MotoAmerica Series Thoughts

The excitement is high for some and the racing fans I know are eager to see what the MotoAmerica series has to offer for the 2015 racing season.  We’ve been waiting patiently for updates and they’ve been coming through with bits and pieces over the last few weeks.  As many have probably seen, they have announced a tentative schedule for the 2015 season and there are some exciting tracks on the list, which is listed on their website as follows:

The 2015 MotoAmerica Road Racing Series: 

April 10-12 Circuit of the Americas – Austin, Texas (2 classes, MotoGP support)
April 17-19 Road Atlanta – Braselton, Georgia
May 15-17 Virginia International Raceway (VIR) – Alton, Virginia
May 29-31 Road America – Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin
June 12-14 Barber Motorsports Park – Birmingham, Alabama
August 7-9 Indianapolis Motor Speedway – Indianapolis, Indiana (2 classes, MotoGP support)
September 11-13 New Jersey Motorsports Park – Millville, New Jersey
TBD Laguna Seca – Monterey, California (WSBK Support Race)

I for one am excited to see COTA and Indianapolis added to the series, as well as the possibility for Laguna Seca.  This means that the US rounds of MotoGP will now feature the MotoAmerica series, making it a complete race filled weekend as opposed to just the XR1200 round we saw this year.  The Laguna Seca round would possibly include the World Superbike series, again giving us some exciting laps to compare to the pro’s!
Being in Michigan and looking at this list, I have to say that I am a little bummed to not see MidOhio on the schedule.  It is a great facility and there is always a guarantee for some good, close racing, but who knows, maybe it is still in the works…  Fingers are crossed and hopefully we’ll see some tweaks to next seasons schedule.  The other big one that is missing is Daytona and the possibility that we might not have the Daytona 200 race to look forward to next year.  I’ve heard some rumors floating around that there are some differences with management and we all know that attendance has been very low the last few years.  Who knows if we need to blame that solely on DMG or if there is lack of interest for such a long race.
Either way, the KRAVE Group seems to be doing a great job with getting motorcycle racing back to North America and has the backing of Dorna and the FIM, which is a huge improvement over what we’ve had the last few years.  If you’ve liked their Facebook page or get their newsletter blasts, you will also see that they continue to add industry professionals that should be able to assist in making the series a success.  The riders are going to make a huge impact as well, I’ve already heard and seen a ton of buzz around new teams forming and riders looking for the rules to start getting prepared for the series.  Hopefully we will start to see more contingency and money back into the sport making it more feasible for the teams to participate.
I honestly feel that if we can get some of the big manufactures and race coverage will be a game changer.  When we started to loose the bike manufactures and backing, racing started to fail.  Shortly after that, we lost any sort of decent racing coverage and were stuck with a half assed effort at online live coverage.  If we can get both of those back in the racing circuit in the US, I think we will start to see some drastic changes across the industry as a whole.
We need a change, we need something to bounce back the industry and get new motorcycles selling in North America.  We see it every day working in the business but it’s sad when your local dealer didn’t even order the new model sportbikes to have on their showroom floor.  This is something most people don’t see, don’t notice or know about but it has a trickle down effect across the board.  We need more people like Wayne Rainey, John Ulrich and alike that care about the sport and the industry to continue to help bring it back.  I don’t know about you, but I don’t want the only racing we see on TV be Nascar and supercross…
I’d love to hear what you think about the series as well, so if you get a minute, drop me a line and tell me your thoughts!
Aubs

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