Just to say - champs a lot!
By TMX Archives on 8th Mar 11
THIS week's column takes a look at a whole new world of championships - and the cost of travelling to them...
GOOD job that the daylight hours are noticeably lengthening because, having stealthily sneaked upon us like a copper with a speedgun, the 2011 Championship season is about to hit us with a vengeance! "Which Championships?” you might ask. "All of them!” is the instant reply! And ‘all of them' adds-up to an unbelievable number. I don't actually like to count them individually but late last year when Mannix was collating the huge amount of data for the 2011 Championship season, ready for printing the calendar in the Christmas issue, even he stopped counting once it got past 50 series and was heading towards 60.
You wouldn't think so but it's true. There's Worlds and Euro and British Champs. Motocross, Trials, Enduro and Supermoto champs. Then there's solos, sidecars and quads champs. And Vets, Under 21s, Twin-shocks, Youths, Pre-65s, Evos plus all the others I've missed-out champs... Then there's ACU, AMCA, MC Federation, BSMA champs etc, etc, ad infinitum.
Even those 50 or 60 series that we (Mannix) collates throughout the year are just the tip of the iceberg. There's centre champs and club champs, each split again into all the above disciplines and all the classes plus a few more. And at T+MX, although we may not achieve it, we are just as committed to printing your club's Wednesday night Twin-shock Over 40 champs (easy course – one round to drop!) as we are the World MX1 champs. Each is just as important to those contesting their series as the next.
Just last weekend the British Enduro Championship kicked-off in East Anglia with the Muntjac Enduro. Don't get started on how many classes are involved...I'm just acknowledging the fact that that particular British series is now officially underway...although following on the heels of the new British Sprint Enduro Championship which had ALREADY kicked-off in early February...
This week sees the two British Championships get underway that T+MX is probably most associated with, the domestric motocross and trials series. The ACU Maxxis-sponsored MX series gets a real early start date – for motocross that is – although the south west Little Silver venue probably gives it the best chance of decent winter weather it could get. As an aside I'd like to say that I personally think that the spectator entry fee of £20 is more than fair in this day and age – you certainly get a full day's sport for your money. I'm often critical of the cost of (to reduce it to basics) standing in a field to watch bikes go round a muddy track but given the standard of bikes, riders, races and presentation you get full value for your £20.
Meanwhile, the British Solo Trials series get off to a flyer with a brand new event near Barnsley in Yorkshire.
As it's a new event, very little is known about how it will pan-out, but as multi British Champ Graham Jarvis is in charge of the sections there should be no worries on that score. Graham did an excellent job on the sections for the British World Round at Carlisle in 2009 and he definitely knows what's what. Oh, there's also a double-header British Sidecar Trials Champs weekend in the West-country. Trials is obviously less weather dependant than MX and in fact it used to be a series heavily dependant on winter events. That's because many of the riders used to ride trials in winter and MX in summer. Amazing isn't it.
Whatever, the Championship season is up and running and – hold tight please – it won't stop now until we hit the finish line.
I'VE had lots of correspondence lately from readers saying that they can't afford to travel any more with the high cost of fuel. I'm with you 100% – and the only answer to that one is to share costs.
A £50 fuel bill for one is halved to £25 if two of you travel in one vehicle. Obviously the more bodies/bikes you cram in the motor, the more you save. Back in the early 1980s Nigel Birkett built a fire-breathing Transit twin-wheeler fitted with a three-litre V6 petrol motor, armed with a carb like a bucket that drank 5-star like a barful of thirsty navvies.
About 20mpg could be squeezed out of it – although flat-out on the motorway it was usually quite a bit less! But with half a dozen bods inside, all chipping-in at the (frequent) forecourt stops it was not only the fastest van on the road at the time – it actually worked-out pretty economical.
My simple arithmetic makes it: Six times 20mpg = 120mpg! You really wouldn't have wanted to fill it up yourself though!
They say necessity is the mother of all invention and nothing invokes a bit of creative invention better than a fuel crisis. I'm not saying that we'll all end up riding ancient side-valve BSA's to events on a Sunday, with the comp bike strapped alongside in a sidecar, but there's no law that says you actually have to travel on your own in an artic – yet I still see lots of big trucks with just the one bike on board.
A bit of judicious sharing could see you even SAVE money! And who knows, you might even enjoy it – we did!