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Letter from Round and Round

mplutodh1

Monkey
Nov 27, 2002
744
0
Sammamish, WA
To our very dear WIM family,

As we are starting to hear the fallout of our scheduling decisions, we feel it appropriate to communicate further some of the reasons behind making them. Let us begin by saying that we have an overwhelming sense of appreciation to all of you for your ongoing support, loyalty, patience and for many of you, your help. We have immensely enjoyed interaction with you, watching your families grow, creating bonds with them and even seeing them on national and world podiums. Many of you are great friends and we have enjoyed the past 10 years of “playing with ya!”

However, as we have grown older too, we have come to realize our limits and the limits of our business. As you may or may not know, what we do with mountain bike racing across the state of Washington takes an enormous amount of work. It is becoming increasing difficult to obtain access to appropriate land for the numbers of racers that we draw. We are competing with many other recreational activities, expenses have increased dramatically for us, and working to develop courses when they are a considerable distance from our base of operations has proven frustrating and very difficult. Property usage fees are increasing and some property owners just don’t want mountain bike racing any longer. Combine that with the fact that our net profit (and we have more expenses than just traveling to the event and setting up a course) is not at a level where it makes sense for us to continue traveling outside our area.

So, even though these things have been apparent for several years, we have hesitated making any profound scheduling changes because of the fear that we would increasingly lose some of you. Well, we’ve lost some of you anyway and it’s time for us to refocus our business efforts. The WIM Series originated in eastern Washington. And we’re taking it back to where it began. Access and permitting issues are better here, course building is in our back yard, we’re able to donate monies to our community to promote outdoor activities (i.e. the Centennial Trail bridge in Spokane), and we currently have Silver Mountain in Kellogg, ID, willing and building courses for us and just for our races!! We want to focus more of our efforts on building mountain bike enthusiasm in our community.

We can understand the frustrations for those of you who feel that driving to Spokane or Kellogg for a race is too far and we’re saddened that we’ll lose some of you. For those who enjoy traveling to our events or who live closer to us, we hope that you will continue to enjoy the hard work and level of racing that we will continue to offer.

Because Round & Round seeks to make a profit like any other business, the changes we have made in our company are business decisions that we needed to make. We hope you will understand…and again, our sincere thanks for your past business. We wish you all many years of fun outdoor adventures.

Very sincerely,

Wendy Bailey
Gino Lisiecki
 

edinSvenson2

Chimp
Feb 10, 2004
78
0
Fcuk it man I can drive to Pemberton in less time than it takes to get to freaking Spokane... let alone IDAHO.
 
While I am disappointed with the '05 WIM schedule, I can't say I blame them.

"too bad it's all about the money all the time"....Why shouldn't a promoter be able to make money promoting??? You have to keep in mind this is their (Round and Round) livelyhood, their job, how they pay rent and put food on the table.

The bottom line is the (local) DH race scene is not a money maker, too much overhead. Logistacally trying to run a race with shuttle trucks and more than 100 riders is a disaster. More than 100 riders should really be at a resort with lifts.

Peple like KR Trailhacker, who promote races for the love of the sport is where the future of local DH racing lies.
 

toughguymagee

Pretty Boi
Jun 1, 2002
446
0
crackhouse down the street
I understand R&R needs to make money, but to not even have a XC race in the west is crazy. We all know there is no issue with SST, CX races are there all of the time, and it would at least show an effort from R&R for some folks in the west. Last year, the Battle in Seattle was the most attended XC race in the entire series. If you are talking about money, you would think you would keep the most popular race around.

This makes my summer really easy. I wish R&R the best but expect them to lose out in the end.
 

Skookum

bikey's is cool
Jul 26, 2002
10,184
0
in a bear cave
toughguymagee said:
I understand R&R needs to make money, but to not even have a XC race in the west is crazy. We all know there is no issue with SST, CX races are there all of the time, and it would at least show an effort from R&R for some folks in the west. Last year, the Battle in Seattle was the most attended XC race in the entire series. If you are talking about money, you would think you would keep the most popular race around.

This makes my summer really easy. I wish R&R the best but expect them to lose out in the end.
Hey Toughguy wanna do some killer epics in the summer?
:D
 

Skookum

bikey's is cool
Jul 26, 2002
10,184
0
in a bear cave
toughguymagee said:
I am all over that Skooks! That's what my summer is going to be all about! Great rides with friends and family. :thumb:
Cool you should start with our Turkey Galby ride in a couple weeks. ;) Probably more technical than most WIM courses anyways. :p
 

mplutodh1

Monkey
Nov 27, 2002
744
0
Sammamish, WA
Bullitrider said:
Nate beat ya to the post but, yeah, too bad it's all about the money all the time.
Dang, I see that now, how the heck did I not get that until today? In both email accounts too.... oh well...

Hey although it sucks, I have R&R to thank for giving me races to participate in for several years and I realize how hard it is to put on an event, let alone a series.

On the bright side i think it might help motivate more people to work on putting on events? The event mgmt company we are working with for our event mentioned this as an opportunity to hopefully put together a decent west side series in the coming years. Although right now they want to take it slow, there is light at the end of the tunnel.
 

oly

skin cooker for the hive
Dec 6, 2001
5,118
6
Witness relocation housing
mplutodh1 said:
On the bright side i think it might help motivate more people to work on putting on events?
I was thinking the same thing. Maybe this will be the spark that lights a new fire? Maybe it will start something new, then again maybe people just say meh, and spend more time in the holy land. I'd like to see something westside start, but i know i dont have the time to du much, but show up to race and maybe dig a few times.....