| September 24, 2023
Cycle News Archives
COLUMN
The Trans-USA Controversy
By Kent Taylor
While autumn may be the time for nature to slow down, it was also once a season for some of the fastest motocross racing ever! In the 1970s and early ’80s, September meant the beginning of the Trans-AMA series, when some of the world’s best European racers, having completed their own Grand Prix battles, would cross the ocean for a stateside showdown with all of the top Americans.
The Trans-AMA train made whistle stops across the country, giving motocross fans everywhere a chance to see legendary European riders like Roger DeCoster, Ake Jonsson and Adolf Weil. Along with visiting the top U.S. tracks like Saddleback and Unadilla, there was a round held in Canada and even a stadium event (the term “Supercross” had not yet been coined) in Philadelphia.
It was a grand time at the ball, but all good things must end, and by the early ’80s, the series was on the verge of turning into a pumpkin. Fewer European riders were participating, making the series a battle between Americans who had already been racing each other all season long. Supercross was becoming the new fan favorite, and in 1982, the now re-badged Trans-USA series would be held for the final time.
Its exit would be about as graceful as a 2000-pound Charbray bucking bull coming out of the chute—on fire!
“Trans-USA controversy explodes; AMA sues Honda, Suzuki and Yamaha,” read the headline in the October 6 issue of Cycle News in 1982. “In a move unprecedented in American motorcycling history, the American Motorcyclist Association filed a $15 million anti-trust lawsuit against three of the major motorcycle manufacturers, Honda, Suzuki and Yamaha.”
What did the Trans-USA do that was so nefarious? The short answer would be “nothing.” But rarely are $15 million lawsuits ($47.7 million in today’s dollars) understood with short answers. According to one former AMA official, the brouhaha that brought on the lawsuit had been festering for several years in the motocross world.
“The AMA believed that our motocross series here in the U.S. should be run with production-based motorcycles,” recalls Ed Youngblood, who served as AMA president from 1981 until his retirement in 1999. “There was already an international series (the FIM World Championship) that allowed the use of prototypes and one-off designs; we wanted our series to be fair for the privateer rider. We even had a claiming rule in place to help keep the field level.”
According to Youngblood, representatives for Honda, Suzuki and Yamaha saw it differently. They wanted to continue to use works’ machinery, the exotic motorcycles that were hand-built, expensive and usually well ahead of the production bike curve.
Kawasaki? “They were on the sideline with this one,” says Youngblood, “and I don’t exactly recall what their position was at the time.”
“But they [Honda, Suzuki, Yamaha] were trying to tell us what to do. They wanted to run the show. And it was coming from the U.S. distributors. I don’t think they were telling their factories in Japan the full story.”
There were other issues facing AMA motocross. The still relatively young sport was experiencing growing pains. There were complaints of too many races, some of which were being run by inexperienced promoters. Others were calling for motocross to consolidate its many championship race series’ and present to the public a solitary Grand National Champion of Motocross, mimicking the AMA’s other most prestigious series which combined dirt track and road racing points into one championship.
Ironically, it was Dick Mann, a former champion of that discipline, who called on the AMA to resist that kind of approach.
“Mann said, ‘motocross was different and that it needs to grow on its own,’” says Youngblood. “He was not in favor of pushing this idea on motocross.”
But no compromise on these issues could be reached and in 1982, the three companies presented a co-signed letter to the AMA. “They told us, ‘If you don’t do it the way we want, we quit.’ And when companies band together to tell an organization how to run its operations, that is a violation of U.S. Federal Anti-Trust laws.”
The letter was delivered in late summer, which leads into the fall—which is how everything is connected to the fate of the Trans-USA series. The companies, it turned out, really weren’t quitting; they were just taking their toys to a different playground.
“They were under contract with us to ride the Trans-USA series,” recalls Youngblood. “Instead, they took their riders and went to California for a new series called the Trans-Cal.”
“It created tremendous tension at our AMA board meetings,” recalls Youngblood. “The AMA had been founded in the 1920s as a marketing tool, trying to find ways to get people to find more ways to use their motorcycles. Each of those companies still had a representative on our board during this time and now we were involved in a lawsuit.”
The show must go on and so the Trans-USA kicked off at the then brand-new Spring Creek MX Park track in Millville, Minnesota. A privateer Suzuki rider named Dave Hollis won the overall over Team Husqvarna’s Billy Grossi. Round two at RedBud, in Michigan, saw KTM’s Donnie Cantaloupi get the win and, at the final round at Unadilla, Kawasaki rider Billy Liles came out on top.
And that was the end. The remaining two rounds, Castle Rock, Colorado, and Sears Point were both canceled. Hollis took the title over Liles and Grossi.
“It was a series I should’ve won,” Grossi says today. He and teammate Kris Bigelow had just taken possession of the new bikes just days before the Trans-USA began and “they were kind of heavy. That bike was a beast to handle!”
The rift between the AMA and the race teams was handled with less difficulty, apparently, with Cycle News reporting in the December 15th issue that the dispute had been settled. A new body, called the AMA Professional MX Racing Board, was formed, designed to establish guidelines and formats for AMA professional motocross. The 1983 Wrangler Super Series came up with a formula that named David Bailey as motocross’ first Grand National Champion. Works’ bikes would soon be banned from AMA competition. And the Trans-USA limped off into an autumn sunset. CN