BMX scoops multi million dollar Olympic Boost

[Mr Ex Speaker]

Thats the title of the story in QLds Sunday Mail today. A 1.5 mill facility to be built in Brisbane. It will feature an 8 metre high start ramp with Barry Knight saying it will be built in consultation with UCI designs. Pictured in the story is Kamawith the sports Minister, awaiting comformation its him as i thought he had a beard as he is apperaing in HRV promos with one. Will look to Bert to post full story for everyone. Wonder if it is Olympic standard would they hold state or Aussie titles there perhaps.
Cheers

[Bmxbandit]

Just wonder if we are getting real value for the $1.5 million they are investing.  The State Government put this huge amount of money into a track designed to "Olympic' Standard.  One assumes this includes berm jumps and the like.

While it is great news that the government is to invest such a large sum of money in the sport with an 8 metre Start Hill etc etc the track will most likely only be useable by the "elite".

If the investment in Shepparton is of the magnitude of $250 000 to get a track of UCI standard(As raced on by all classes at the Worlds etc every year) then for $1.5 million we could have 6 tracks or more of this standard spread up the entire length of the state of Qld.

[Mr Ex Speaker]

I realised latter on about my comments of having States or Aussies there, unlikely due to the track being Olympic only 18 or up future Olympians would use it surely. View the track from the olympics and you couldnt let sprockets on it etc. I wonder if the State body knew this was in the pipe work and advised them how to get the support, you would wonder why BMXA wouldnt use the chance to boost numbers not just cater for the elite.
Cheers

[Bmxbandit]

Yeah look I'm not knocking anyone for getting the Government to invest in the sport.  That's a great thing.  But it is a lot of money if the facility doesn't cater for everyone in the sport when we are sadly lacking a facility of world class standard(World championship standard).

I wonder if the government is aware that a track built to "Olympic' standard only caters to about 0.05% of the sports participants?

Bit like Chula Vista in the States.  Great facility for 50 or so people to use out of the 100,000 BMXers in the States.  And the average American track is no better than most of ours!

And all focused on one race every four years.

[Psykopath]

Bit like Chula Vista in the States.  Great facility for 50 or so people to use out of the 100,000 BMXers in the States.  And the average American track is no better than most of ours!

Chula Vista is to host the USAC Nationals - for Challenge and Championship.....

USAC are the national cycling fedaration, the USAC nationals is also the US qualifier for worlds.

[BMX Bandit]

Posted by: Mr Ex Speaker      Posted on: Yesterday at 02:42:27 PM
Insert Quote
Thats the title of the story in QLds Sunday Mail today. A 1.5 mill facility to be built in Brisbane. It will feature an 8 metre high start ramp with Barry Knight saying it will be built in consultation with UCI designs. Pictured in the story is Kamawith the sports Minister, awaiting comformation its him as i thought he had a beard as he is apperaing in HRV promos with one. Will look to Bert to post full story for everyone. Wonder if it is Olympic standard would they hold state or Aussie titles there perhaps.
Cheers


It was Kama in the picture, he shaved his beard of to do the new BMX Australia Sign On Day TV advert. I saw it the other day on  Win TV, he was really good on it.

[Hoadie]

Totally agree with BMX Bandit, we need a facility to cater for all riders or
split the 1.5 mil up to each club in QLD so we can better our tracks and facilities.
We have our track open to our club members 4-5 nights per week, our riders are good riders, can you imagine the next step these riders would take if they were riding on a World class track day in day out. Look outside the square.......

[Paul 40]

Chula Vista has two tracks, the Supercross track and an am or "normal" track so they can cater for all riders. The Supercross track is also used alot to host Jnr Development camps to get the Jnr's up to speed.

Please don't winge about big money being spent on the Elite riders, this will benefit us all in the long run. Numbers are up since BMX was at the Olympics with many new and a lot of old faces returning to BMX. Get number's back up to something like the 80's and sponsors might start to value BMX $$$ again.

I'd also put money on that BMXA will look at getting more World cup rounds held at this facility which again can only draw more attention to BMX and help grow the sport.

Hoadie, Imagine how much better they will be if there riding a Supercross track day in, day out.

[bmxkirk]

For the 1.5 mil they could maybe do something like the 2010 World Title design for South Africa with three straights seperated for Pro and Amature and only combining the last straight. It also uses two start hills!

[Hoadie]

I'm hearing you Paul 40, I just hope this track will cater for both Jnr Developement riders as well as elite, but will Jnr riders be able to ride it day in day out? I am all for big money being spent, just spend it to benefit all.

