Well spoken by all. The only thing I can think of to
add would be an idea about the national network that
Emily refered to. In my opinion, one of the very few
things that the USAC has to offer (or has a monopoly
on, more to the point) is the national team and the
national championships. Since OBRA is the Oregon
bicycle racing association, we clearly can't hold our
own national championships. However, OBRA isn't the
only 'renegade' association in the country. What I
would love to see is all the independant associations
get together (FIAC?.. I think that's it) and start
holding national championships, and perhaps even put
together a composite team for the sole purpose of
raining on the USAC's national team's parade. Or for
the purpose of promoting elite level racing, but I
like raining on USAC's parade better.
I imagine I'm not the first one to have this idea. I
also imagine that Mike Murray has even discussed the
possibility with other association representatives.
So, does anyone have any imput on whether this would
work at all, do anything to solve the problem of
regional isolation, halt global warming, or end
mindless rambling in a public chat? (That last part
was aimed at me.. telling me to stop now)
Thanks,
Brian O'Neal
I think other people have responded to Emily's note
adequately but I just
wanted to point out that what Emily is complaining
about is really a USAC
problem and not an OBRA problem. USCF could at any
point decide that they
recognize and award upgrades for placing in non-USCF
races that otherwise
meet their distance and field size requirements.
They could also stop
discriminating against riders because of where they
live. (If you think that
is not a problem then talk to Lance Coffel about his
experience...Or maybe
even Steve Larson.)
USAC is in serious financial difficulty. If they
can manage to turn things
around so that they can stop the hemorrhage of
members and events then it is
possible that the could fix their problems but it
looks very unlikely at
this point. Ultimately it appears to me that the
USAC's ship is sinking.
It would do us very little good to attach a line to
them at this point so
that we could get dragged down with them.
I agree with Emily that the elite level racers pay a
price here but it is
important to recognize that the price they pay is
due to the failings of
USAC not because of the success of OBRA. Even though
the elite (or potential
elite) level racers pay a price they also benefit
from the larger number of
races, larger prize lists and decreased membership
and ultimately lower race
entry costs. Even though Emily has not noticed any
"decline in race fees
since OBRA went solo" you can guarantee that would
be increases if we were
to go back to doing USCF events since the costs to
the race organizers will
go up substantially and the number of riders will go
down due to the
increased membership costs.
Having said all this I have to agree that OBRA needs
to do a better job at
encouraging development of elite level riders. Our
current system is heavily
participation based and inclusive rather than
exclusive. This is a good
thing since it has increased the total number of
riders. Currently Oregon
easily has the highest number of bike racers per
capita in the US. The
problem is that the number and quality of lower
category and Masters races
has contributed to the problem of the shrinking of
the Cat. 1/2 fields. To
reverse this trend we need to give riders more
reason to become Cat 1/2
riders, to stay Cat 1/2 riders and to come to the
races that are offered. I
have several ideas about how we can do that. One
big component would be to
stratify prize lists so that Cat 1/2 riders get
substantially more. (Why do
we prize Old Guy races anyhow? Does it do anything
to increase
participation or to help the sport?)
I would love to change this discussion from a rant
for or against USAC and
to a discussion of what we can do to solve our own
problems. It is unlikely
that USAC will be providing us anything other than a
bill in the near
future.
Mike Murray
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