Hey race fans I just wanted to give everyone a daily update as I am racing the 40th I-500 cross country race. First off let me back up a bit, this past weekend I raced a ice race in northern Wisconsin so Sunday morning we got the sled preped to get it ready for the bumps, Monday was load up, Tuesday was pack, and this morning (Wednedsay) was hit the road at 5:30 am for the 8 hour drive to the race.
Today I got the sled tech'd in and found out that I will be the 61st sled off the starting line. The factory guys are starting number 22,23,24 and 25. My sled is in impound over night with the rest of the sleds as after they get tech'd their is no touching the sled until the race starts. After tech I got registered and went to the drivers meeting. At the drivers meeting we found out that their is 103 drivers starting the race tomorrow and typically only 70% of the sleds finish day 1. Tomorrow I will update and let you know how many people approx. dropped out on day 1. Day 1 is going to be about a 150 mile race that has 130 miles of ditch and 20 miles of river. Fuel stops are roughly 55 miles out, then another 55 miles after that with the last leg only being about 40 miles from the finish line. I am the very last semi-pro sled to take off the line so I will have my work cut out for me as hopefully I can make up some time and pass through the field. My goal for tomorrow is to finish in the top 7 for day #1. Remember that only 70% people finish day 1 so I need to ride hard but keep it under control and finish day 1.
Tomorrow night their is a drivers meeting at 7pm so after that is all done I will be back in the hotel room and I will try to log on and give everyone a update as long as my arm pump is under control and I can type
Racing starts at 9am and you can go to usxcracing.com or watch usxc Facebook page for updates throughout the day.
Thanks for the support and look for a update tomorrow night.
Korey Kilinski #125![Yrules :yam: :yam:](/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/yrules.gif)
Today I got the sled tech'd in and found out that I will be the 61st sled off the starting line. The factory guys are starting number 22,23,24 and 25. My sled is in impound over night with the rest of the sleds as after they get tech'd their is no touching the sled until the race starts. After tech I got registered and went to the drivers meeting. At the drivers meeting we found out that their is 103 drivers starting the race tomorrow and typically only 70% of the sleds finish day 1. Tomorrow I will update and let you know how many people approx. dropped out on day 1. Day 1 is going to be about a 150 mile race that has 130 miles of ditch and 20 miles of river. Fuel stops are roughly 55 miles out, then another 55 miles after that with the last leg only being about 40 miles from the finish line. I am the very last semi-pro sled to take off the line so I will have my work cut out for me as hopefully I can make up some time and pass through the field. My goal for tomorrow is to finish in the top 7 for day #1. Remember that only 70% people finish day 1 so I need to ride hard but keep it under control and finish day 1.
Tomorrow night their is a drivers meeting at 7pm so after that is all done I will be back in the hotel room and I will try to log on and give everyone a update as long as my arm pump is under control and I can type
Racing starts at 9am and you can go to usxcracing.com or watch usxc Facebook page for updates throughout the day.
Thanks for the support and look for a update tomorrow night.
Korey Kilinski #125
![Yrules :yam: :yam:](/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/yrules.gif)
natedawgedog
TY 4 Stroke Guru
good luck racing!!!
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Port-Parts
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Good Luck Korey!!
Day 1 in the books
Well guys/gals day 1 is in the books. The course today was exactly 150 miles, and 130 of it was ditch with mostly knee high bumps. Yesterday I may have mentioned how their was very little snow here...I lied. Well sort of becuase the ditches have about 3-4 feet of snow in them and the fields are wind swept and pretty much bare. If we were not in the bottom of the ditches we were bouncing off rocks going across the fields, or running gravel roads with maybe 1" of snow on them at 100 mph...Thank god for my DuPont Slides!
Today was only day 5 of me riding my Nytro, and day 1 riding my Nytro in bumps which was a bit weird racing one of the most prestigous races and not having a clue how the sled was going to handle in the bumps. The first 20 miles was ditch banging before we jumped onto the river and I was not very fast or smooth as I learned how big blue was going to react going 60-80 mph through the bumps. I did get passed by 2 people in these 20 miles and followed them for the next 30 miles to the fuel stop. After the fuel stop I was feeling much more confident and I was able to re-pass and put a gap on the 2 that passed me and hold them off for the next 100 miles which was good. My second 50 mile loop and my 3rd 50 mile loop today were way way faster than my first loop so hopefully tomorrow will go better for me now that I understand the sled.
