Youth ATV MX

[DEVINF450R]

in District 18 (Southern IL and mid MO), we have a very low turnout of youth riders. They are really wanting to change this. All feedback will be appreciated, esp those of you that have done things to increase rider turnout and been successful. I also would be interested in hearing what other youth riders and their parents would like to see. keep in mind its a district race so its not gonna be anything too expensive. We would love to increase rider turnout in all classes, but youth has NONE that show up :confused:

[300ex_#387]

Back when I was racing 300's there were loads of people racing that class. Now hardly anyone shows up anymore. I can take part of the blame for that too though. I hardly showed up to any district 17 races last year. Do you know is crossroads will still run quads this year devin?

[DEVINF450R]

Yes they are. They had a really sweet track last time I was there.

[quad2xtreme]

I've been pondering this for some time because D29 in NC no longer has ATV racing. I've been asked to consider helping re-establish it. I've been thinking about it for 2 months now. I just don't know what changes would help. ATV racing was eliminated due to low turnout across the board in all classes.

Very interested in seeing what people post. D29 ended before the economy went south so that isn't the only issue for sure.

[tjsdaname]

wow, that sucks.... here in Iowa D22 there are as many or more youth racers that adults at any race....

[DEVINF450R]

I would like all guys that raced and do not race now to post why they quit and I would like guys that do not race to post why they havent raced. we really want to pull in riders or atv mx will be dropped from d18 motocross schedule

[LTRracer4]

Quads are just hanging on here in D18. Two years ago quad riders *****ed because we'd sit around all day waiting for the bikes and we were guaranteed to be home late and ride a bone dry track. Last year they decided to run us on saturday, that way we'd have our own day. It was nice, but they have bike practice after the races on saturday so they try to run us through as fast as possible. Indoor races around here have full gates of youth racers, but none show up the outdoor races. The majority of our outdoor tracks are a blast, and there are only a few that are outliers in the way of being far away. The people that run our district are welcome to adding classes we want and track time, etc, but we lose these privileges with the low turnouts we've been having. If we had one solid season of 80-100 quad turnouts we could pretty much build our own layout for the way OUR race day is ran.

[300ex_#387]

It wasn't fun showing up with 2 or 3 other guys on the gate. I got another Honda now though so I will hit up a couple D17 races. I've never ran any D18. What tracks do you guys run?

[DEVINF450R]

Originally posted by 300ex_#387
It wasn't fun showing up with 2 or 3 other guys on the gate. I got another Honda now though so I will hit up a couple D17 races. I've never ran any D18. What tracks do you guys run?

There are some stellar tracks in D18. Way more than in D18. Xroads and Walnut are the only tracks that d17 has that can step to most of the d18 tracks, paradise in duquoin il, splinter creek dirt riders in fosterberg il, finger lakes in Columbia mo, hilltop in Mexico mo, Salem is pretty nice too.

[300ex_#387]

Does Salem ever hold any quad practices? I'm only about an hour east from there. I need to get some seat time I havent rode since May. Thinking about going down to earlywhine here in a couple weeks.

[fastex91]

We run primarily at Casey and we switched from the mini quads back to a bike because of several issues.
1. It sucked sitting around all day to race on a half asked prepped track when there was no one there to watch. Kids like people there.

2. We had a fully built Honda 125 and it wasnt competitive enough against a cr85 90 mod. No fun knowing you cant win.

3. Poor turn out at every race, average turn out was usually 3-4 riders.

4. As a parent, (past racer also) its just too expensive to run a quad anymore. We have an 85 bike now and this is the first winter i havent had to spend thousands to get ready for the race season. In fact this is the first race season I havent spent a dime.

[300ex_#387]

I've been racing quads for the past 6 years and last May I sold my 450 and bought a 250f honda. I'm now back on quads. It's just something I couldn't stay away from. I would rather drive 3-4 hours than race Casey. That place needs a whole new layout and all new dirt.

[kimv]

I would ask this same question in the mini atv forum..you will probably get more responses.
How many race series do you have in your state that run quads?

[DEVINF450R]

As far as individual series Id say 5-6 at least but only 2 ama districts.

[kimv]

We race D14 in MI and have a few faircross series, GLMX and D14. A few yrs back D14 and GLMX split causing a low turnout for mini quad riders. When we started a few yrs ago my son only had 1 other quad to race and the other classes did not have many either. As of last season we had close to 30 minis at every race between the 50s, 70s and 90s. What we started doing is sending out an info/schedule rackcard(4x9) to everyone we could get an address for, only for the atv racers. We sent them to every atv dealer we could get an address for also(I think we sent out 25 a piece to each dealer). We have also started a fb page which has helped alot. Another thing that we have done is gone through alot of the other series and looked through results with the kids name and city and tried either finding their address(not too easy) or trying to look for their parents on fb and sending them messages to see if they were interested in receiving the info. We have had alot more interest this year. If you can get them to all run one series obviously the turnout and racing is going to be alot better and everyone wants that. It is alot of work, but it is working for d14. I hope this helps!

[DEVINF450R]

some GREAT ideas... ill pass them along, thanks!