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In Episode 18 of the Two Enthusiasts Podcast, Quentin and I use the recent news of Danny Eslick’s arrest in Daytona Beach, and his subsequent suspension from AMA racing, as a launching point to discuss the myriad of issues that surround rider personalities in motorsports.

Our conversation hits on the topic of how rider personalities have been whitewashed over the years, for the sake of corporate sponsors and team image, and we talk about the need for more “raw” riders in motorcycle racing.

This is obviously a topic that expands beyond just Eslick’s situation, and what is going on inside AMA Pro Racing / MotoAmerica, as we see other series, like World Superbike and MotoGP struggling with the same issues. It’s a meaty show, and we think you will like it.

As always, you can listen to the show via the embedded SoundCloud player, after the jump, or you can find the show on iTunes (please leave a review) or this RSS feed. Be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter as well. Enjoy the show!

For a long time, the Daytona 200 was the USA’s premier road racing event, garnering attention around the world. Over time though, the prestige of the race has waned away, and with DMG handing over AMA Pro Road Racing to MotoAmerica, the race’s stature has come under question.

For 2016 though, the American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) has given the Daytona 200 its blessing, sanctioning this year’s running of the race.

Officially put on by the American Sportbike Racing Association, the Daytona 200 was little more than a club race when it ran last year. This is due to a variety of factors, one of which was the lack of FIM sanctioning, which only the AMA can grant.

Getting the AMA sanction now means that racers from all over the world, who carry an FIM license, can now compete in the Daytona 200. This means that star racers from Europe and Asia can come to America during bike week and compete on Daytona’s banked walls.

It’s with a heavy heart that we regretfully inform you of the passing of AMA Pro Road Racing and MotoAmerica racer Dane Westby, who died on Monday night while riding his street bike to his parents’ house in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Early reports say Dane struck a utility pole with his Honda Hawk street bike, and according to a report on RoadRacing World that quoted Westby’s friend and former-mechanic Dustin Meador, the 28-year-old may have been trying to avoid a collision with another vehicle at the time of the crash.

MotoAmerica has announced its lineup of TV announcers for the series’ telecast on CBS Sports Network, and the trio is a mix of familiar faces.

Motorcycle racing veteran Jonanthan Green will be calling the races from the booth (many World Superbike fans will recognize his voice), and the man helping Green analyze the race should sound familiar as well, as it will be MotoGP star and two-time WSBK Champion Colin Edwards.

While the boys are in the booth, Crisy Lee will continue her role as pit lane reporter, something she did with AMA Pro Road Racing under the DMG administration.

When the provisional MotoAmerica calendar for the 2015 season debuted, a single date was left to be determined. Now the folks at KRAVE media are able to confirm that Utah’s Miller Motorsports Park will be featured on the rebooted American road racing series’ debut.

Miller Motorsports Park will host MotoAmerica June 26th thru 28th, which will help add more of a Western United States presence to the road racing series’ schedule.

A popular venue for fans and racers, Miller Motorsports Park is just a stone’s throw away from the Bonneville Salt Flats and is flanked by the picturesque Rocky Mountains, making for iconic imagery and a tour of two-wheeled racing history.

Plans for the inaugural MotoAmerica season continue to move forward, and after KRAVE posted the basic guidelines for its 2015 class structure, the company behind America’s road racing revival has announced its full rules package for the Superbike, Superstock 1000, Supersport and Superstock 600 classes, note the KTM RC390 spec-class rules have not been finalized and are not included.

The full rulebook can be read online here, and as expected the rules bring MotoAmerica’s class structure and technical aspects very much in line with the World Superbike Championship’s new class structure and rules. A such there are few surprises for race teams and fans in the rulebook.

There is positive momentum around America’s new MotoAmerica series, which will takeover duties from DMG and AMA Pro Road Racing, starting next season. We have already seen the series’ new class structure, which makes significant steps to parallel what’s going on in the World Superbike Championship.

Today, we see MotoAmerica’s efforts on its racing schedule, a hot-ticket item after DMG’s five, then six, race schedule this season. American fans should rejoice, as eight races are on the calendar, which reads like a greatest hits album of American race tracks.

Supporting both American grand prix at COTA and Indy, as well as the WSBK round at Laguna Seca, the provisional MotoAmerica calendar includes, Road Atlanta, VIR, Road America, Barber, and NJMP. West Coast racing fans are still S.O.L. though, with only one race west of The Rockies on the docket thus far.

Motorcycle road racing in the US looks set for a revival after its years in the wilderness. Today, the AMA announced that the rights to road racing in the US have been reacquired from the Daytona Motorsports Group, and handed to a consortium led by Wayne Rainey and Chuck Aksland. The KRAVE Group will run a new series of races in North America from 2015, under the joint auspices of the AMA and the FIM.

It has been a long and difficult few years for motorcycle road racing in the US. Since the DMG bought the rights to the AMA Superbike series, at the start of the 2008 season, the series has been in a steady decline.

Long-serving staff were replaced, circuits were dropped, classes were dropped, rejigged and renamed, and the manufacturers – or rather, the national distributors of the Japanese manufacturers – were either chased out of the series, or left over disagreements over the technical regulations.

The series reached a low point this year, when the AMA Pro Racing Superbike series held a grand total of just six races. Making things worse was the fact that just one of those rounds was in California, traditionally a very strong base for motorcycle racing in the US.

To alleviate the situation, Roadracing World’s John Ulrich stepped in to organize the Superbike Shootout, a three-race series held in California and Utah, to offer road racers something approaching a fuller season. However, DMG did not have a deal to televise the Superbike series, relying instead on live internet streaming of the events.

The decline of the series cannot be laid completely at the door of the DMG. They took over the AMA Superbike series at the start of 2008, a few months before the global financial crisis hit. That crisis had a massive impact on all forms of motorsports, and saw a great deal of sponsorship money evaporate.

For months now, we have been talking about a North American road racing series that would compete against the ailing AMA Pro Road Racing championship that DMG runs. The series in question was rumored to be headed by Dorna and Wayne Rainey, and today’s news confirms at least half of that partnership, as the three-time World Champion is affiliated with the project

Called MotoAmerica, the North America series is run by KRAVE Group LLC. Rainey is a partner in the KRAVE Group, along with Chuck Aksland who was a 20-year manager of Team Roberts and recently the Vice President of Motor Sport Operations at the Circuit of the Americas race track. Terry Karges, a marketing executive from Roush Performance is a part of the team, as is Richard Varner, a motorcycle industry entrepreneur.

According to the AMA, MotoAmerica will promote and manage the series, which will be sanctioned by the AMA and FIM North America. This means that MotoAmerica will be able to award AMA and FIM North America #1 plates to series class champions, replacing the role of AMA Pro Road Racing as run by the Daytona Motorsports Group.

There has been so much smoke lately about Dorna doing something in the American market for road racing, that surely there must be some fire. Our sources, and the consensus in the MotoGP paddock is that Carmelo Ezpeleta has his eyes on a North American Championship, of sorts — a move designed to side-step issues with DMG and AMA Pro Road Racing.

With the France family perhaps responsible single-handedly destroying American interest in motorcycle racing, it should not be too surprising that the often unliked entity that is Dorna Sport, is being hailed as a possible savior of the sport in the United States. Whatever you think about those two entities, it is clear that something has to give.

Talking to Fox Sports 1, Ezpeleta tipped his hand on what he envisioned for the US market, saying that he has been talking to “relevant people” to create a program that will develop American riders for the Grand Prix Championship. Helping him spearhead that plan is none other than a certain Mr. Wayne Rainey.