Area 51 CAN-AM WOW!

Vet261

Vet261

PR Addict
813 entries for Sunday CANADA vs AMERICA race! It was packed!
239 entries for Saturday night cross = more than 1000 entries over two days.

Huge class turnouts
Track is awesome
Nice job laying out the pits with lines designating roads and parking

Negatives -- things got a little chaotic at times, FM radio was not working until late Saturday night and that made Saturday seem even more chaotic. I've complained about the way trophies, awards, etc are picked up since first attending the event, and it's still a big hassle. Pit Bikes were insane. You people on here complaining about Ohio events and pit bikes have no clue what pit bike insanity is.

Constructive Criticism -- this event is really taking off as the turnouts show. Please do some shifting around to make this all run a little cleaner -- I almost think you try to do too much. Maybe race ALL 50 classes on Saturday or something so that Sunday is only big track racing. I don't know, but it's getting to be too much to handle it seems with these huge crowds. Track exit road -- great idea having a separate track exit road for the bikes, but need to figure out some way to get this watered! It was the dustiest part of the facility.

Thanks AREA51 for all the effort and hard work for the fun event. We know you all worked very hard and the track was really fun on Sunday.

Results are posted here:
http://www.tracksideresults.com/wnyracing/class.asp?s=19&c=all&e=167
 
Last edited:
Could someone with a few spare minutes count the number of U.S. Riders VS the number of Canadians?
 
I had a great time. I saw a lot of people from Pit Racer. For the number of people I thought things went pretty smooth.
I did have some trouble hearing the stager call numbers for gate picks. And maybe there was some stagger drop confusion.
I also got a chance to hang out with Shark over the berm in the picnic area in one of my motos.
I'll go back next year!
 
There was a lot of confusion, from every single person I talked to. Starting with saturday morning, the person at the gate wasnt sure what time practice was starting. I saw 2 different times listed. She then told me to take my time, they were running late.. and about 5 min later they sent out practice lol.

Practice sunday morning they had the order screwed up. Splitting staggered starts were screwed up. If it was 90 degrees that would be a different story, but when its that hot i dont really want to sit around any longer than i have to.

the theme seemed to continue, any person working that I asked anything to, didnt really have an answer.

pit riding was pretty crazy at times.. i dont know why they dont just ban it all together.. or make it 18+ to do it. Saw so many trucks almost get 110s crashed into the side of them from kids screwing around.

practice was short enough saturday, i didnt get as much seat time as i would have liked, but they seemed really slow at sending groups out.. and then the big delay in the middle to run 50s or something? (I actually have no idea, as i couldnt hear on the radio) would seem to make more sense to run that afterwards?

with all that said theres plenty more small things like that, but still a good event, but it had the vibe that it was their first time running an event of that size, and thats not true. I remember 3 years ago when I went, it was a lot smoother and enjoyable.

the track got insanely rough.. i was out for 18th moto... (or 19 or 20 who knows after they kept adding stuff).. and the track was just flat out dangerous IMO. you couldn't see 10 ft in front of you at times. huge holes in the faces of stuff. I feel bad for the little kids that got sent out last moto! and then C LCQ's ran after that. I can only imagine how that went.

so then it was 4:00 and finally 2nd round of motos started..little late?

however track was PRIMO after the intermission prep.

alright im done!!! maybe i better stick to pro practicing!
 
They do a great job of mailing out flyers before the event with a ton of info on them.....BUT -- not so much at following that info! Seemed like stuff was changing all the time and caused a lot of confusion as Crute said.

I felt like I had to be glued to the PA announcements all day in order to keep up with what was changing. Also like Crute said -- they've run this even almost a dozen times! Several years ago it was crazy and chaotic, then the last few years ran really smooth. This year -- sort of back to craziness.

Also forgot to add -- please water the pit roads! They did a good job of watering the main road but not so much all the rest.
 
Yeah, I feel like they made good effort and laying everything out, just didnt stick to any of it. i agree that 90% of my time was spent trying to figure out what was going on that i couldnt just hang out and enjoy the time there.

watering some of the track was questionable too... like faces of jumps/ landings, but ignoring whole other sections that would have been much safter to throw water on.. (mid moto)

otehr than that.. .not bad. lol. I personally don't think i'll be back, not for a few years at least. baja looked really fun and will probably put that one on the calendar next time.
 
I enjoyed the topography of the track, the layout, elevation change and use of natural terrain is sweet!

I left on Sunday itching to come back when a little healthier and able to show some aggression on the circuit. Very cool track.
 
I have a question, how many motos? And did they cut laps? I heard it was an extremely long track. I guess Im curious on they handled time management, given such a large turnout and what seems to be a long track. Did everyone get 4 laps, 3 laps?
 
BriarcliffMx said:
I have a question, how many motos? And did they cut laps?
Click to expand...

I believe there were 19 motos on the big track on Sunday on the original moto list. Some motos got 4 laps and some 3, and I think A classes got 5 or 6. I say "original moto list" because that did not include the extra motos run for heat and consis races in classes bigger than 40. Also I think a couple classes were listed as staggers but ended up being separate motos.

I don't know the rhyme or reason behind who got how many laps, but I know in +45 we ran 3 lap motos while my other vet classes I did 4.

Keep in mind also that number of 813 entries includes 50's and beginner 65's, which run on a separate track.
 
a7cc3ebb8e6442eba1afdd9ce221bbce.jpg



Dig the elevation changes....
 
  • Like
Reactions: TBO
The track is cool no doubt. When it was freshly prepped you can really rip around there. A few really rocky sections but thats about the worst comment I could make about the track. After 20 motos though, it was dangerous!!!!

I love the elevation, the jumps are all safe but still decently sized. The dirt is nice. Its plenty wide enough.. plenty of places to pass. They got a good thing going up there for sure as far as the facility itself goes, everyone was just on a different page this weekend i think.
 
Looking forward to riding up there eventually. Should be a better track without a billion riders on it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top