No merit in moto-cross decision

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32050, 26 July 1969, Page 11

No merit in moto-cross decision

TT is difficult to find any merit in the decision of the Manawatu Orion-Motor-Cycle Chib to restrict the official international motocross series this season to four meetings in the North Island. Finance has been mentioned as S'reason but when the proven ability of South Island clubs to raise money is considered any problems in this direction seem to evaporate. At any rate, the value of such a series must be in the impetus it gives the sport When this stops, so must the series. With four meetings in a restricted area the boost must be severely limited. If an international series

such as the Manawatu club has, in association with many other chibs and contributors throughout the country, held in recent seasons does not run at a loss then it must be regarded as a success. A- profit of $145 was made on the seven New Zealand meetings (four in the North Island, three in the South Island) last season and this can hardly be regarded as a sound reason for depriving South Island centres the chance of taking part in the official series. The Manawatu club has left the way open to other clubs to run their own meetings. It is apparently prepared to sell the two world

class riders it proposes to bring from .Europe to other clubs for a limited number of meetings. But these will not carry international moto-cross points and many leading New Zealand riders, especially those in the North Island, will obviously give these a miss. There seem to be only two possible reasons for the Manawatu club to take such action, which is clearly against the best interests of the sport in New Zealand. It must want a far greater financial return for the amount of money it has invested or its members must have become tired of organising such a comprehensive series.

Either way, it seems time for the New Zealand Auto Cycle Union to step in and take over the running of an international series; It has the resources to back it financially and could easily set up a nation-wide committee to organise it One cannot praise too highly the initiative shown by the Manawatu club in inaugurating the international series or the tremendous amount of work done by the former Australian international, A. T. Gibbes, of Palmerston North, but one must now question the right of a single dub to run such a series. Any international series must be for the benefit of

the sport as a whole. Areas where motor-cycle sport ■ is not flourishing are perhaps the areas which would gain most from an international meeting. The series proposed for next season could never be regarded as the New Zealand international series. It 'will merely be a series, of four meetings with an international flavour and with limited interest outside the four main North Island centres chosen as venues. It can only be hoped that the club will change its mind when a meeting of in-, terested parties is held in Palmerston North on August 2 and 3.