ArenaCross and KTM

[lksseven]

I attended an ArenaCross race last night.   So much fun - those guys are amazing.  The jumps, the speed, the INSTANT acceleration.

The little kids division - 65cc and 85cc - was probably 90% KTM.  But in all the normal divisions, not a single KTM 125, 250 or 450.  Sad.

Is that all just 'marketing' and mnfr-rider support, or does KTM really not have a competitive motocross setup?

Larry Seale
I choose to ride

[firstturn]

Larry,
  I am not sure of KTM and their rider support programs on the lower level of MX.  But the KTM on the small size bikes is really the only race ready bike that is ahead of the power curve.  I imagine the riders on the 125, 250 and Open class bikes depend more on local dealer support and what ever support they can get from the big 4 japanese manufactures.
  As far as KTM having a winning combination for MX they do a outstanding job of a race what you buy Bike.  I still believe that most riders suffer from not being in shape, not eating right or in the words of Tom Benolkin "would rather buy a new pipe than spend money on gas to practice till you drop".

Ron Carbaugh

[cubfan1968]

We got an ArenaCross coming to Omaha on St.Patrick's weekend. Really looking foward to seeing it. Last time I saw a pro event was 1977 at the L.A. Coliseam.

Rod Whitman
1972 Six Day (Rider)
1972 Six Day (Project)

[Doug Wilford]

Arena cross, super cross are not Moto-cross.  I think KTM is on the right track as they manufacture Off road motorcycles.  Which covers alot more participnts than an indoor football type of event.   Just an old farts opinion.   Have Fun!

[lksseven]

Hi Doug,

I agree that these things aren't motocross, or off-road events.  But 5,000 to 15,000 people show up and pay to watch these events, and that's a lot of people that are gonna want the same equipment the winners ride, just like a zillion kids buy Nike's because Michael Jordan wore them.

My real question, I think, is:  will KTM's focus and success in the 65cc kids classes translate into more KTM's being ridden in the bigger classes in years to come as those kids get older and bigger?

Larry Seale
I choose to ride

[firstturn]

Larry,
  The real answer here I think is money.  People today don't buy a race bike 2 or 3 times a year like a lot of people did in the 70's.  Today a lot more people just watch the racing and don't race.  I know first hand working for a manufacturer the Race Team was used as a marketing tool to sell the brand and not just the race bikes.  I feel KTM focuses on the world market and tries to mix up the support for off road racing as much as possible.
  The Last Man Standing Event was all but ignored by the Big 4, but it has some how turned out as a KTM (RED BULL) sponsored event won by the secondary sponsor?  Just reporting what my Friends feel about the outcome.  Hey everybody could have shown up and the same results could have been recorded??
  The last thing about bring up riders that stay on the same brand.  Most marketing people in the industry feel like riders will go where the money is and there are no more Jeff Wards out there in the world today.  The other thing is that Dealerships are becoming more just business people and less motorcycle people.  Yes they are still out there, but it is big business, and with the internet, people just shop price so why concentrate on rider loyality.
  All in all I feel like THE SHOW (Motorcycle Racing for the public) is just a money deal and that is there really isn't a warm feel for quality riders to progress to the top without THE MONEY SPONSOR.  Life isn't always fair and neither is racing.  I guess you hit a hot button since my days on the race team where we did help local talent and with some luck they did make it big.  Now I am somewhat disappointed in the trick jumping and young people thinking that it is racing.  On the other hand the introduction of Super Motard is exciting and something that takes REAL TALENT.  Please remember that this is just my opinion and racing is racing.  Oh, I have never raced stagecoaches or trains only because I wasn't ever offered a ride![]  I hope everyone reads this and understands a big part of my life has been racing...of all types[8D].  Now what was the question?

Ron Carbaugh

[Doug Wilford]

Larry;
It would make sence that these kids as they grow up are not going to forget the great experiances they had with the KTMs.   Many will get out of racing, maybe even through college.  Then at a more mature age want to get back into off-road riding.   What Brand do you think they will look at first?   I think KTM has a fine future marketing plan.  The super cross intermission show has the big four drooling and wishing that they had thought of it.   Great topic.
Have fun!
Doug

[tlanders]

I too ALWAYS root for the KTMs. They are dominant in the enduro and hare scramble circuits throughtout the US and of course Salmin (sp?) won the GNCC last year on one. But I too am saddened that KTM doesn't "go after" the supercross market because of the incredible exposure it has. Of course we will see KTMs doing well in the new endurocross series.

On another or maybe the same note, there were VERY few Pentons/KTMs at the AHRMA Phoenix national last weekend. Tom benolkin didn't come (family reasons?) so it left Dave Coupe to take all the honors. Curt Kennelly, another rider and I showed all the foreign bikes (Pentons are American aren't they???) a thing or two in the +60 grouping and Bob Egan did well in his races, but I think out of 800+ rider entries in 6 off road events, we were it as far as Pentons/KTMs are concerned.

