals.

 

[deadhead]

I won't take my son to Budds until daylight savings time, and even then I usually leave upset. The last few times we went during simple district races, Budds will combine D7 and D13 MX and ATVs into a single weekend. There's a noise ordinance that prevents engine start till 9AM. They CAN NOT possibly have the full program they advertise. There will be over 100 people waiting in line to sign up, but a woman continuously blares out on the loudspeaker that if you're caught on the track without your practice sticker, you'll be asked to leave. Perhaps she could get off the mic and down to sign up and help out. As soon as practice starts, the tap dancing begins. "Well, there are just too many riders...", "You know, we've got both districts this weekend...", blah, blah, frickin' blah. Then they tell us they're cutting back to one long moto for each class. I've never tried, but I've heard that folks have asked for their money back when Budds announces the cutback to one moto, and they've been told practice started, "Sorry". The Unlimited Mini class is almost always at or near the very end of the order, and my son has been at the gate and told not only was he not going to get one long moto, his one moto would only be three laps, one lap less than if they had their sh!t together.

It pisses me off because they know beforehand they can't run their advertised program except in the summer. Would we tolerate this from any other type of business? Pay for two medium meat lovers pizzas. After a while, they guy comes out and says they don't have any more medium crust, he'll make you a large pizza instead. Then he comes out with a personal pan, cheese-only. No refund.

deadhead

 

[Chili]

I have been saying this locally, seems like forever. Combine all the classes of the same bike size, 125 A/B/C/D and run them all on one gate.

A nice idea in theory but at an area qualifier with 1000+ entries you would likely be looking at 300+ guys in that 125 a/b/c/d category. I know at Millville Am day last year there was 4 full 40 man gates for qualifying in 125 C. Even at a local level here if you combined 125 A/B/C/D you'd have about 140 entries to get down to a 40 man gate, so at that point do you divide up that 40 man gate to 10 per class?

 

[Masterphil]

Chili, I wish our tracks had a turnout like yours. We'd be lucky to have 300 riders TOTAL at a local race. I'm not talking about qualifiers(never been to one), just local races.

 

[Pete Payne]

Something needs to be done. As stated before if any other type of bisiness started cutting out what ya payed for , tyhere woulkd be serious counseqences. Meanwhile the promoter is still counting his $$$$. This is supposed to be a national quality track . I don't know about the quality and as far as laps go there ain't no quantity, either. If he advertised for "2 lap races " like we realy get the # of entries would definently go down . Maybe practice time needs to be cut down some .

 

[2stroke]

I can see if that kind of thing catches a promoter off guard once in a while, but if it's the norm, then something should be done. I cant really comment on the modern classes because I dont run them, but I am headed to Budds next weekend for the vintage race. I love the track, and I can see why people would travel far to go there. It would suck to show up and not be able to get to get a good run in.

 

[Pete Payne]

Maybe we should check out
www.masondixonriding.com
I have heard good things about this new organization.

 

[theroyz71]

Amen!

Amen!

Amen!

We were at the LLQ at Budds Creek this year. We stood in line for almost 3 1/2 hours to sign up for practice on Friday morning. We actually missed the first practice. Granted, we should have got there earlier. It was our fist qualifier and we had no idea the line would be that long and sign up would go that slowly. It was very unorganized. Once we got signed up we were able to practice. They didn't give out any stickers so we could have sent my son out for the first practice session while one of us waited in line to sign him up. Oh well.

My son raced the 50cc 4-6 (Cobra #112) and the 4-6 Shaft (PW50 #11) Classes. Budds Creek cuts the track for all of the 50 classes which is fine. Some of the hills are pretty steep and the PW50's would have a hard time getting up them. But, they also cut out the big off camber section during practice but not for the race. Some of the kids went through it while others went around. They didn't know because none of the track officials told them. You would think that you would race the same course that you practiced. Anyway, they had to red flag the start and bring all of the 4-6 kids back to the gate to restart the race. As it turns out, this was great for us as we had a mechanical problem and were the last one to get off the gate. My son't rear brake got hung up.

In the first moto, my son was in the lead when he crashed (with help) and finished 10th. In the second moto, he got together with another kid at the bottom of the first hill and they both crashed. Luckily, he got up quickly and worked his way up to 5th in the shortened moto and ended up 7th overall.

We didn't have any issues in the shaft class. My son won both motos easily.

 

[Pete Payne]

Budds moved the finish line over to the infamous "BIG GULP " in an effort to speed up things now the riders get 1/3 more of a lap .......
= very small band-aid .