Help me with some ideas on the "start" for Malvern! Would like do something fun and a gate drop is a no go.
Most GP's I've run, we all line up in rows in the starting area for each session, meaning all riders for that session are in the starting area ready to go.
Dead engine flag start, starter walks to each row to start them after the first row has gone far enough away. This means the first row is a lot closer to the first turn than the last row. Very similar to HS start.
MX track is irrellevant for a GP, most of these guys quit riding/racing MX because of all the big jumps anyway. So running a track backwards is fine, and often times pretty fun. Just as long as there is nothing that becomes horribly dangerous riding backwards, like a double with a peaky takeoff that you would slam into from running backwards. Anything like that just cut out of the course.
The big keys to remember is that GPs are not MX's or harescrambles. No big MX jumps needed or wanted and also no gnarly knuckle busting tree root wipeout HS sections. When I race GPs it reminds me of when I was young and just had fun riding my bike all over the place. Take some of the MX track, then dip into some woods or fields, back on a couple sections of MX track, back into a field or woods, etc.