Decision pending on 2020 MX Nationals

The uncertainty over whether a 2020 Australian Motocross Championship, aka MX Nationals, will be held continues, but a decision on its fate is set to be made on 1 October.

Normally, by this time of year, the motocross season would have been finished and riders and teams would be preparing for supercross. However, the coronavirus pandemic saw the planned nine-round motocross season postponed before it even began.

On 22 April, a revised calendar was released, with plans to reboot the series in August and compress all nine rounds into a two-month period. However, the ongoing coronavirus and its effects, including a second wave outbreak in Victoria and resulting lockdowns, meant that revised calendar did not kick off in August and has yet to be implemented.

The series was thrown into further disarray when longtime series promoter, Williams Event Management (WEM) withdrew from the championship on 26 June. WEM had been due to hand promotion rights back to Motorcycling Australia (MA) at the end of this year, but blamed the pandemic for their decision to end their association early.

Two weeks later, on 10 July, MA announced they would take on the series’ promotion and management for 2020. Regular communiques from MA have followed, stating they were working with “key stakeholders, venues and industry” to get a series, possibly of five or six rounds’ duration, up and running, but as of mid-September, no dates or venues have been confirmed.

The cancellation of the entire 2020 Australian Supercross Championship on 9 September has opened the window for some form of MX championship to be held, as there are now no fears of clashing with or overlapping that series. However, the same coronavirus-related factors that saw the SX series cancelled seem more than likely to force an abandonment of the 2020 MX series as well.

Regardless, MA say they are continuing the assess the viability of hosting a championship this year and have been buoyed by reduced coronavirus cases in Victoria in recent weeks, as well as the impending reduction in lockdown laws and state border restrictions.

MA says they will provide a “final update” regarding the status of the 2020 Australian Motocross Championship no later than 1 October, 2020.