Amp'd Mobile Supercross Race Format Changes Made

2006-12-01 20:18
Live Nation Motor Sports, producers of the Amp'd Mobile World Supercross GP/Amp'd Mobile AMA Supercross Series, and the American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) and AMA Pro Racing, announced today format changes for the 2006-'07 Amp'd Mobile Supercross events that will help facilitate the addition of a second live TV broadcast and will reduce the impact to the racing surface throughout the evening program.

Live Nation previously reported that the opening round of the Amp'd Mobile AMA Supercross Series in Anaheim will be broadcast live on SPEED. The live broadcast at Anaheim joins the Las Vegas supercross finale as the other event scheduled for live broadcast on SPEED.

One of the changes that will help to sharpen the focus of the live broadcast while reducing wear on the racing surface and related track maintenance time, will be the adoption of the event format for the AMA Supercross class that has been used for several years at the Rockstar Energy Drink U.S. Open and in the AMA Supercross Lites class for more than a decade. The new format for the AMA Supercross class will continue to provide riders two opportunities to qualify for the main event through the heats and the last chance qualifier. The use of semi-final races, which traditionally ran with those riders who failed to qualify for the main event from their heats races, have been dropped from the format.

Another change to the program will provide those AMA Supercross class riders, who are ranked in the top 10 positions in current points that fail to qualify for an AMA Supercross main event, either through their heat races or the last chance qualifier, with a provisional start spot in the AMA Supercross main. Qualified riders in the top 10 places in current points will be eligible for provisional main event start spots twice during the 2006-'07 season.

A third change to the AMA Supercross class' race format is the use of timed qualifying practice to replace the qualifying races that ran in the afternoon at each event following the AMA Supercross and AMA Supercross Lites practice sessions. Every rider will have each lap of their practice sessions timed by the official AMA transponder scoring team, and those practice lap times will now be used to seed riders into the evening race program for both the AMA Supercross and AMA Supercross Lites classes.

According to Live Nation Motor Sports' senior director of Supercross Todd Jendro, "This change to use timed practice for qualifying riders and the use of the provisional start policy to replace the semi-final races will significantly reduce the impact on the race track during the program and will allow us to ensure spectators that the track will be in the best condition possible for the AMA Supercross and AMA Supercross Lites class main events. These changes will also tighten up the program a bit to make live AMA Supercross even more attractive as a live TV property. It's been nearly two decades since the AMA Supercross event format was revised, and were confident that the changes will help to enhance the quality of the Supercross experience for our fans".


Source: Live Nation

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