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Trials awards.


walkertrials
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On a recent holiday to Scarborough I spotted an advertisement for a Sea Angling competition entry fee £5 prizes of from £200 down to £40 & £50 for largest fish. Trials & most other motorcycle sports pay a minimum of £15 entry and much more for speed events yet give out very few awards. I know we have insurance costs to take into account, some years ago I attended a local car rally regional status & drivers could sign on when using certain products tyres, oil etc and be in line for a bonus for a good result I'm talking modified road cars not WRC. You would think at National level trials the suppliers could give a little back to unsupported riders.

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I remember in the mid 70s the UK Kawasaki importer effectively made every buyer of a new KT250 a works rider, promising a fairly substantial cash payout for a win or first class award in a national (and possibly Centre) trial. Remember, we're talking about the KT250 - up against the Bultos, MARs and Cotas, their money proved to be pretty safe.

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The problem is some of the manufacturers like michelin, renthal, tech, braktec already pretty much have a monopoly in trials, plus to someone like michelin trials is probably <1%

I wish redbull would have got more involved than they do and have done previously. Trials you would think would fit their remit, but other than sponsoring select riders (which i know is more their style across all sports) as far as i know they've never really committed beyond the odd area trial

As for dealers, they seem to be more interested in sponsoring riders than events

Edited by faussy
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The purpose of sponsorship is to make money for the sponsor.  The fishing contest prizes mean more entrants so more people paying for boat space, more bait sales and so on.  Since most trials are run by clubs who make very little if anything from entry fees and have limited capacity for numbers of entrants trials is not an obvious place to spend marketing budget.

Sponsorship for a big event that brings in spectators like the cancelled Anglesey event is a better bet if you are looking to get companies to part with their profits.  I think it is a shame we cannot attract enough people to come and watch stuff like that.  Also why only Sheffield for the indoor trials?  Can we not attract enough people to other venues? 

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1 hour ago, ChrisCH said:

The purpose of sponsorship is to make money for the sponsor.  The fishing contest prizes mean more entrants so more people paying for boat space, more bait sales and so on.  Since most trials are run by clubs who make very little if anything from entry fees and have limited capacity for numbers of entrants trials is not an obvious place to spend marketing budget.

Sponsorship for a big event that brings in spectators like the cancelled Anglesey event is a better bet if you are looking to get companies to part with their profits.  I think it is a shame we cannot attract enough people to come and watch stuff like that.  Also why only Sheffield for the indoor trials?  Can we not attract enough people to other venues? 

 

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1 hour ago, walkertrials said:

I'm not on about sponsors for events more the awards you win, clubs now days don't do the Premier, first & second class awards the majority run club championships and only the winner of that receives an award ( there are exceptions obviously) 

It would be easy to offer a prize if that were without (any real) monetary value I guess, but if not we are back to some sort of sponsorship or increased entry fees to cover the prize money (fishing contest model).

A rosette and a certificate perhaps?

Do people want that?

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1 hour ago, ChrisCH said:

A rosette and a certificate perhaps?

Do people want that?

Absolutely not!!!! Maybe for the youths, but id rather have the £5 it cost for some fake chromed plastic trophy than the actual trophy itself! Those things aren't even recyclable, straight to land fill in my house.

Edited by faussy
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Yes but they need to be paid for by somebody, most clubs barely scrape by as it is after paying for land usage / insurance etc. No shop would benefit nearly enough to warrant the expense on a monthly basis (sponsorship)

Also the same half a dozen riders will win the prizes all the time, whether that be cash, trophys or 'Goodies' . 

And I realy wouldn't want to see entry fees go up just to cover that.

Costs enough with 2 of us riding weekly as it is. 

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24 minutes ago, crashmonkey said:

Yes but they need to be paid for by somebody, most clubs barely scrape by as it is after paying for land usage / insurance etc. No shop would benefit nearly enough to warrant the expense on a monthly basis (sponsorship)

Also the same half a dozen riders will win the prizes all the time, whether that be cash, trophys or 'Goodies' . 

And I realy wouldn't want to see entry fees go up just to cover that.

Costs enough with 2 of us riding weekly as it is. 

If it were a certificate or something that costs less than a quid it might be nice for some people - doesn't have to be for "winning" could be for best presented pre65 bike for example.  I can see the attraction of such a thing.

If you are going to give cash for the best score then I agree with you - the entry fee has to go up to provide the winnings.  Either way it is more admin and work for the people that administer meetings and from what I can see they have enough to do already.  Our club is certainly over reliant on one person's enthusiasm to sort out meetings (at which he doesn't ride).

Also people get funny when money is involved.  Even a fiver/tenner and there will be arguments and disagreements.  You will also have to have observers as it will become difficult to trust people on the sort of self scoring that we do routinely.  People would be much less likely to "cheat" for a certificate or rosette.  (I think)

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Personally I ride for the fun of it these days. Trials is probably one of the safest & cheapest motor sports you can do. Unfortunately its quite exclusive and has never seemed to gain much popularity with the public or in some cases even other motor sport enthusiasts. So for me expecting some reward for a couple of hours fun in the woods is a bit pointless and i'd rather see my £10 I might win go back into the clubs that need the money to enable them to put on the events in the first place.

For the young kids coming through I get it, anything that keeps them enthused has my vote!

At the higher national level, yes maybe a little help with costs for the riders would be helpful for sure especially for those travelling around the country to compete. But again I don't think entry fees would cover this and higher fees may put the majority of riders off from making the journey, especially if they feel they have no chance of getting into the awards.  If trials was a bigger more popular sport, like golf or similar then you could have substantial awards going down to lower places because you would get the backing from big sponsorship deals. But unfortunately its the tin pot end of motor sport so I can't see its popularity gaining much ground anytime soon. 

Just going back to a point I mentioned. I've competed in a few different motor sports over the years and the general consensus I get is that, even other motor sport enthusiasts seem to be uninterested in trials. Whether they feel that motor sport = speed or not is their thinking I'm not sure. But I have had many folk say to me "trials is boring" the problem is from a spectators perspective I sort of see their point!     

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I agree Intotrials it is percieved as being boring but so are snooker & darts and many others but they seem to get plenty of TV time, in my area we have had two new groups of riders take up trials one from Enduro & one from MX the MX riders can't believe what the experts can get over and the Enduro group say they wasted 10 years of their lives before trials so we must doing something right.

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Don't get me wrong I love trials.

But its a minority sport with no money, that is boring as hell to watch and pretty inaccessible to most.

I find trials very boring unless your taking part, then its great!

Its a lot easier to pop down and try your hand at snooker or darts!

 

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