Redline/Gold Cup races are a series of regional championship events that are held mostly for the benefit of the amateur racer with a No.1 plate on the line for the overall winner of the age and classification. It originally was a one-off Jag like Championship race on November 27, 1981, in which the competitors just had to come in the top 100 in their districts to compete. It became a six race qualifying series in 1982 held in conjunction with standard nationals. Like in its inaugural year, the Championships was held the day before the ABA Grand Nationals in Oklahoma as a pre race.
The USBA, suffering its own financial dire straits, sold it back to Hutch who in turn sold it to the ABA. Several ABA tracks left the ABA and joined Roker to participate in his series which were to be NBL sanctioned. With this siege mentality in his background it was easy for Mennenga to believe that USBA stole the valuable ABA membership records to proposition ABA Schwinn Meridian racers to join the USBA. While the value of this list would be a motive to steal it, Mennenga provided no evidence. The magazine had left the ABA on the verge of bankruptcy. The rising costs of the insurance crises of the early 1980s, with its skyrocketing rates, affected every sanctioning body, but given the ABA’s greatly weakened state it, was life-threatening.
Redline Bicycles had been sponsoring the Gold Cup Series for the prior six racing seasons. Today the Gold Cup Series Championship or simply the Gold Cup, is the second most sought after title in the ABA. The ABA felt it was a deliberate action to siphon off racers, particularly the pros from their season-ending Grand National. Schwinn Meridian The hiring by the Knott’s Berry promoter Thomas Henn of former NBA founder and President Ernie Alexander to run the race (he also designed the temporary track at Knott’s) didn’t help matters. Alexander had a reputation of deliberately scheduling NBA events against the events of other sanctioning bodies when he ran the NBA.
Legitimate complaints regarding such issues as high entry fees and subpar tracks that hosted nationals have been lodged to the ABA. Mennenga designed and built special tracks to run the nationals. In 1978, the National Bicycle Association had 50 tracks and 5,000 racers.
This was in the teeth of a general two year sag in ridership on the racing side of the industry and in the face of the popularity of BMX Freestyle, Skateboarding and the rise of Mountain Biking. To help reduce costs, the ABA ran a few selected Amateur open classes to offset, at least partially, the losses. The most successful of the Spectaculars (non-racer attendance) was the fifth round held in Phoenix, Arizona, on February 8, which drew 2,600 paying spectators. However, the cost of renting the arena and lack of entrance fees were financial expenses the ABA could not absorb. Despite the relatively low admission fee of $5.00, the venues were either empty, or seating was well below capacity. At the first event held at the Lawlor Events Centre of the University of Nevada in Reno, Nevada, only about 2,000 spectators were on hand in a facility that could seat 10,000.