97% of today went good and I was smooth and mistake free as I rode in my comfort zone and wanted to finish day 1 of the race which some people say is the hardest day to finish. My 1% not so awesome part of the day was going about 75 down a ditch in knee high bumps then coming into a 90 degree right hand turn that had waste high braking bumps. We were coming up to a intersection of county roads and we had to turn in the ditch to the right. When I got into the deep braking bumps my back end was swapping from side to side out of control so I hammered on it and held the sled pinned to straighten it out, it worked until I realized I was heading up the side of a pretty steep ditch right for the big old red stop sign for the road. I quickly jammed on my breaks leaned right pulled hard and carved around the corer as the outside of my left Curve XS ski tagged the stop sign and shook it like crazy. Their was a few fans up on the road waching this part of the track so I am sure I gave them a good laugh...I even had to laugh a little my self knowign I just hit a big metal stop sign and it rang like a school bell. No damage nor did it really slow me down which was good. The other 1% that was not good was after every road approach it would take my nytro a little bit to get back up to speed and I had a Arctic Cat in front of me for a really long time and he would pull me like crazy after he would land off the roads which was frustering but after about 30 miles I finally found a spot to carry more speed and passed the person.
The last 1% that did not go as planned was me not being in the top 10 at the end of day 1. Their is 17 guys in my class and I finished 12th which I am not to happy about, but o well tomorrow is another day. The top 4 guys in my Semi-Pro improved stock class are going very fast and their times are all in the top 8 for times as far as the pro's go. Should they be in semi-pro...probably not but o well nothing I can do about it. My goal for tomorrow is to ride smooth, finish (as I know more people will not) and break into the top 8. That should set me up for day 3 and hopefully ending up in the top 5 at the end of all of this.
103 people started the race....17 did not finish today so now we are down to 86 racers. My bet for tomorrow is that we will be down to around 75 racers at the end of the day. Hopefully myself along with the 4 factory Yamaha boys will still be in the race and doing well.
Thank you for the support and look for another update tomorrow.
Korey Kilinski #125
Well guys/gals day 1 is in the books. The course today was exactly 150 miles, and 130 of it was ditch with mostly knee high bumps. Yesterday I may have mentioned how their was very little snow here...I lied. Well sort of becuase the ditches have about 3-4 feet of snow in them and the fields are wind swept and pretty much bare. If we were not in the bottom of the ditches we were bouncing off rocks going across the fields, or running gravel roads with maybe 1" of snow on them at 100 mph...Thank god for my DuPont Slides!
Today was only day 5 of me riding my Nytro, and day 1 riding my Nytro in bumps which was a bit weird racing one of the most prestigous races and not having a clue how the sled was going to handle in the bumps. The first 20 miles was ditch banging before we jumped onto the river and I was not very fast or smooth as I learned how big blue was going to react going 60-80 mph through the bumps. I did get passed by 2 people in these 20 miles and followed them for the next 30 miles to the fuel stop. After the fuel stop I was feeling much more confident and I was able to re-pass and put a gap on the 2 that passed me and hold them off for the next 100 miles which was good. My second 50 mile loop and my 3rd 50 mile loop today were way way faster than my first loop so hopefully tomorrow will go better for me now that I understand the sled.
97% of today went good and I was smooth and mistake free as I rode in my comfort zone and wanted to finish day 1 of the race which some people say is the hardest day to finish. My 1% not so awesome part of the day was going about 75 down a ditch in knee high bumps then coming into a 90 degree right hand turn that had waste high braking bumps. We were coming up to a intersection of county roads and we had to turn in the ditch to the right. When I got into the deep braking bumps my back end was swapping from side to side out of control so I hammered on it and held the sled pinned to straighten it out, it worked until I realized I was heading up the side of a pretty steep ditch right for the big old red stop sign for the road. I quickly jammed on my breaks leaned right pulled hard and carved around the corer as the outside of my left Curve XS ski tagged the stop sign and shook it like crazy. Their was a few fans up on the road waching this part of the track so I am sure I gave them a good laugh...I even had to laugh a little my self knowign I just hit a big metal stop sign and it rang like a school bell. No damage nor did it really slow me down which was good. The other 1% that was not good was after every road approach it would take my nytro a little bit to get back up to speed and I had a Arctic Cat in front of me for a really long time and he would pull me like crazy after he would land off the roads which was frustering but after about 30 miles I finally found a spot to carry more speed and passed the person.
