U.S.A. Cycling To Murder American MTB Racing

While few of you may think I don't know enough about cycling (like the upside of RotorRings and Vectran brake cables), I do know enough to hand you all a few tasty morsels now and again. As we all know, the NCS series here in the States, which is supposed to be THE series to do, has a total of GOOSEEGG spectators,etc. Hell, even INDUSTRY people don't come and attend anymore. Rather than make an attempt to better organize the American racing calender, U.S.A. cycling has handed down a sweet new way to F**K everything up for our potential Olympic hopefulls, and their team managers.
They have decided that UCI points for Americans will no longer just be decided by the Nationals in the 2007 NMBS series. That would be easy (unless you were Mary Mac from a couple years ago), so they decided to make it impossible. They have handed down a mandate whereby ANY EVENT ORGANIZER with a cash purse and proof of logistical capability can put on a race with FULL UCI points status, regardless of the region or athlete turnout. This means that if a guy has a rider, and about 15,000 bucks, he can put on a UCI qualifier for points in say....LUBBOCK, TEXAS, and gurantee his boy some killer points. That being the case, how do the major players like Adam Craig, JHK, Mike Broderick, Mary Mac, Jimena, etc plan their race schedule? instead of a few tightly spaced World Cups and NCS races to worry about, now they have to ponder some guy/girl from nowheresville North Dakota taking their Olympic spot in a race they never heard of.
That's not all. What about the team managers? Speaking from this perspective, I have a large team and a tiny budget. Until two days ago, I had the money allocated to all my Semi-Pro/Expert people for the NCS races. Now, how am I supposed to be able to know where and when to send my guys and girls? Do they do the Snowmass national, or the Billy-Bob's Bacon-Barn Classic? It's the same points, so now what?
How about the industry vendors? Sport Legs, Hydrapak, Kenda, etc? They spend LARGE rolls of dough to bankroll NORBA NATIONALS. If the Bacon-Barn Classic carries the same weight, why should they invest in the NCS series? Madness...and BUNGLING madness at that. USA Cycling certainly is trying their damndest to put that final nail in the coffin of NORBA.

Dirtbags.


Cap'n Chris