03/05/2026
Announcement: Board decision on Qualifying for all classes in 2026.
The MRA board has engaged in an exhaustive effort to investigate the feasibility of implementing qualifying for all classes in 2026.
After several meetings with multiple stakeholders, including other clubs, software providers, and former MRA Board members with relevant insight and experience, we have determined that implementing qualifying for all classes in 2026 is not viable.
We conducted multiple tests, with lots of trial and error, and we were able to work out most of the software related challenges, but not all of them. After all of our discussions and tests, the biggest concerns that still remained for us included:
• Safety considerations - Switching the practice sessions into qualifying sessions, without an opportunity to warm up first, raised some questions about the safety of leaping right into qualifying first thing in the morning, especially early season when we have lower track temperatures.
• Race day Schedule Impact – this would have been significant, through either dramatically extending the length of the race day, and / or creating an issue where people did not have sufficient time to plan, hydrate, and prepare bikes between morning practice / qualifying sessions, and morning races. The membership has been clear that they do not want to feel rushed between races, but we also cannot simply offset this by racing until late in the evening.
• Process security – while we believe we have worked out the majority of the software issues, a few logistical challenges remain, (such as navigating those with multiple bikes trying to qualify). Without making sure we have resolved all of the small issues, we could leave ourselves open to another embarrassing failure that affects everyone’s race day. If you were there in 2025, you know!
As a Board we took this seriously, and spent considerable time investigating this. To our knowledge, nobody else runs a single day schedule, with qualifying, for 21 classes – it’s a big ask for any club.
The hard work done by the board throughout this investigation has provided us with a lot of insight on what might be possible for future seasons, though in all likelihood that will require a deeper conversation with membership around what changes and sacrifices they might be willing to make to the race day schedule, and available race classes, in order to implement qualifying. These are conversations that can be revisited later this year as we approach the rule change process for 2026.
It is always our goal to deliver on what our membership asks for, however we want to ensure that we do not sacrifice the overall experience of your race day, by over promising, and under delivering.
We will still have qualifying for Race Of the Rockies, and Amateur Open.
With this decision made, we will move on to the last item we have for you all to vote on, which is the race day schedule. We will provide three options, one option that is the exact same race day schedule as we had in 2025, and two other alternative options.
Information and ballots will be sent to membership on Friday, April 6th. If you do not receive your ballot, please reach out to us and we will ensure you get one. Voting will be open to all members with a current competition membership, and we will also send a ballot to anyone who renews, or purchases a competition membership before voting closes.
As with the round 5 layout vote, we encourage you all to have your say – this is your club, and as a board, we are committed to doing the best we can when it comes to giving you the racing experience you want.
Regards,
2026 MRA Board Of Directors.
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