Heavyweight change discussion

[Jim Brewer]

Something like this was suggested in 2013 ..

Redesignate

Heavyweight Supersport to be Middleweight Amateur Supersport
Heavyweight Superbike to be Middleweight Amateur Superbike

Remove Heavyweight Endurance


Specifically
2.2.3.A - Middleweight Supersport rules stay the same
2.2.3.B - section is removed
2.3.2.1 - Middleweight Superbike rules stay the same
2.3.2.2 - section is removed
2.7.A - remove "Heavyweight"
4.2.A - Amateur definition (RoR restriction) is applied to Middleweight Amateur Supersport and Middleweight Amateur Superbike classes.

Reasoning -

• There hasn't been and are no "heavyweight only" bikes in the MRA (except for Cindy's) so the classes are duplicates of Middleweight.
• There are enough entries in the heavyweight races to warrant keeping them
• Designating these classes as "middleweight" is just acknowledging reality
• Making them amateur classes will expand trophy and contingency opportunities

Historical discussion can be found at http://forums.mra-racing.org/showthr...cussion-thread

Jim, why you want to take away HWEND? I know there are no, or almost no HW bikes anymore, but given that our race day still generally gets done with all races completed, and that it runs with OPENEND, it doesn't add any time to the race day and just gives another opportunity for middleweights to 'race up' and do another endurance race, as well as add additional $$$ to weekend revenue for the MRA. Given the usual tightness of the MRA budget, I am not for removing any class altogether as it just removes revenue from the club. There are a lot more people now who are doing both MWEND and HWEND and I think a lot of people (me included) would be disappointed to see this class go away.

I think we both agree that HWEND is a repeat of MWEND - same bikes, same riders, etc. Since MWEND got so popular and fast, we had to break it out from the LW classes (to keep them from being mowed down), create 3 endurance events, and shorten the races to 20 minutes. I'm proposing going back to 30 min races and having MWEND run with OPENEND as they do in RoR.

Financially, we could run the numbers but my guess is that HWEND is at best a 2nd entry, if not a 3rd.

I also would like to see Supersport and Superbike stay expert only classes and not changed to amateur designation. I think a lot of experts race these classes partly because they are expert only and are typically some of the faster classes in the club and making them novice eligible would I think discourage participation by some experts. AMO and AMU exist for exactly this purpose and have historically served both racer designations quite well for a long time.

Just to be clear, I'm not talking about *ALL* Supersport and Superbike classes becoming amateur, just redesignating HWSS and HWSB. MWSS and MWSB remain expert. I'm suggesting only HWSS & HWSB become Middleweight Amateur SS & SB for the reasons I stated.