AMA Board acts on rules recommendations from Congress
The AMA Board of Directors considered 54 rules recommendations from
the AMA Congress at the recent Board meeting in Las Vegas, approving 50
of those proposals outright, voting against three of them, and
requesting further investigation of one.
The AMA Congress consists of delegates elected from each of the
chartered AMA districts across the country. Those delegates submit
proposals for changes to rules governing AMA-sanctioned events. Those
proposals are voted on by the entire Congress and those that pass are
then considered by the Riding and Racing committees of the AMA Board
before going before all Board members for final decision.
On the road-riding side, the Board approved six proposals, most
related to technical language in the AMA Road Riding rulebook. In the
area of amateur racing, the Board approved changes to National
Championship Enduros designed to make it easier for promoting clubs to
hold this form of competition and also ratified a rewritten chapter
better defining the sport of observed trials and making it easier for
clubs and promoters to run these events. In addition, the Board agreed
with the AMA Congress to increase the allowable displacement of
motorcycles in the Super Mini class, to 112cc for two-strokes and 150cc
for four-strokes. Four-strokes up to 150cc will also be allowed in
Schoolboy-class racing.
On three specific proposals, the Board decided against
recommendations from the AMA Congress.
The Board disagreed with a Congress recommendation that would have
allowed two-stroke motorcycles displacing up to 144cc as built by the
manufacturer to compete in motocross Class 2. Currently, riders in that
class can only compete on 144cc two-stroke motorcycles if they were
built and homologated as 125cc machines, then bored out to the larger
displacement.
The Board also voted against approval of Congress recommendations
that would have increased minimum purses at Pro-Am races and increased
displacements in the 90cc ATV racing class.
Finally, the Board voted against immediate enactment of a Congress
recommendation that would have made sweeping changes to the AMA
competition class structure, eliminating the separate displacement
limits for two-stroke and four-stroke machines.
Noting that this proposal would have changed class structure for the
2007 racing season, which begins in less than two months, the Board
instead directed AMA staff members to submit to the Board a three- to
five-year class structure plan, after consulting with technical experts
in the field.
"When we looked at this recommendation," said Carl Reynolds, chairman
of the AMA Board's Racing Committee, "we realized that it would have
ramifications for nearly all of the AMA's racing programs, and that a
couple of months was too short a time frame to expect racers to react to
those changes. We have instead asked staff to give this issue the type
of technical investigation it deserves and come up with appropriate
rules for the future."
© 2006, American Motorcyclist Association
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