What's up with 4x getting canned?!?!??!

Lame.

A revamp I could see but complete elimination sucks. I really enjoyed watching the events.

That UCI Gravity report thingy seemed really negative about 4x so I'm not too surprised

It costs way WAY too much. Tracks cost more than DH and XC combined. They run it at night on Saturday's when people want to be in bed. Spectators don't show up. It's basically a huge waste of time and money.

Transcend said:

It costs way WAY too much. Tracks cost more than DH and XC combined. They run it at night on Saturday's when people want to be in bed. Spectators don't show up. It's basically a huge waste of time and money.

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Bring back dual on a grassy hillside with a bunch of flat turns.

Should we start a pool on which 4x specialists will move over to DH full time?

Dual slalom

ZoRo said:

I understand the cost venue thing. Tracks are indeed costly. But most of the venues that will host a WC for next year already have a 4x track built. So no real chucking $$ here. As for the time slot, I agree that nightime is not the best. Light sucks most of the time.

So basically no gated racing at next years World Cups?? Sucks a lot...

I hope this does not turn into the DS vs 4x thing. It's not the point of the thread...

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True, but getting the track in shape for a World Cup, even one that is already built, costs an awful lot of money. And using that thinking, it limits potential new venues to try and save upwards of $200 000 USD etc.

No one knows what is happening yet, fyi, the UCI hasn't said a word, but that's the rumour that has been floating around since early September. I'm sure that UCI survey didn't help matters either!

Transcend said:

$200,000 USD

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If this is really how much it costs to build a WC track, that is far too much.

dump said:

If this is really how much it costs to build a WC track, that is far too much.

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The estimates the UCI has been willing to divulge are all around $150k-$250k per track. It's absurd. Heavy earth moving equipment, manhours, sometimes loads of earth. Not to mention the banners, fencing, bridges and woodwork sometimes etc. It's crazy.

Transcend said:

The estimates the UCI has been willing to divulge are all around $150k-$250k per track. It's absurd. Heavy earth moving equipment, manhours, sometimes loads of earth. Not to mention the banners, fencing, bridges and woodwork sometimes etc. It's crazy.

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That is crazy. I'm surprised a budget of $150-$250K per track was even permitted in the first place.

ZoRo said:

I don't know up to what extent it's true, but heard that the Bromont 4x track cost upward 500 000$$$ to build. Fact of the matter is that 4x tracks are crazy expensive to build and practicaly nobody uses them day in and day out (except cooks like me who go to Bromont during the week and hike the track...).

Compared to a BMX track built with a similar budget, the BMX track will see routine traffic, a local club, about 20-30 races per summer, families, hot-dog stand, etc... 4x track are, in that matter, poor investments for sure. Though in Czech Republic, they seem to make them work pretty good, in the UK too.

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I've heard the same thing about Bromont, but let's be honest, the majority of that was govt funded. Quebec loves handouts. The rest came from the owners of Bromont who are actually investing in their resort, as well as the promoter from their own event budget.

This is a good thing. In its current form it is unsuccessful. 4x is there for spectator draw and it is clear its not doing that anymore. The problem with 4x is that it doesn't represent a style of riding, it is a event that has no grass roots following.

Now UCI can focus funds and time on DHI and XCO and make them more sponsor/spectator friendly. Got to down size in a slow economy, the weakest event has to go.

dump said:

If this is really how much it costs to build a WC track, that is far too much.

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It's basically a giant earth moving/construction project. Several $100k sounds reasonable. Like Transcend says, earthmoving equipment, probably union labor, etc. it will all add up quickly. I think I speak for almost everyone when I say that DAMN, it would make a lot more sense to put that into the DH course. Think how camera friendly (and how many cameras) they could afford to make it with an extra $250k.

And to think that Whistler builds a 4x(not last year, but it could have easily been one), dual slalom and slopestyle course from scratch every year...oh and they also built a pretty amazing pump track to boot(plus another one at mid-station).....and they don't even do WC stuff.

