This just in from Dan Wildhirt:

The late-December announcement by Clear Channel Entertainment that it had secured the rights from the FIM to produce the Supercross World Championship in collaboration with DORNA might seem on its face to be just another shot across the AMA’s bow in the ongoing war over the control of Supercross.

However, it may well prove to be the most significant development yet in motorcycle racing’s biggest-ever pissing match.

Up to now, the SXWC has been little more than a ceremonial title that carried far less importance than winning the U.S. Supercross crown or even, for that matter, winning certain individual races such as the legendary Bercy SX. Beginning in the mid-1990s, the SXWC never, if memory serves, comprised more than four events in any given year. Only once did the series ever visit the USA, the sport’s acknowledged birthplace, and that was for a forgettable, sparsely attended fiasco at Pasadena’s 100,000-seat Rose Bowl in 1999. The following year, the “series” was made up of just two European rounds, which probably had a lot to do with the championship being cancelled entirely for 2001.

So what does CCE get out of being associated with this seemingly moribund series? Exactly what they needed. Ever since the split between AMA Pro Racing and CCE, the AMA has made noises about the U.S. Supercross Championship being “the most sought-after title in Supercross racing,” as if that alone were enough to guarantee success for the new JamSports-produced AMA series. Now, however, the AMA may not just find itself competing against the most successful Supercross promoter in the world, but also one that has official sanction from the sport’s governing body to confer what should be the most recognizable title in Supercross.

I’m not privy to CCE’s decision-making processes, but I have to believe that the rights to the SXWC were acquired with an eye toward integrating it into the existing CCE Supercross infrastructure. As we’ve seen over the past several years, CCE can be a very creative and persuasive organizer. It’s doubtful they’d enter into an agreement such as the one with DORNA and FIM unless they intend to get maximum leverage out of the association.

The 2003 CCE Supercross series already has the venues, the merchandising, the promotional muscle and the logistics in place; all that was needed was an important-sounding title on which the series would be focused. Now they’ve got that, too. Kudos to the Clear Channel staffer who realized the SXWC property was in play.

But how, you might ask, can you have a “world” championship centered around a U.S.-based series? First of all, the current AMA series, under the auspices of CCE, is already recognized as the de facto world championship of stadium motocross, if not by the FIM, then certainly by the riders and fans. Jeremy McGrath and Travis Pastrana, to name just two of the biggest stars, have never pursued the world championship, yet they’re far better known internationally than any of the putative world champions of Supercross.

Second, the precedent for a world championship series concentrated on a single continent already exists. There are already a number of FIM “world” championships that rarely, if ever, leave Europe: enduro, trials and endurance road racing, for example. All CCE needs is a few overseas dates to give the schedule the appropriate international character. How does the “Tokyo Supercross” sound to you? More importantly, would the factories–the lynchpins in this battle–get excited about it? Ya think?

It’s not too far-fetched to foresee Clear Channel-owned radio stations and billboards across L.A. and Orange County blanketed a year from now by ads for three Anaheim rounds of a revitalized Supercross World Championship. If I were CCE motorsports division President Charlie Mancuso, I’d already be working on it. Wouldn’t you?