The last 1% that did not go as planned was me not being in the top 10 at the end of day 1. Their is 17 guys in my class and I finished 12th which I am not to happy about, but o well tomorrow is another day. The top 4 guys in my Semi-Pro improved stock class are going very fast and their times are all in the top 8 for times as far as the pro's go. Should they be in semi-pro...probably not but o well nothing I can do about it. My goal for tomorrow is to ride smooth, finish (as I know more people will not) and break into the top 8. That should set me up for day 3 and hopefully ending up in the top 5 at the end of all of this.
103 people started the race....17 did not finish today so now we are down to 86 racers. My bet for tomorrow is that we will be down to around 75 racers at the end of the day. Hopefully myself along with the 4 factory Yamaha boys will still be in the race and doing well.
Thank you for the support and look for another update tomorrow.
Korey Kilinski #125
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Turtle
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Sounds like tough race, but you are doing great. Good luck on the next leg.
7 skulls
TY 4 Stroke Junkie
Good luck! Great report. Could almost smell the exhaust and was bracing for the bumps as I read. ![Rockon :Rockon: :Rockon:](/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/rockon.gif)
![Rockon :Rockon: :Rockon:](/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/rockon.gif)
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Cor146
VIP Member
Keep it up Korey as we are racing for both of us!!
For the TY members, I feel horrible for not being able to represent all you this year at the 500 but family comes first.
Last Saturday at Round 2 of the Cor PowerSports series I found out just prior to the start of the race my Dad was in the ICU in Duluth which was 3 1/2 hours away.
Let's just say that my mind was not focused on my racing but I still managed a 3rd place finish and maintained my points lead in the 4 Stroke class.
We got to the hospital Saturday night and then he passed away Sunday morning. Funeral was yesterday so that is why I am not competiting at the 500 this year with Korey...
I have been keeping in contact with him and giving advise, anything to be the supportive teammate even though I am 6 hours away he knows in spirit I am right next to him!!
For the TY members, I feel horrible for not being able to represent all you this year at the 500 but family comes first.
Last Saturday at Round 2 of the Cor PowerSports series I found out just prior to the start of the race my Dad was in the ICU in Duluth which was 3 1/2 hours away.
Let's just say that my mind was not focused on my racing but I still managed a 3rd place finish and maintained my points lead in the 4 Stroke class.
We got to the hospital Saturday night and then he passed away Sunday morning. Funeral was yesterday so that is why I am not competiting at the 500 this year with Korey...
I have been keeping in contact with him and giving advise, anything to be the supportive teammate even though I am 6 hours away he knows in spirit I am right next to him!!
Day 2 update
This one is going to be pretty short and sweet becaue I am beat. Today's leg was another 153 mile race and I started out in 12th spot and now at the end of day 2 I moved up to 10th. Tomorrow's final leg is 170 mile race which will put us at 470 miles for the total distance of the race. Tomorrows leg is about 30 miles of river and about 140 miles of ditch running. In the drivers meeting tonight they made it very clear that their is a lot of single track and "dangerous" spots with stumps, culverts, rocks, and boondocking in tomorrows race. To me the term boondocking means climbing a hill weaving through the tree's in deep powder, if this is what its going to be, it should be interesting in the middle of a cross country race.
Remember on day 1 I mentioned how many people dropped out of the race and this race is a test against man and machine? Only 17 people dropped out on day 1. I was guessing only about 10 more people would drop out today but a total of 29 sleds dropped out today so that brings only 52 people of the 103 that started the race into the last leg of the race and I am still one of them!
Today was more rough bumps through the dtiches for about 120 miles with about 30 miles of tight twisty river. If you want to see how tight and twisty I am talking google earth a image of Theif River Falls MN and check out the river that heads SE of town...90ish on the straights all the way down to some 10 mph corners.
My Nytro is bone stock for clutching, gearing and the motor (set up the way I was told to set it up...leave it stock) and I am only able to run at about 75 mph down the ditches which does not seem right being that everyone else is goign 85 through the ditches. At the end of the day I was frusterated being that I am 10 mph slower and I want to go faster as I am in complete controll going 75 and wanting more mph. After talking to the factory guys I found out that "stock" does not work well in these deep snowy ditches and I should have re-geared and machined some material from the clutches....Finding this out after day 2 is frusterating because if I would have had this info last week I could have had it done for this race and then been able to run 85-90 mph all the time and bee sitting much better than 10th place. Ross Erdan and I were talking and he is able to run 90-95 down the ditches right at max rpm. Even if I only gained 8mph from these mods....8mph for 120-130 miles of ditch is quite a bit of time. O well I guess that is the hand I am delt being a privateer racer and not having the resources to test parts and set ups before each race.
