EBR's Plans for Racing in the Near and Long-Term Future

I'm curious if anyone has heard any rumors or has any speculation or even just a wish-list for future racing.

It seems likely that a real racing program is a very expensive luxury at this point and we won't see a real organized effort for the next several years.

Will Splitlath continue? Will they expand into something like British Superbike or MotoAmerica?

MotoAmerica would seem the logical place for EBR to be racing in the near future, and I'd like to see them racing there in some kind of organized way within the next few years.

I'm wondering (since the almost certainly won't be racing as a factory team in MotoAmerica ) if it might be worth creating a SERIOUS contingency program.

For example:

	Superbike	Superstock
1st	$25,000	$5,000
2nd	$15,000	$4,000
3rd	$10,000	$3,000
4th	$5,000	$500
5th	$2,000	$250
10th-6th	$1,000	$100

With approximately 20 races (10 rounds with 2 races per round), if someone ran the table, that would cost them $500,000. Which is a lot of money, but if someone really ran the table on an EBR, how many bike sales would that translate to? I'd think the resulting publicity would be enough to justify the cost.

And since riders would be much more likely to collect the smaller prizes, I think the overall cost/publicity ratio would be fairly low.

If someone ends up getting 20 fourth places in Superstock (probably much more likely than the above), that would still be good (not great) publicity and only cost EBR $10,000. And if they sneaked on to a couple podiums in there, it would be worth the extra.

With a contingency plan like that, I'd think that some riders and teams who were on the fence regarding what bike to run might take a shot with EBR.

There seem to be a good number of EBR riders currently racing at the club level, and I'd like to also see them support those riders so they can build from the ground up. I'd like to see some sort of organized group that includes all EBR racers that would give those riders a link to talk directly to EBR engineers (there may well be some sort of informal program in place). Not only would that help and encourage the racers, but it would also provide valuable feedback to EBR.

So what does everybody else think about what they will be doing and what they should be doing regarding racing in the coming years?

Helping the privateers at the club level with contingency win money would be dollars well spent. Just one podium finish would help pay for the years' wear items and, for EBR, it would help sell bikes so it would pay for itself. As for EBR shelling out $25k to $10k for podium finishes, that is a lot of money and takes several bikes sales to recoup. So starting slow and at the privateer/ club level may be the way to go. I wouldn't be surprised to hear that EBR does "reward" Splitlath and their riders for podium finishes now.

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Originally Posted by buell-fan

As for EBR shelling out $25k to $10k for podium finishes, that is a lot of money and takes several bikes sales to recoup.

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Think about it this way: How many podiums did EBR get from Eslick, May, Pegram and Cory West? I'm thinking maybe 5 or 6 total in the several years they were putting a serious effort into AMA racing. With my model, they'd probably pay $70,000 - $80,000 for all the podiums they ever had. Do you think they put more than $70,000 - $80,000 into their AMA racing over those years? :wink:

I don't think the money they'd put out would be the downside. I think it's more likely there wouldn't be any riders collecting, but even if they could get someone taking $500 here and $250 there in Superstock, that would be a bigger MotoAmerica presence than they currently have, and I think every dollar they would pay out under such a structure would be well worth it.

Very good question. IIRC, didn't Buell operate something similar for years before there were any actual factory teams?

Regarding Splitlath, in case you didn't see the earlier post, Mark Miller recently announced his retirement from motorcycle racing. Hopefully we'll see Shelina Moreda in more races on an EBR this year.

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Originally Posted by Hughlysses

Very good question. IIRC, didn't Buell operate something similar for years before there were any actual factory teams?

Regarding Splitlath, in case you didn't see the earlier post, Mark Miller recently announced his retirement from motorcycle racing. Hopefully we'll see Shelina Moreda in more races on an EBR this year.

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I'd love to see them pick up another young rider and start building something for the future. Racing in China can't be cheap, but it's probably a little less expensive than a serious BSB or MotoAmerica effort. I wonder how much it costs to go to Macau, Isle of Mann and China and if they could do a full season in BSB or MotoAmerica without spending too much more (though Macau and Isle of Mann seem to be their 'thing' so they may not want to give them up). I would think that Shelina and another rider on EBR's would be interesting enough to attract some sponsorship money if they wanted to try a full season somewhere.