Gas Gas racing alumni - can we get them back?

barkeater

barkeater

New member
What would it take (besides the obvious - deep pockets or stalking) to get old Gas Gas alumni back on the bikes?
Riders we lost because of lack of support, like:

Russell Bobbitt
Nick Fahringer
Richard Lafferty
Cody Mastin
Dylan Debel
Matt Stavish
John Barber

You get my drift.
 
2008 race season is a write off (too late).
I guess they can make a push for the '09 race season.
Gas Gas will have to sell a lot of bikes to cover a huge rider support program.

Gas Gas' "problem" is that they don't update the bikes enough yearly to make riders want them.
Look at the Gas Gas motor, it's been around for 14 years. True it's bullet proof etc. But they are not attracting younger riders.

Gas Gas needs some type of gimmic. KTM's electric start 2 strokes are selling like hot cakes.

KTM riders are buying new bikes every couple years, because their bikes are revamped every 2 to 3 years. That means sales go up.

Just my $0.02
 
True, but KTM has to revamp their bikes every couple of years in hope of getting it right for once :) .

But you're exactly right, there aren't any gimics that help GasGas sell ther bikes, there isnt as much publicity in magazines to help sell bikes as other manufacturers have (although ive noticed an increase in ADB magazine in Australia), and we havent got someone like David Knight riding for us. But that takes us back to the start again.

We want some of those good old riders back, but we need to make sales, but we need popularity to sell bikes which you can get from having big name pro riders. :confused:
 
or someone like Team USA's Kurt Caselli :)

Yes it would help Gas Gas greatly to get more publicity and there are several ways to accomplish it:
1- Polish up the MC250 and get into the supercross series
(how I long to hear a 2-stroke on the track)
2- Get a top level rider entered into the GNCC series
3- Same goes for National Enduro Series
4- Hire Red Bulls marketing company (obviously they know how to sell)
5-Etc.......

Remember most of all it can be done:D
 
ramcclure200 said:
or someone like Team USA's Kurt Caselli :)

Yes it would help Gas Gas greatly to get more publicity and there are several ways to accomplish it:
1- Polish up the MC250 and get into the supercross series
(how I long to hear a 2-stroke on the track)
2- Get a top level rider entered into the GNCC series
3- Same goes for National Enduro Series
4- Hire Red Bulls marketing company (obviously they know how to sell)
5-Etc.......

Remember most of all it can be done:D
Click to expand...

In a nut shell, you're right.
Supercross would take too much money. It would cost $5 million to run a team for a year.
 
Remember Paul Edmonson? We can thank him for developing what we have today.

I have an idea, let's all make our own team. We'll show up for national enduros in force. 20 of us, we can all pit together.
 
we have four guys racing Gassers out of the box truck this year,now to figure out a name for our team!
 
Personally I couldn't give a flying f$ck about MX or SX. I don't like the people (arrogant little sh%theads with jack for brains) and I'm not sure we should be associating with those people. It's also, as stated previously, hugely expensive. Even that orange bike company is having problems trying to break into SX, what chance a small Spanish company?

IMO we should worry about off-road (enduros & hare scramble/GNCC & trials).
 
I would agree with that. Forget SX or MX, it's a different direction than the bikes are going now, and could sway the influence away from off road. No thanks.

Although, I do remember when Fast By Ferracci had a Husqvarna racing team in SX, they actually did pretty good.
 
I say start small . like Fury1' s gasgas team. Get some nice gasgas stickers from gofasters the 7 inch ones and start winnig . It's probably the biggest race team and the best that they got .I'll send you some goods fury to get you started . Anyone else got anything?
 
If I was the importer I would add $100 to the price of every motorcycle that came into NA and used that money to support a race team of some kind. 250 bikes x $100 = $25K. That wont run a factory team by any stretch of the imagination, but it definitely will allow you to support some riders.

I would find 1 top ten enduro rider (Nick Fahringer comes to mind) and give him a couple of bikes and a $5K parts allowance. Give some race discounts or at least some delayed billing on some bikes for other guys and let them go racing.
 
My personal opinion is gas gas doesn't have a program together this year that supports the guys that race them week in and out. I got into gas gas back in 06 and they were giving a good break on the bike and some parts and one of the main reasons I bought gas gas. Now riding the bike for 2 years and making AA this year and winning the expert 250 championship and I have been trying to work a deal to continue to ride gas gas but I'm not really getting too much of a response. Does gas gas want to keep guys on there bikes or realize they need to keep these guys on the bikes. We are just starting to get a presence at the local NETRA events and I see nothing happening with race sponsorship. Gas Gas needs to step up and keep the bikes and riders out there WINNING.
Is Gas Gas listening?
 
It is a sad time to be an importer with the USD being so low against the euro. Up until the the euro came into being, the euro importers had a fighting chance and selling bikes and supporting riders. The profit margin for an importer is tight now, and with total sales being down, I don't see how they can afford to support any national level rider or offer contingencies. Worse yet, is that a local dealer probably is not selling enough volume of bikes to warrant supporting a racer. GasGas racers must be satisfied that their bikes perform well enough stock and a reliable enough that they don't need the contingency money that guys get when riding rice burners.
 
talked with a couple guys today about GasGas,and they told me that a local AA rider who rides GasGas from our hare scramble series has been chosen to represent GasGas during the national enduros and the gncc races this season,not sure how true this is as its only heresay,but if its true ,he deserves it,great guy and will represent us well
 
Fury,

If thats true then good for Jim, He does deserve it and has been in the hunt for a championship for the past few years. Super fast and a great guy!!! Good luck to him!
 
the talk came from kennys shop,so I would think the info is good,but you know how things get!
 
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