103 racers started the race....52 are left...that means that about only 50% of the racers are still left in the race. 17 guys started my class (Semi-Pro improved stock) and I am currently 10th.
I am really not in contention to win the race at this point as I am about 30 mintues behind 1st place in my class so the game plan is to ride smooth and finish the race and hopefully my time tomorrow will be faster than some others, and then some people may break down and I could end up in 7th, 8th or something like that. I have finished the I-500 once before and I got a 13th so I could be happy with a 7th......but man I want to podium
Again thank you for all of the support and please watch usxcracing.com for final results tomorrow. Look for #125 in the Semi-Pro improved class. I will not be updating this tomorrow night as I will be headed home and not online. Hopefully early next week I can give a final run down.
Thanks again!![Rockon :Rockon: :Rockon:](/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/rockon.gif)
This one is going to be pretty short and sweet becaue I am beat. Today's leg was another 153 mile race and I started out in 12th spot and now at the end of day 2 I moved up to 10th. Tomorrow's final leg is 170 mile race which will put us at 470 miles for the total distance of the race. Tomorrows leg is about 30 miles of river and about 140 miles of ditch running. In the drivers meeting tonight they made it very clear that their is a lot of single track and "dangerous" spots with stumps, culverts, rocks, and boondocking in tomorrows race. To me the term boondocking means climbing a hill weaving through the tree's in deep powder, if this is what its going to be, it should be interesting in the middle of a cross country race.
Remember on day 1 I mentioned how many people dropped out of the race and this race is a test against man and machine? Only 17 people dropped out on day 1. I was guessing only about 10 more people would drop out today but a total of 29 sleds dropped out today so that brings only 52 people of the 103 that started the race into the last leg of the race and I am still one of them!
Today was more rough bumps through the dtiches for about 120 miles with about 30 miles of tight twisty river. If you want to see how tight and twisty I am talking google earth a image of Theif River Falls MN and check out the river that heads SE of town...90ish on the straights all the way down to some 10 mph corners.
My Nytro is bone stock for clutching, gearing and the motor (set up the way I was told to set it up...leave it stock) and I am only able to run at about 75 mph down the ditches which does not seem right being that everyone else is goign 85 through the ditches. At the end of the day I was frusterated being that I am 10 mph slower and I want to go faster as I am in complete controll going 75 and wanting more mph. After talking to the factory guys I found out that "stock" does not work well in these deep snowy ditches and I should have re-geared and machined some material from the clutches....Finding this out after day 2 is frusterating because if I would have had this info last week I could have had it done for this race and then been able to run 85-90 mph all the time and bee sitting much better than 10th place. Ross Erdan and I were talking and he is able to run 90-95 down the ditches right at max rpm. Even if I only gained 8mph from these mods....8mph for 120-130 miles of ditch is quite a bit of time. O well I guess that is the hand I am delt being a privateer racer and not having the resources to test parts and set ups before each race.
![Banghead :o| :o|](/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/banghead.gif)
103 racers started the race....52 are left...that means that about only 50% of the racers are still left in the race. 17 guys started my class (Semi-Pro improved stock) and I am currently 10th.
I am really not in contention to win the race at this point as I am about 30 mintues behind 1st place in my class so the game plan is to ride smooth and finish the race and hopefully my time tomorrow will be faster than some others, and then some people may break down and I could end up in 7th, 8th or something like that. I have finished the I-500 once before and I got a 13th so I could be happy with a 7th......but man I want to podium
Again thank you for all of the support and please watch usxcracing.com for final results tomorrow. Look for #125 in the Semi-Pro improved class. I will not be updating this tomorrow night as I will be headed home and not online. Hopefully early next week I can give a final run down.
Thanks again!
![Rockon :Rockon: :Rockon:](/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/rockon.gif)
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Really appreciate your reports.Awesome racing and good luck!
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Crewchief47
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Yes, love the reports. Good luck Sunday!
I-500 wrap up report
Well the 40th running of the I-500 is over and I ended up finishing 8th in the Semi-Pro improved stock class. I am happy with the finish but I didn't really plan on racing for 8th place at the end of the race....I was racing for a top 3 and it did not quite happen.
The top 4 guys in semi-pro also entered the pro class and those 4 guys finished top 10 in the pro class. The winner of the Semi-pro class has won the Semi-Pro class in the I-500 a few times now so I just don't understand why this person is still allowed to be in the semi-pro division. To me if you are able to put up top 10 times in the pro class you are not a semi-pro level racer. Don't get me wrong I love the competition and it will only make me faster racing the faster guys but their is still plenty of fast guys to race against if those guys were moved up like they should be.
