The Rise & Fall of Motocross in America #3

The Rise & Fall of Motocross in America

In the early 1990's several kids in my neighborhood had small dirt bikes, at that time we could ride right from our houses to each other’s houses and on trails near the neighborhood we lived in, we also made small motocross tracks in nearby fields, that we could also ride to from home. This was the normal way of life back then not just for us, it was like this at that time in many cities and states all across America, and I lived in the suburbs of a large metro area not way out in the country.

My friends and I started out on small air cooled trail bikes like Honda XR80’s, I had a Kawasaki KD80 which is an air cooled trail bike, after a couple years on trail bikes my group of friends and I moved up to racing versions, I got a Honda CR80, some got Kawasaki KX80’s, and Yamaha Yz80's (at the time they were 80cc not 85cc) then we started racing local motocross races and then later moved up to 125cc two stroke race bikes.

It was around that time things started to change in our area, it was in the mid 1990’s, when the fields that we used to ride in started to turn into neighborhoods, businesses... schools... golf courses... (Urban Sprawl) … Also corporate farms bought up a lot of the land in some parts of the country, this was definitely true in the midwest. It seems now days in some states there is almost no vacant land that isn’t either privately owned or being farmed. The western states and side of the country still has lots of wide open spaces, Deserts etc, but not so much in some of the midwest states… It also became more & more taboo over the years to ride even a short ways down the street to get to riding spots like we had been able to do in the past, you cant get away with that anymore in most places. (Unless your in Philadelphia or Florida apparently and willing to do it illegally & run from the police)

We were not being disrespectful back then, we would ride slowly on the far right side until we got to our riding spots.

Now days unless you live in a rural area, or way out in the country, you have to have a truck or trailer to bring your bikes to tracks to be able to ride them, and tracks are far and few in some areas, often hours away from populated areas.

Its my personal belief that unless you grew up riding dirt bikes and remained into it, or have a close family, or friends that are already into motocross that the chances of people randomly choosing to get into motocross racing in its current form and just going out and buying expensive dirt bikes that are quires expensive these days plus a helmet, boots, gear etc., I think the chances of people randomly getting into it are slim.

These are just some of the reasons why dirt bike sales in the USA have declined so dramatically from the 70’s, 80’s, 90’s, to now. Many people also blame the change from 2 stroke to 4 stroke.

I do believe it played a part, however I don't personally think that it's the sole reason for the decline, I used to think that as well but I though so mainly because they were more expensive, but I began to really question that thought after doing some research, I realized that people were still buying other things that are just as expensive,

Quads, side x sides, boats, jet ski's, even mountain bikes are expensive these days, I Now believe Its a combination of things.

Another big change from the 1970’s which is when they were selling the most dirt bikes ever is that the dirt bikes were much less powerful air cooled bikes, they had less horsepower & they were easy to ride, easy to learn on types of bikes, and the size of the jumps were smaller and the speeds were a lot less, it was less dangerous and people's and perception of the danger was different as well.

Now days it is considered an extreme sport. And its true it is a lot more extreme and dangerous.

But knowing all of that, I still think there are things we can do to help turn it around.

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I believe that by looking back throughout the history of the sport and recognizing what the changes were over the years and fully understanding the effects that each of the changes had on the overall direction of the sport that we can address them one by one and fix a lot of the issues in the sport.

I have pointed out a lot of the problems, here are some viable solutions.

I believe that we can start a movement thar will.pit an organized focus on helping the sport grow.

With a Social enterprise, website, plus live events we can show relatable sides of the sport to America. These days people that dont ride mostly see extreme stuff they couldn't do, only the most extreme stuff is shown on TV. motocross is a lifestyle, its a group, it's fun, there is a strong social aspect, and there are easy to ride, more mellow versions of dirt bikes that a lot of people just don't know about, because they aren't being focused on by the AMA and there are no race classes for them.

The sport creates friendships and a brotherhood, it encourages a healthy lifestyle it puts a focus on a healthy lifestyle, exercise and nutrition. But does the average person know that?

Education:

The decline has gone on for so long now that the younger generations know very little about motocross. I believe that the sport needs to be reintroduced to America and that people need to be formally invited to participate.

Technology: We now have the internet and social media.

We can't make it so people can ride everywhere like they did in the past but we now have a lot of technology that can be used to educate people and to rally people together and teach people how to get a track started in their area.

We can share stories of how it has been done in other places.

Events:

I believe we can help the sport grow with participation from the industry by having planned events all around the country to formally introduce people both kids and adults to mellow easy to ride bikes, these bikes are our BUNNY HILL I believe there should be classes equivalent to a PW50 for older kids and adult beginners. Not everyone is lucky enough to get started riding dirt bikes at a young age. I absolutely believe that we can help grow the sport by filling in missing areas such as that. Fill a void. Smaller mellower easy to ride safer bikes are still being produced. They are also much cheaper and a heck of a lot of fun to ride and race against others that are on the same type of bike. Give most 10 year old's a couple XR75s and a corner track in a field and they will run the tanks dry.

These bikes still exist, And mini motocross is actually on the rise organically, there are some parts of the country where it is growing big time. I have seen kids having back yard races with with more bikes on the gate than some classes at the local Mx tracks these days and that is without their being any big national campaigns or any type of governing body putting a national focus on mini moto.

I am working on a passion project that is about ways to help grow the sport that we love! Please join me at

mx-collaborations.com

#bethechange