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According to the Daytona Beach News-Journal, Danny Eslick (shown above in his mug shot) has resolved his issues from Daytona Bike Week, as the local newspaper reports that Eslick has plead “no contest” to charges that he struck a police officer last week, ahead of the Daytona 200.

In exchange for his plea, Eslick’s charges for battery on a law enforcement officer have been dropped from a felony of the third degree, down to a misdemeanor battery.

This means that Eslick should get a 12-month probation from the court, with early termination set at the six-month mark, which includes provisions for sobriety and counseling. However, that sentence could not be made by Circuit Court Judge Frank Marriott because of a technical matter, as it is not clear how Eslick will serve probation while out-of-state.

This leaves Eslick suspension with the AMA in a bit of limbo, until the terms and process of the probation are figured out by the Florida Department of Corrections.

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!

Danny Eslick will not be racing in the 2016 Daytona 200, as he has been charged with battery on a law enforcement officer, a felony of the third degree in Volusia County.

The events leading to Eslick’s arrest transpired around 11:46pm on Monday, March 7th, in Daytona Beach, Florida and during the Daytona Bike Week festivities.

In response to Eslick’s arrest, the American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) and the American Sportbike Racing Association (ASRA) have suspended Eslick from this weekend’s race, after consulting with the Daytona International Speedway.

The AMA has levied an additional penalty against Eslick, saying that he will continue to be suspended from all AMA-sanctioned events until the case with the Volusia County Clerk of Circuit Court is resolved. Once resolved, the AMA may release the suspension, or take further punitive actions against Eslick.

Now with the blessing of the American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) the 2016 Daytona 200 is set to kick-off on Saturday, March 12th at 1pm EST, during Bike Week in Daytona, Florida.

Racing for 57 laps on the high banks of Daytona International Speedway, Daytona 200 contenders will be on supersport class machines, where tire management and careful drafting will be the most important aspects for the racers.

At one point in time, the Daytona 200 garnered the attention of motorcycle racing fans around the world, and its owners DMG hope to return the iconic race to that stature.

To that end, the AMA’s sanction now makes it is easier for FIM-licensed riders to participate in the Daytona 200, and vie for its impressive $175,000 purse ($25,000 goes to the winner).

And for fans, the race is easy to watch, as DMG will be live streaming the Daytona 200 on its FansChoice.TV web property. The pre-race action starts at 12:30 EST; so if you’re on the West Coast, you will want to rise and shine a little earlier than normal, perhaps.

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.

At first it seemed the only way to watch the Daytona 200 was to be there in-person, but DMG has been able to swing a last-minute deal with FansChoice.tv to bring the internet live streaming of the historic race.

Sanctioned now by the American SportBike Racing Association (ASRA), it is not clear at this time what ASRA’s coverage will include, but the green flag drops at 1pm Eastern Time, Saturday, March 14th — commentary, or not.

It has been a relatively quiet week in the world of motorcycle racing, with much of the focus on preparations for 2015 rather than actual on-track action. The past week has seen riders spending more time on stage than on track, as many teams have presented their 2015 racing programs.

This is but the calm before the storm, however: from Saturday, there is another bumper period of world championship action, with MotoGP testing at Qatar from 14th-16th March, Moto2 hitting Jerez from 17th-19th, followed by the second round of World Superbikes at the Chang circuit in Thailand from 20th-22nd.

There have been some bikes from other series circulating in the past week, however. The British BSB series has been testing in Spain, the MXGP championship has raced in Thailand, two weeks ahead of the World Superbike series’ first visit to the country, and in the US, Florida is gearing up for the Daytona 200.

Now that the Daytona Motorsports Group is no longer in control of AMA Pro Road Racing, intrigue has surrounded DMG’s home race, the Daytona 200. An event that usually kicks off the motorcycle racing season in March, the Daytona 200 has been an outlier with its early schedule, endurance format, and technical challenges.

The race always seemed forced upon the AMA schedule, and it required teams who wanted to be competitive to run different equipment and tires than what they were using for the rest of the season.

The limitations on tires ultimately meant that the Superbikes, the premier road racing class, could not compete in 200 mile race, leaving the event for the aptly named Daytona SportBike category, which was a mix of middleweight machines.

With The KRAVE Group now in charge of professional motorcycle road racing in the United States, with its MotoAmerica series, there is little desire to continue the oddity that is Daytona. That hasn’t stopped DMG though from putting on the historic event, which will have its 74th running of the Daytona 200 on March 14, 2015.

We have a strange love affair with motorcycle pit stops here at Asphalt & Rubber. Maybe it’s the added spectacle that comes with rider and crew racing to change tires and fuel the machine.

Maybe it’s the carefully planned and choreographed dance that ensues, with an ever mindful eye on the stopwatch. Maybe it’s because any number of things can go wrong in those few precious seconds, which could alter the result of a race.

Whatever the case may be, we are enthralled, and at 120 frames per second, what takes only a handful of seconds to achieve, is drawn out into nearly a minute of precise motions. So without further ado, watch the RoadRace Factory Red Bull team pit their rider Jake Gagne, and help solidify his second place finish in this year’s Daytona 200.

Did you miss this weekend’s Daytona 200? It wasn’t on TV, but instead was streamed on DMG’s new website: FansChoice.tv. The content was pretty standard, for anyone who has watched AMA Pro Racing’s TV commentary before, though it was without a high-defition feed, which irked video snobs like us.

Some readers reported other technical difficulties with the steam itself, though for the large-part of viewers, things seemed to work ok. The only probably up until now, is how to watch the Daytona 200 and other races if you didn’t catch them live. DMG has a fix for that now as well: YouTube.