2016 FIM Motocross World Championship

Youthstream, series organisers for the FIM Motocross World Championship, has just released the 2016 race calendar. And yet again, Australia is conspicuous by its absence. This is despite Youthstream’s Guiseppe Luongo singling out of both Australia and the USA two years ago as likely venues to be added to the series “to help make it a truly international World Championship”.

Well, the USA’s Glen Helen was added (as the series finale) this year, and it retains that plumb position on the 2016 calendar, but an Australian round is still nowhere to be seen. According to Kevin Williams, who ran the Australian round of the MXGP in 2000 and 2001 at Broadford and who attended the USA MXGP a few weeks back, “We spoke to Guiseppe in America because, of course, we would very much like to get the World Championship back on Australian soil. Nowadays, it’s much more expensive to secure a round. Some 15 years ago, it was closer to $250,000 for the rights, whereas these days, that cost alone is in excess of $1,000,000. When you add your staging costs on top of that, you’re looking at a budget of more than $2,000,000. That said, we are currently working with Youthstream and other partners to gain the support required, with a view to staging the Championship in Australia in 2017, ’18 and ’19,” Williams went on to explain.

Aside from the fact that million-dollar rights fee dictates that a major (and probably outside-industry) sponsor kicks in handsomely, we can’t help thinking that Australia and New Zealand are going to have to work collaboratively if either country (or preferably, both) is ever going to see a round of the MX World Championship on our home soil again. In the meantime, Aussies’ closest option is the March 13 Malaysian round, which makes its first appearance on the calendar for 2016.

UPDATE: This week, TransWorld Motocross caught up with Youthstream President, Giuseppe Luongo, and he confirmed that he has been speaking with MX Nationals promoter, Kevin Williams, about hosting a round of the FIM Motocross World Championship in Australia in 2017. To read the interview, click here.

The 2016 FIM Motocross World Championship race calendar is as follows…