How many of us will there be in Florida???

Teddy

[lksseven]

Ron and Doug,

You both make good points.  Ron, you're 'on the money' - A big % of the fans watching the Arenacross didn't appear to me to be motorcycle riders.  They were just there to be entertained.  And ArenaCross track is so tight/small that it's ALL about the hole shot and then you just watch the top 4 guys triple jump everything until the checkered flag in 5 laps or so (but it is fun to watch).

And Doug, I also think that those young riders will think about KTM when they get back to riding in their 40's .... unless they moved on to Jap bikes in their teens and had good experiences there, too.  

Money - so true.  I guess you have to pick your battles, and KTM has decided not to go head-to-head with the huge Japanese corps, but attack the niches where there's less focus by the Japanese.  

But I also predict the following ... as off road racing gains in popularity, it will more and more show up on the Japanese radar, and they will attack that market aggressively.  AND, as these young hotshoe motocrossers get to old to compete at the top level in motocross (you know, 28 - 30 years old), they'll look for other forms of racing that they can succeed in, and off road racing will attrack more of those guys, and they will be very very successful there, plus Super Motard, as well.  If more of them were on KTM's in the motocross world, that would be more marketing muscle for KTM everywhere.

I mean, how hard can it be to just decide to make the best motocross bike available, and then do it?   KTM's got a history of doing that over and over again.   In every article I read, everyone praises the KTM engine, and everyone slams the suspension.  Well, why doesn't KTM just address the complaints (even if half of the complaints are driven by the fact that the big 4 spend more ad dollars in the magazines, there's got to be something to the complaints for them to be so widespread) and present a kickass bike, then spend big bucks to get a couple of big name motocrossers to ride for them, and see what happens?

Just the opinion of a middle-aged, slow guy who wished he'd kept riding after he turned 16 and got his car license.



Larry Seale
I choose to ride

[Big Mac]

I think the honchos at KTM are simply smart. Why kill yourself and your corporate wallet to get a sliver of exposure in American televised MX, Supercross, etc when the Japanese manufacturers are intent on using their horsepower to buy the talent with jumbo contracts? Why not concentrate on the markets where they have an established foothold and don't need to pay through the nose to promote themselves--European GPs, SuperMotard, Dakar Rally, 65cc kid's class---and just concentrate on making an exceptional quality out-of-the-crate product?

When I go to an off-road event put on by a local club in these parts, it's about 1/3 or more KTMs. Local motocross races, 1/2 the 65cc class is KTM. Check out the current standings in the Euro GPs--Yamaha holds the most wins, followed close by KTM, then Honda, Suzuki and Kawasaki taking up the rear.

All the other smaller Euro brands tried various formulas to compete, promote and stay alive...and except for those that followed a niche like trials, they all died. Meanwhile, KTM gains ground slowly and continues to win fans with real riders who don't buy all the hype based on who's on what brand on TV. Last I heard, KTM has overtaken Kawasaki in US sales, all without the investment in the Big Show that was required of that brand.

[desmond197]

I remembeer going to one of the first Arena cross events in the 80's that a friend of mines husband was promoting. I though it was kind of stupid after have been to many real MX events. Shows what I know. I also had a chance to invest in Hooters when it was a start up and did not do it. I thought the bikini car wash was a better idea.

[lksseven]

Hi Mac,

Great points.  I was a marketing major in college, so I'm always fascinated by the strategy and tactics of companies - how they see themselves and how they see their marketplaces, and therefore their futures.

Has KTM really exceeded Kawasaki sales in the US?  That's intriguing.  Didn't I read that Kawasaki and Suzuki are sharing joint R&D on frame production, or are sharing actual frame production?
             Question:   do you think James Stewart's success and celebrity will pump up Kawasaki sales in the US to a signicant degree?

Here's a question about marketing tactics:  what about the idea of KTM offering a reward of $xxx to the winner of any local race of a certain level/rating, if the winner is riding a KTM.   That would be an attempt to invest only in success, and provide a carrot for good, promising young riders to ride KTM (if the money was enough to be interesting to them).  Or maybe KTM could incent its dealers to invest in local riders, in some manner.  

I'm rambling on with this, because I'm a firm believer that success always attracts unwanted attention from your competition (Question 1: what can we do to succeed? Question 2: what can we do, after we succeed, to defend our success).   The more success KTM enjoys in its offroad markets, the more it puts that market in the crosshairs of Honda and Yamaha, and it might be a good idea if it was making inroads into its competitors gravy markets.  The more time and money Honda and Yamaha have to spend defending and innovating in their main markets, the less time and money they have to try and hunt in KTM's main markets - take the fight to the enemy, where feasible.  

Actually, having some of the studly European offroad champs come ride over here in the States is a brilliant idea.  It's a great way to promote KTM prowess.  Kudos to KTM for that.

