Adrian Hunter and Kevin Williams during the Monster Energy MX Nationals season launch yesterday in Melbourne.

Australasian manager of Monster Energy, Adrian Hunter, has spoken out about the leading energy drink brand’s involvement as title sponsor of the MX Nationals, Australian Motocross Championship, in 2012.

Monster Energy’s support of the series will extend past the sponsorship dollars it continues to pour into the sport, outlining a clear vision intended to build motocross from strength to strength in Australia during the years to come.

With the collapse of Super X for this year, which Monster had supported since 2009, the brand is putting its weight behind the MX Nationals and Hunter looks forward to further establishing the brand within Australia.

“We’ve been obviously big fans of the supercross, but unfortunately we’ve had a couple of unlucky years as far as the weather is concerned,” said Hunter, who has experience working in the U.S. at the pinnacle of the sport.

“I don’t think we have it there, we don’t have the crowds and we don’t have the capacity for what Monster wants to build for supercross in this country.

“Unfortunately it has taken a step back from where we hoped it to go to, but working with Kevin [Williams], he is very open to our ideas and what we want to do, how we want to establish our brand within the MX Nationals.”

A number of promotions and specific plans are being put in place by Monster, in accordance with WEM’s Kevin Williams, to help raise awareness of the sport in a bid to boost crowd attendance at all 10 rounds throughout the series.

Collectively, Monster Energy and WEM will give away 30,000 free kid’s tickets to events during the 2012 championship chase.

“We want to drive consumer awareness, we want to drive consumer promotions and not only that, we want to drive new spectators. If we can drive new spectators then we can drive new awareness for every brand that’s part of this,” he continued.

“We’ve been working with Kev pretty closely on this, so if we can give away free tickets, if the kids are getting free tickets, then it’s going to help drive the family aspect of bringing more people to the sport.

“For us, obviously we have a great fan base in Australia, along with our website, and we are going to use the MX Nationals as one of our major platforms to drive the awareness locally.

“One of the biggest things we are going to do with my teams because we do have the resources, is between a week and a week and a half [out from each round], I’ll have sampling teams and sales guys in the actual town, suburb or city, in those areas making sure they know it’s actually coming.

“It’s great for us because it shows that we are passionate about the sport and are actually putting some effort into it.”

Another goal of Hunter and Monster Energy is to increase return and enjoyment for competitors, regardless of their results at the end of the season.

“Some people know that we do have some great assets with our semi trailer and other things, so we want to make sure that each motorcycle rider and each sponsor that is involved in this sport this year, really takes away that we have come onboard,” he said.

“I’ve put pressure on Kev and he’s obviously very open to it, to make sure that the final round and the gala dinner is something that everybody is proud to go to, not that they haven’t been in the past.

“But with our involvement I think it just gives Kevin that extra resource and that little bit of money to help make it bigger for people to go, ‘oh wow, that was a great year’, championship or not.”

Hunter said that it’s important the series is run at a level where teams can maintain major sponsors, which are vital for growth in the future.

“For me it’s important that the riders are stoked and they want to be part of this sport, and another important thing for me is the sponsors,” Hunter added. “I want to make sure that we collectively maintain the sponsors that are onboard in the sport.

“Carlton and a lot of these big brands with some of these teams, they can go sideways left and right if they don’t see value, so for me, it’s important to see these teams well funded by major sponsors.

“It keeps riders coming internationally, it keeps the support there, continuing to allow these teams good budgets to get good riders here. The better the riders we have, the better the MX series is, the more we’ll attract as far as the crowd goes.

“Building it from where we are right now, I can see the sport in the next two to three years with television and with some great ratings, which is what I would like to build the sport into, obviously with Kevin’s help.”

Monster Energy will also remain title sponsor of Kawasaki’s factory race program, while personally continuing to support riders such as Ben Townley, Brad Anderson, Ford Dale, Errol Willis and female national champion Megan Rutledge.