Podcast: John David on 2019 USA BMX Rule Changes
Just prior to the Christmas holiday, USA BMX released the 2019 rulebook and schedule of national entry fees. The specific meanings of the changes on-tap for the new year drew a ton of online discussion, with some hair-on-fire doomsayers foretelling a “number plate police state” where riders’ scores are summarily stricken from the record due to an offending background color or too many logos. To say nothing of side plate enforcement at the nationals.
And, of course, the ongoing saga of “clips versus flats” in BMX Racing where the pedal pirates ply their trade, and argue passionately about the particulars of one over the other. We wanted to know just-what the problem is with clips that half the sport wants to ban them–or at the very-least restrict them.
With all this rumor, speculation and personal-opinion pontificating, News is stoked to welcome one of the key players involved in approving these rules, USA BMX COO John David. It’s always-awesome to welcome JD to the Announcers Tower show, where he never fails to lay-out the specifics of our questions.
This was a pre-Christmas taping, which we held til after Santa had securely returned to the North Pole. Not many podcast listeners on the wire while chestnuts are roasting on an open fire, and Jack Frost is nipping at noses. Today, however, is another story, as we see the BMX world is back to its regular-old-self.
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So, without giving too much away, suffice it to say that USA BMX is not out to create a “Number Plate Police State,” nor impose any other overly-onerous admonitions in Anno Domini 2019.
Editor’s Note: At 23:19 in the show, we ask a question (off the topic of 2019 rules), about how number plate letters are assigned to riders at Nationals. Is it in order of “precedence” (National, NAG, and so-on down the line), or are letters assigned in some other way? This question is as a result of News seeing NAG and even National champions at nationals with letters over their #1s–which seems contrary to the spirit of those “earned” numbers.
At 25:05, John said he would get us a clearer answer on how this works, and that-very-day, we received the clarification from Brad Hallin at HQ. We will run that answer as a separate article, so as not to crowd either story.
—Mike Carruth
Links
Download the 2019 USA BMX Rulebook (PDF)
