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AMA Pro Racing (the new AMA Pro Racing) announced Thursday that long-time, old school flat track racer, former AMA Grand National Champion, race promoter, Motorcycle Hall of Fame member, and Texan Mike Kidd has been chosen to head the redevelopment of the national flat track program. This is good news. Kidd has been around the block more than once and knows the flat track business. He's also seen the ups and downs of race promoting, being one of the first to bring racing to the small arenas in the mid-'80s.

I love flat track — watching those big Harley XR750s pitched completely sideways at 100mph in a mile race is awesome. The old AMA's apathy toward flat track was exceeded only by their apathy toward outdoor MX. Flat track is a genuinely American form of competition and deserves much better. I've read that AMA Pro Racing's Roger Edmondson is a big flat track fan, and this move to bring in Kidd is encouraging.

Kidd has done some very innovative things in his promotional career, but it seemed he never really had the big bucks behind him that he needed - even though he had the backing of Clear Channel for a while. It just didn't work. But now that he's got the backing of a group with both money and a love of the sport things could be very different. I hope so.