But I still don't understand why KTM can't provide suspension on its motocross bikes that motocrossers, as a group, applaud.   Or is the US magazine business so corrupt with payoffs and quid-quo-pro arrangements that it's an impossible 'fix'.

I agree that KTM is obviously a smart company.  I'm just musing for "musing's sake" because I like KTM and - because I own a small business in an era of big competitors - I'm interested in the tactics employed by small firms against huge competitors in their marketplaces.

Larry Seale
I choose to ride

[Big Mac]

Larry,
Your thought about $'s to the locals sounds pretty much like Kawasaki's Contingency program, which was big in the '90s. If you rode the brand and finished well in off-road events, you'd earn Kawasaki bucks. They were the most involved in non-pro racing, would bring a fully equipped truck/crew out to the SoCal desert events and seemed to be focused on support and dollars for the unknowns in order to build brand. I last lived and rode down there in the mid-90s so not sure the involvement today, but seems like they've scaled way back. It doesn't appear that it was very successful in my opinion.

I have no idea what setup the Euro GP motocrossers use on their KTMs, but seems to work fine for those guys, and their tracks are fairly close to the outdoor AMA series here. I just recently got cabled up to the Speed Channel, which covers the GP series, and was very surprised to see all the orange bikes leading the pack there, especially their domination over Honda this year.

[tomale]

I have read year after year the bike shoot outs and to my amazement, KTM never did better than 3rd out of the 5 brands tested... I could be wrong about that but not by much... The results could be for a number or reasons including those already mentioned. I am sure that the big dollars of the fab 4 does make a difference. After all they do have to sell Advertising space. However, I think it also needs to be said that a close look at the shoot outs and you will find that the differences are very small theses days. unlike when we were growing up and the differences in bikes were major. This is not my speculation but something I have read more than once from more than one magazine. Someone does have to be a winner.... like you I would love to see KTM on top once in awhile. I think that there are some differences that KTM has to offer that may not be so apparant on the Fab 4. Europeans seem to Value the money they spend on a bike much more than Americans do. So A KTM  has to last a few years in order to justify the cost. Which by the way at least here in the USA in not that different from the Jap bikes.. And then there is the Off Road market. Mac is right you do see more KTM's in off road events... They just hold up. I think that is due in part to the heritage that has been handed down from John Penton.
As for Supercross and Arenacross, to me it is alot like the Circus coming to town. Alot of much content. I still believe that they are not good for the Sport. It has changed the way we do even Outdoor Motocross too. Too many seem to think that supercross and it little brother are the same thing as Motocross and they are not. Because of it outdoor national are looking more like supercross which translates to the local tracks looking like them as well. Supercross may be alright for the Pros but it can be really dangerous for the locals. I have a great nephew that has broken just about every bone in his body because of it. Just stop for a moment and count up the number of our Heros that are disabled for the rest of their lives because of the insane jumps and rythum sections that supercross feeds on. It is getting to be like the Roman colliseums of two millenium ago, wear men and women were slaughtered for entertainment. I realize that I am over the top and it is really not that bad but I state it this way to make a point. I race regually with a couple of guys that had riden the Supercross's in the early days and They both told me that is scared them to death, but they had to do it if they were going to get noticed by the Factories. From my perpective it was the Promoters setting the standards, all in an effort to turn a profit. Is there more money in the industry... yes, ARe there alot more riders yes, Are we on the edge of the Mainstream... yes has it brought better bikes.... yes, is more riders getting sponsors.... yes, but at what cost. And who really paid the bill?

Thom Green,Still crazy after all these years!
76' 250 MC5 (orginal owner)
75' GS400 (project bike)
72'sixday (project bike)

[lksseven]

Hi Thom,

great points.

The human costs have been paid mainly by the riders, of course, but then they've also enjoyed the lion's share of the highs.  Same with race car drivers (heck, it's the same with regular drivers in traffic - how many people suffered whiplash before the car companies got the bright if tardy idea to put a headrest on top of the frickin' seat, and then decided to do it even if it cost a little more?).  Same with computer software - 100 million people have to reboot their computers constantly, lose data frequently, suffer from viruses and spam daily ... and Bill Gates is earning $7.6 million PER DAY in interest on his billions.       WAAAAAHHHHH!

It's the AMA's responsibility to put in regulations and limits on the size of jumps, etc on AMA sponsored events, to try and protect the riders.  But, you're right again, it all comes down to $$$, and while true race fans would appreciate a great, sane track and excellent racing skills by the riders, the other 90% of the paying public wants to see circus-type thrills and spills.

One of the big problem with ArenaCross for me is the same complaint I have with Formula One racing .... not enough lead changes.  Both venues have tracks so tight and restricted that it's almost impossible to pass, which makes for a boring race to me.

Larry Seale
I choose to ride