AMA/DMG Official Rules Released. Finally.

The Daytona Motorsports Group, operating as AMA Pro Racing, finally released an official rule book today.  It's taken nine months of arguing, negotiating, threats, personal attacks in the media, and who knows what else to get here, but they finally made it.  I haven't perused the 115-page document yet so I really don't know much about the details.  I do know that there are three primary classes:

• American Superbike - This will be the premier class (after DMG finally dumped the idiotic idea of making a weight- and horsepower-limited 600cc-based class the premier class) and the last I heard will be based mostly around the 2009 rule book that was agreed upon by the manufacturers in 2007.  Also, I keep hearing that this class is ultimately going to shift to using the same rule book as World Superbike, which I applaud heartily and have been advocating for some time.
• Daytona Sportbike - This class is the originally-proposed, aforementioned weight- and horsepower-limited, 600cc-based class that finally ended up.  My understanding is it's kind of a cross between 2008 Formula Xtreme and 2008 Supersport.  Kind of like Formula Xtreme in that there are a variety of different bikes ranging from 600cc inline fours to 1000+ cc twins, but similar to Supersport in that the bikes aren't allowed a very high level of tune.  I'm not sure if the originally proposed weight and horsepower restrictions stood.
• SuperSport - I don't know much about this one yet, but I gather it's similar to SuperSport from previous years.  The big changes are that factory involvement will be severely curtailed or completely disallowed and there will be an age limit for the riders.  This class is intended to be a entry-level class for young riders to use as a springboard into the bigger class.

There haven't been many announcements from the various factories and teams so far.  The only people who've done anything official with regard to their factory team is Yamaha.  The held a media day last week and announced their 2009 racing plans as well as unveiled their 2009 rider lineup, which consists of Ben Bostrom and Josh Hayes on Superbikes and Josh Herrin and Tommy Aquino on Daytona Sportbikes.  Hopefully the announcement of the final rules hasn't come too late for everyone else to get onboard.  I can only assume we'll have a better idea in a couple of weeks when the traditional December tire tests occur at Daytona Internation Speedway.

For anyone who's interested, the official rule book can be found here: http://www.amaproracing.com/prorace/pdf/2009%20AMA%20Pro%20Road%20Race%20Regulations.pdf and an articles about Yamaha's Media Day can be found here and here.