The practice day thing is talked about a lot and how it is killing racing. I've thought about it another way. Maybe Ohio is ahead of the curve and practice days ARE the future. It fits perfectly with how society has shifted to a more laid back demeanor. People these days want everything to be convenient and easy. Show up at a practice day at noon, hangout with your buddies, bang out some 20 minute motos and head home to drink some beer and netflix. (netflix is now a verb by the way)
Does it make us better racers....? .....of course not, but it's fun and that's all most people care about these days. I've been racing for 30 years...not much in the past 12 or so, but I do have two kids 5 and 7 who love to ride. My 7 year old has raced quite a bit, my 5 year old twice. I'll be honest, my kids someday being 11 and 13 and racing scares the hell out of me. Part of me wants to train them to be cyborg racers and the other part doesn't really care if they race much because then I won't have to worry about them having a catastrophic injury that I'm responsible for for putting them out there to begin with.
I don't think cutting out practicing and trying to force people to race is a good model. You may just lose those guys forever. The economy is different than it was back in the day, interests are different and money is spread across many more forms of entertainment. Maybe we should embrace the change instead of trying to fight it because in history that has rarely worked.