Mike Ripley
Hey,
Thanks for the Survey and I hope to do a follow up one with Miriam and Chris
after this one has ran its course. Overall we have had a good year, even
though a few races were down overall its been great and Kris and Short
Track---keep up the great work and maybe some of these folks will venture
out to one of our great XC races in 2009 and give a XC race a
try. Maybe more people are riding on the dirt than the road---ST, XC,Cross,
SD and DH-----maybe thats a bold statement and I am wrong? Someone will
tally that up and set the record straight.
Some things to consider.
I think the fact that 3-4 million people live in the Portland area and
getting 350 to Short Track is great, but getting 225.00 to Ashland or Bend
is awesome numbers considering the population.
We do have alot of racing in a few short months and having 2-3 at most per
month is the best situation in my opinion but if someone wants to put on a
race we do not limit this and even as we as promoters look at the schedule
for 2009 with more of a watchful eye on over doing the spring, someone could
start putting on races february through april if the venues existed to tear
up.
Back in the day---Don't get me going, but it was Mudslinger in April and
Spring Thaw in May and maybe a race on Memorial Weekend and then the bulk of
the racing started. Now I would personally love to get back to this schedule
and not overlap on Single day road races and make it better for people to
race road and mtn and get more numbers at events, but this currently is not
the case and who tells who that they should not put a race on and crowd the
schedule with muddy or wet mtb races.
Weekday racing---great at building up the local race scene---but if a xc
race were to happen on a Sunday in July, how many people from Portland would
race both the XC race and do Short Track in Portland----I would bet that 75%
of the people that live in the Portland area would just race Short
Track---and racing Short Track is a great thing, but is it then a risk to
put on a race in the summer if you may not get the support of Portland. This
would hold true for road if a friday night TT series were to take place and
a TT was scheduled on Saturday---it may not get numbers as well. I love the
participation, but it means that we may just have too much going on
personally over the weekends to race more xc races or a weekday race may be
taking the place of the traveling and expense to go to a one-day race/event.
I say to all areas of the state to look at your teams and get more people on
them, juniors, sports, cat 4/5 riders---under 30 year old riders---ect and
take a road trip once or twice a year away from your area. Build it from
within, support OBRA and have fun riding your bike. If you do not have a
mountain bike---go buy one---I hear 29ers are pretty nice and it would make
a great back up bike in the pits at cross.
Thanks
Mike Ripley
OBRA mtb rep