Now onto day 3 racing. We started at 9am and it was freezing rain and a little foggy out but non the less it was the last day of the 500 and people were excited to get out on the track. Their was a 100 yard drag race to the first corner where we turned a 90 degree corner and stopped for a road crossing. We took off two at a time and I got paired up with the Jolene Bute (#22 factory Arctic Cat pro women racer) and I got the hole shot over her. When I slid into the first corner and hit the break to stop at the stop sign I herd a weird noise and it felt like my breaks were stuck. All I could think was "great, 170 miles to go and I have a problem already." Headed down the first ditch line my goggles already were iced up, the light was flat and I was hitting bumps that I did not even see. I knew that the last day was going to be a day of survival being that you could not see a thing. From the starting line to the river is about 3 miles. In the first three miles Jolene pasted me then crashed hard over a road approach, 50 yards after that their was a Polaris upside down laying in the middle of the road and the driver was on his knees in the ditch gaining his composure. Just before the river their was another Polaris slammed up against a tree. At this point I knew it was going to be smart to back it down and let the crazies crash out and ride a safe race to the finish.
Next up was 25 miles of river....Did I mention fog and freezing rain yet? Yep goggles were iced over and I basically rode at 70mph down the whole river while scrapping ice from my goggle lenses the whole time. After I got off the river I got into some single track sections with huge drifts where a Polaris Rush was stuck in the drift, no way was I going to lift big blue out of a snow drift in the rain so I just put the hammer down and plowed through it. Shortly after I saw an ambulance, come to find out a Ski-Doo pilot smacked some rail road tracks and got slammed onto the blacktop. So far the day was not going well from my eyes, people crashed out, hurt, stuck, freezing rain and fog. I took my time and rode it out to the first fuel stop. Just before the first fuel stop I came across Re Wadena (Factory Yamaha Pro) and he was broke down in the middle of a field. Come to find out he also had issues over the rail road tracks and crashed and then had sled issues.
Leg 2 of the race. Right after I fueled up we headed south down a field for about a 10 mile stretch....The light was so flat, and my goggles were so froze up I literally had no idea where I was supposed to go. I rode about 20 yards behind a guy on a cat and we kept looking at each other trying to figure out if we were on the right path. I passed him and basically looked 10 feet in front of the sled and followed the sled tracks from the guys in front of me. I kept the rubber side down and made it to the final fuel stop of the race.
The final leg of the race started out fun. We got on a tight narrow river that was drifted in with about waist high rollers. The torque of my Nyrto was perfect for this section because I was able to hold a rhythm and double through the drifts. After we got out of the river section we were put onto a gravel road for about 2 miles. When I say gravel I mean gravel with no snow. At the end of the road was a burnt down Polaris. Its amazing how many drivers don't use their heads and drive down the gravel road at 100 mph for 2 miles and think their sled will not over heat. After the long gravel road we got into a swamp full of stumps. Here Justin Tate on his Ski-Doo ripped this whole front right sled off, both a-arms, shock, ski and all. I drove through this section at maybe 5 mph knowing I was about 10 miles from finishing the race. Also by now the fog really set in and it was very very hard to see. I am thinking maybe 20 feet in front of you was a pure white out of fog, rain and snow.
Coming around the final two corners and seeing the finish line I knew that I was only 1 of 3 Yamaha's to finish the long race and was proud that I did it. Soaking wet, cold, and tired I was glad the race was over. To find out at the end of the day that only 37 of the 103 original racers finished the 500 mile race I was glad that I was one of the 37.
I could not have done it without all of the great people behind me helping me out. First off I have to thank my dad for everything he has done. My sponsors Yamaha Racing, Totallyamaha.com, Port Yamaha, Cor Powersports, Studboy, Curve Ski's, Arcticfx, HMK, Castle, Rox Speedfx, Muffin Works, Scott Goggles, and Fly Racing. Without all of you I would never have been able to finish my second I-500.
Thank you everyone for your support!
Well the 40th running of the I-500 is over and I ended up finishing 8th in the Semi-Pro improved stock class. I am happy with the finish but I didn't really plan on racing for 8th place at the end of the race....I was racing for a top 3 and it did not quite happen.