[Icrashalot]

Exactly how is this going to grow the sport? It isnt a "normal" race track and as someone said above will benefit very few of our riders. I love watching bmx supercross as much as the next person but it is not a realistic representation of our sport. Yeah lets spend $1.5millon on a track to attract riders to the sport in a way that most of these new riders will never benefit from. Iagree with the south african worlds style track, at least us average joes will get some use out of it.

[Bmxbandit]

The reality is that even if the facility mirrored the two track set up mentioned above it would still only provide a benefit to those in the immediate area.  Developing tracks across the state would provide an enormous boost to the sport across the whole state.  Remember its nearly 2000k's from the southern most track to Cairns in the north and even further to the Isa.

How much money will be available via the grants system for clubs to develope their facilities after the sport gets $1.5 million for this one facility from the State government?  We are about to try to upgrade our Start Hill and track and estimate we need about $40k to do so plus quite a bit of in kind assistance from the local business community.

But it must be one hell of a facility.  I have been involved in a number of large projects at work(10's of millions of dollars) and have no doubt that $1.5 million should put together a very impressive facility.  (You would assume that being built at Sleeman will mean that there is no land purchase component in the costings.)

Will be interesting to see what actually gets delivered for the $$$$. 

And who will be the managing entity for the facility(BMXQ, BMXA, Qld Academy of Sport??).

This in itself will have a major influence as to whether it is a benefit to the sport in Qld. 

[race69]

I say woo hoo a track like this in our back yard can’t get any better than this. It’s only a 15min drive from my front door. I will also look forward to all the big events this track should attract.
Unfortunately wherever something is tabled like this, there will be someone with a concern that they will be missing out, I guess this is human nature. They had a motto cross track on the inside of the bike track at chandler so I guess they already have the dirt.
For a politician to say the 1.5 m will be spent and the actual dollars coming out of the government are two different things. It would be great to see this come off but I guess there is a long way to go.
It’s great to see the sport moving forward

[Paul 40]

Exactly how is this going to grow the sport? It isnt a "normal" race track and as someone said above will benefit very few of our riders. I love watching bmx supercross as much as the next person but it is not a realistic representation of our sport. Yeah lets spend $1.5millon on a track to attract riders to the sport in a way that most of these new riders will never benefit from. Iagree with the south african worlds style track, at least us average joes will get some use out of it.

How is it going to grow the sport? It's called exposure. Unfortunately in this day and age, if you're not being seen, to most you don't exist. Something like this attached to an Olympic sport gets that sport noticed by people outside of the sport. Yeah let's spend $1.5m to preach to the converted, great idea  The Supercross format is what will get BMX noticed by outside media, sponsors, new competitors. I get it's not what 99.9% of us do but that goes for most sports with some sort of Elite grade. Most car racers wont race F1, most AFL or NRL players wont play in the top grade but that .1% that do make people want to do those sports. And before people start with the "but BMX is a family sport" thing think of this, how much better would it be if there were more families involved, because they seen on tv the Aussie BMXer's doing well at the Olympics which was helped by this track being built, cause lets face it, if the Aussies aren't doing well there will be no or little Olympic BMX coverage in Australia. I also think it would then be easier for clubs, state and national bodies to secure sponsorship or funding to get things done when outside parties have some idea what BMX racing involves.

In the long run I believe this WILL help us all.

[just rollin]

No ones ever bloody happy on here bloody amazes me really. So when we get a supercross world cup here none of you winges are aloud to come. Your not aloud to have the big name international riders at your tracks to do gates.
Your kids when they turn 14 will not be able to train on there or if they ever are close enough to get to the Olympics you tell yea you could of had a track to train on like ever other bmx country in the world but I said no cause you couldnt ride it at the time.
why not be bloody happy the money is being spent!!
someone said before they were spending 40 grand to do what remodel your track lift your start hill 2 meters that's great but that's nothing compared to bringing in 2000 trucks of dirt taring berms that are probably twice as big as the ones you have. what about the civil drainage what about lighting what about new amenity's canteen training rooms car parking spectator seating for a few thousand what do you think it will cost to properly fence the whole place and the little things like architect draws for said buildings these are just some of the things need to build a world class facility the list gos on and on to set up some thing like this
Everyone wanted the Olympics and this is part and parcel of what it takes
As for other clubs missing out on money from the state government thats rubbish this is not a grant they are going for they are not taking anything you might have got on the contra who ever is behind this has just opened the eyes of the state government to the potential of our sport.
This is what our elite guys need the jr kids have great tracks in QLD were can the elite guys go to train ? Lukes back yard or we can spend more money on flying them all over the world so they have the time on a track that's whats been happening and gesse what everyone complained about that as well why are only these people going why carnt Jo Blow go blah blah blah no ones ever happy start looking at a glass half full and not half empty