Something seems wrong with that. Yes I know Whistler is a busy place, but you would think that other places could make it feasible too.

You would also think that 4x would be a great televised event due to the size of the course...just need to make courses that aren't won in the first corner.

samdemo said:

And to think that Whistler builds a 4x(not last year, but it could have easily been one), dual slalom and slopestyle course from scratch every year...oh and they also built a pretty amazing pump track to boot(plus another one at mid-station).....and they don't even do WC stuff.

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I remember hearing someone running the numbers saying that if Whistler would hold a WC, that the resort would loose money. On a normal summer weekend, they may have more visitors than a WC would bring.

mattmatt86 said:

Should we start a pool on which 4x specialists will move over to DH full time?

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Is Jill Kintner a long lost relation of Nostradamus?

Man, what are guys like Dan Atherton gonna do...? Good DHer and BMXer no doubt, but 4x is his main gig.

ThePriceSeliger said:

I remember hearing someone running the numbers saying that if Whistler would hold a WC, that the resort would loose money. On a normal summer weekend, they may have more visitors than a WC would bring.

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whistler first needs a proper race track, one that's not interupted by over trails. with that, no interference with normal bike park guests...

I overheard that 4x track construction was 40% of the total event budget at windham. That would make the numbers posted previously accurate.

Not too many people here seem too sad about canning it...

mattmatt86 said:

Bring back dual on a grassy hillside with a bunch of flat turns.

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Heck yeah!! That's what I wanna see again!

Scrub said:

Dual slalom

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Agreed. Id much rather watch DS than 4x. I love watching any type of bike racing generally, but didnt watch any 4x highlights or races this year.

Maybe you should all read this
http://www.ridemonkey.com/forums/showthread.php?t=236765
It will give you a better understanding of what the world thinks about 4x.

rosenamedpoop said:

Man, what are guys like Dan Atherton gonna do...? Good DHer and BMXer no doubt, but 4x is his main gig.

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Dan is one guy that I would like to see focus on DH. I think he could do pretty well. Most of the other guys will probably head back to BMX. ...assuming this is all true.

rosenamedpoop said:

Man, what are guys like Dan Atherton gonna do...? Good DHer and BMXer no doubt, but 4x is his main gig.

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Dan has several WC podiums, he's even gotten 2nd place a few times. He'll have no problem refocusing.

rosenamedpoop said:

Man, what are guys like Dan Atherton gonna do...? Good DHer and BMXer no doubt, but 4x is his main gig.

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That's my thoughts as well. I have never liked 4X and always wished it was straight up dual slalom on the world cup curcuit, but that said, my heart goes out to a guy like Jared Graves. A top notch guy, and awesome athlete who just had his sport taken away.
That sucks no matter how you look at it.
Ironically, it was watching Graves race one year at Snowshoe that helped form my opinion about 4X.
At the national, Snowshoe had a 4X and a slalom.
They spent a gazillion dollars on this super huge 4x course. It looked really impressive, but the race itself was a bore.
And since Snowshoe blew there wad on the 4X course, all they did for the slalom was put up a few gates on the grass with a couple of shallow berms and anthill rollers. The course looked lamer than Nickleback sounds, but the racing itself was awesome. The crowd was going crazy and by the time Graves and Herndon raced in the finals, it was off the charts.

They aren't going to completely can it, they wouldnt just take away professional careers from riders. I think/hope they will just change what we currently see as 4X, hopefully they can make longer, steeper tracks which are easier to pass on and they make it more like downhill, they need to come up with more interesting tracks and take it away from just being rough bmx. 4 riders down a-line at once? haha

Just as 4x started to get good in my opinion, i thought this year 4x was the best its been, sure i wasnt at the races, nor was i racing, but i thought it was just getting figured out, telephone poll whoops, rock gardens, more passing, i thought it came out pretty good. thoughts?