The top 4 guys in semi-pro also entered the pro class and those 4 guys finished top 10 in the pro class. The winner of the Semi-pro class has won the Semi-Pro class in the I-500 a few times now so I just don't understand why this person is still allowed to be in the semi-pro division. To me if you are able to put up top 10 times in the pro class you are not a semi-pro level racer. Don't get me wrong I love the competition and it will only make me faster racing the faster guys but their is still plenty of fast guys to race against if those guys were moved up like they should be.
Now onto day 3 racing. We started at 9am and it was freezing rain and a little foggy out but non the less it was the last day of the 500 and people were excited to get out on the track. Their was a 100 yard drag race to the first corner where we turned a 90 degree corner and stopped for a road crossing. We took off two at a time and I got paired up with the Jolene Bute (#22 factory Arctic Cat pro women racer) and I got the hole shot over her. When I slid into the first corner and hit the break to stop at the stop sign I herd a weird noise and it felt like my breaks were stuck. All I could think was "great, 170 miles to go and I have a problem already." Headed down the first ditch line my goggles already were iced up, the light was flat and I was hitting bumps that I did not even see. I knew that the last day was going to be a day of survival being that you could not see a thing. From the starting line to the river is about 3 miles. In the first three miles Jolene pasted me then crashed hard over a road approach, 50 yards after that their was a Polaris upside down laying in the middle of the road and the driver was on his knees in the ditch gaining his composure. Just before the river their was another Polaris slammed up against a tree. At this point I knew it was going to be smart to back it down and let the crazies crash out and ride a safe race to the finish.
Next up was 25 miles of river....Did I mention fog and freezing rain yet? Yep goggles were iced over and I basically rode at 70mph down the whole river while scrapping ice from my goggle lenses the whole time. After I got off the river I got into some single track sections with huge drifts where a Polaris Rush was stuck in the drift, no way was I going to lift big blue out of a snow drift in the rain so I just put the hammer down and plowed through it. Shortly after I saw an ambulance, come to find out a Ski-Doo pilot smacked some rail road tracks and got slammed onto the blacktop. So far the day was not going well from my eyes, people crashed out, hurt, stuck, freezing rain and fog. I took my time and rode it out to the first fuel stop. Just before the first fuel stop I came across Re Wadena (Factory Yamaha Pro) and he was broke down in the middle of a field. Come to find out he also had issues over the rail road tracks and crashed and then had sled issues.
Leg 2 of the race. Right after I fueled up we headed south down a field for about a 10 mile stretch....The light was so flat, and my goggles were so froze up I literally had no idea where I was supposed to go. I rode about 20 yards behind a guy on a cat and we kept looking at each other trying to figure out if we were on the right path. I passed him and basically looked 10 feet in front of the sled and followed the sled tracks from the guys in front of me. I kept the rubber side down and made it to the final fuel stop of the race.
The final leg of the race started out fun. We got on a tight narrow river that was drifted in with about waist high rollers. The torque of my Nyrto was perfect for this section because I was able to hold a rhythm and double through the drifts. After we got out of the river section we were put onto a gravel road for about 2 miles. When I say gravel I mean gravel with no snow. At the end of the road was a burnt down Polaris. Its amazing how many drivers don't use their heads and drive down the gravel road at 100 mph for 2 miles and think their sled will not over heat. After the long gravel road we got into a swamp full of stumps. Here Justin Tate on his Ski-Doo ripped this whole front right sled off, both a-arms, shock, ski and all. I drove through this section at maybe 5 mph knowing I was about 10 miles from finishing the race. Also by now the fog really set in and it was very very hard to see. I am thinking maybe 20 feet in front of you was a pure white out of fog, rain and snow.
Coming around the final two corners and seeing the finish line I knew that I was only 1 of 3 Yamaha's to finish the long race and was proud that I did it. Soaking wet, cold, and tired I was glad the race was over. To find out at the end of the day that only 37 of the 103 original racers finished the 500 mile race I was glad that I was one of the 37.
I could not have done it without all of the great people behind me helping me out. First off I have to thank my dad for everything he has done. My sponsors Yamaha Racing, Totallyamaha.com, Port Yamaha, Cor Powersports, Studboy, Curve Ski's, Arcticfx, HMK, Castle, Rox Speedfx, Muffin Works, Scott Goggles, and Fly Racing. Without all of you I would never have been able to finish my second I-500.
Thank you everyone for your support!
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Cor146
VIP Member
Great job Korey!! You represented the team well as well as our sponsors, wish I could have been there to make it 4 sleds to finish!!
Congrats. What you have accomplished is no small feat.
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