The only 4x race I have been to was the Windham WC finals. I think it is a great spectator sport you can see large portions of the track, not just one section like when you go to a dh race. Alot of people turned out to watch, only thing I wish they started earlier in the day, finishing up late made for some difficult pics.
They did a great job on that course and with the bid for 2 more years there I would hate to see it go to waste.

Once Graves won worlds, I was kind of over 4x. I did like how Martin Soderstrom raced those two or three world cups though. He made it interesting to me again. Once he stopped racing, I stopped watching again. 4x needs more interesting people riding. The RSP guys are pretty funny but with them and Graves taking most of the wins, it got repetitive to me. Hopefully they can it in 2011 and overhaul it somehow for 2012 or if we make if, 2013.

4X is a sport in its own right, if we all remember back in the day, DH was talked about in very much the same way, tagged onto XC events, with the same guys doing both, now look at it. 4X is new still; although we kicked it off in the UK under the name Bicycle supercoss at the KIS venue in 1999 and had a great following. The main problem is the same as Downhill had at the start, not enough tracks, not enough grassroot events! simple. So long as there's no places for the grassroots to grow the sport will be tiny and seem a waste of time. The problem is most of the young guys racing Downhill now don't know how it used to be. no uplifts, no proper tracks, no proper bikes, now things are way better and this can be the same for 4X.
4X is a spectator sport, ideal for TV. the prob is its seen and very small for the investment made, which i can understand but to stop it is crazy. I sponsor a small 4X team in the uk now and would love for the sport to be taken seriously, its got a lot to offer, with new venues starting to show up things are looking up but its still by no means sorted, the UK NPS series gets less riders than we did 10 years ago but its no reason to stop it. In the UK it needs more people to step up and organise grassroot events. At the moment you have the UCI worlds and in the uk the NPS, they are worlds; sorry for the pun, apart, the elite cat in the UK is tiny and if we are to grow we need imput. its not that theres no riders, its more a case that the only series in the uk is very expensive for the youg guns of tommorow. so don't stop a sport from kicking off, if you don't like it, so be it, but if the guys who talked down DH had been successful you would'nt have DH now. incidentally i won a nat DH jersey in the vets in 96 so love both. its all about riding guys.... get over it. if you want to help with 4X in the uk get in touch.

i wish it had a bigger folowing in the US, more tracks more events. I always wanted to get into 4x or ds but it is really limited.

we are in the middle of rebuilding our bike park here in Surrey, England (what was Esher Shore) to suit the changing needs of riders from have moved away from freeride back to racing!

we had 3.5km of "north shore" style trails that have been removed, and recently we had a site visit from reknowned builder Phil Saxona to look at the possibilities for a 4X race track - what is called the "Esher X" project

unfortunately, our site is too heavily populated with protected trees, and a touch too small (3 acres of woodland on a steep hill) to make a cutting edge 4X track that would attract enough racers to justify the expense

the costs of putting in a 4X track were quite obscene when we looked into the sheer surface area of a 9M wide 4X track of usable length - the amount of materials and machine time we needed have led me to understand how these World Series 4X tracks can be costing $100,000s

since this visit, in discussion with Phil, we have made the decision to build a cutting edge dual-slalom based complex with 3 different grades of dual track:

novice - pump bumps and berms

intermediate - pump bumps, berms, tabletops

advanced - pump bumps, berms, gap jumps, wallrides, hips, etc. (like a downhill dirt jump / slopestyle hybrid!)

the plan is to have the intermediate and advanced track gated to offer gate practise and racing; the build costs for dual slalom are 1/10th of the 4X track and much easier to repair and fine tune without machine time!

we are keen to build a strong grass roots programme based around the Esher X bike park and will be offering a heavily subsidized Banshee AMP bike complete bike with race jersey to local kids (and older guys!) who are keen to really get into the Dual scene

we would loved to have built a 4X track but the site limitations and build costs were unachievable as based on our experiences running the Esher Shore "north shore" bike park you never get your money back with bike parks - lucky to break even / cover operating costs