Your biggest splat

[NOS-PRO]

Steiner.....that could have really ended up bad.... But the way you described it, I was generous and gave you a 9.5 on the scorecard

That sounds almost like my son's incident. The very first ride with my Viper in Dec. 2013....we were on the river by us. My friend who had an Apex gets his game on and my son being 2nd took full advantage of trying to catch him with the Nytro which was picked. I tried to catch up but with out studs....it wasn't going to happen. Up ahead was open water and hoped he saw that before it was too late......NOPE... My son crossed the open water and when he came up to the edge of ice, the sled caught and flipped him and the sled landing on it's left side. He got up and fell back down cause he was in pain. Lots of bruises and hurt pride.....but I was so happy to see he was ok. The Nytro (just cleaned it up night before last) you can see where the panel paint was cracked and was pushed in.....but material things can be replaced.....we can't

 

[4StrokeAddict]

Glad he is OK! You must have been one scared dad especially if you had to watch that.

 

[steiner]

Steiner.....that could have really ended up bad.... But the way you described it, I was generous and gave you a 9.5 on the scorecard

Thanks.
Found the picture of the ditch , the ruts and my tracks. It was quite the Super Slider Snow Skate ride.

 

[steiner]

That sounds almost like my son's incident. The very first ride with my Viper in Dec. 2013....we were on the river by us. My friend who had an Apex gets his game on and my son being 2nd took full advantage of trying to catch him with the Nytro which was picked. I tried to catch up but with out studs....it wasn't going to happen. Up ahead was open water and hoped he saw that before it was too late......NOPE... My son crossed the open water and when he came up to the edge of ice, the sled caught and flipped him and the sled landing on it's left side. He got up and fell back down cause he was in pain. Lots of bruises and hurt pride.....but I was so happy to see he was ok. The Nytro (just cleaned it up night before last) you can see where the panel paint was cracked and was pushed in.....but material things can be replaced.....we can't

Glad to hear that he was ok. Scary bad thots can race thru your mind when you know what could happen.

Accidents. One of my worst fears when taking my son out on a ride. I spent lots of time with him in the fields and ditch trails near home before I took him out to the real trails in the Whiteshell.
He did very well until one night. Four of us, 2 dads and sons had just stopped for a road crossing. We crossed safely and where back onto the trail system. It was a long straight chute to an open field so I took some liberty on the flipper and had some high speed fun as I knew the other dad was following the boys. Down the chute and about halfway across the field I got this lonely feeling. Looked behind me and there were no lights. Hmmm. They don't drive that slow so I spun around and waited a long 30 secs. Still no lights! Well then the Dad Mode kicked in and I race back down the trail wondering what had happened to my son. As a million thots race thru my head I come upon them and sure enough they had stopped because of my son. He blew a belt. Wow what a relief it was only a belt, not a crash.

 

[NOS-PRO]

Glad he is OK! You must have been one scared dad especially if you had to watch that.

That is the hardest ...knowing there was open water ahead, seeing him trying to chase down my friend who has ridden/rode the river his whole life (parents still live there, that's where we unloaded), but seeing my son full bore with me not being able to catch him.....yup, a lot of what if's, what the outcome will be and who we going to call if something happened.... very scared father. Glad he was ok.

Glad to hear that he was ok. Scary bad thoughts can race thru your mind when you know what could happen.

Accidents. One of my worst fears when taking my son out on a ride. I spent lots of time with him in the fields and ditch trails near home before I took him out to the real trails in the Whiteshell.
He did very well until one night. Four of us, 2 dads and sons had just stopped for a road crossing. We crossed safely and where back onto the trail system. It was a long straight chute to an open field so I took some liberty on the flipper and had some high speed fun as I knew the other dad was following the boys. Down the chute and about halfway across the field I got this lonely feeling. Looked behind me and there were no lights. Hmmm. They don't drive that slow so I spun around and waited a long 30 secs. Still no lights! Well then the Dad Mode kicked in and I race back down the trail wondering what had happened to my son. As a million thots race thru my head I come upon them and sure enough they had stopped because of my son. He blew a belt. Wow what a relief it was only a belt, not a crash.

Whew.....that is a relief knowing that it was just a belt....
Funny thing is my son and I had many talks before he drove a sled about "what can happen". The 1st couple of times when he would ride the sled, he would get on it hard and spin the track. I kept telling him "It's not if it's going to happen, it's when". He would just roll his eyes at me. After his wipeout, he knows now why I said it.

That picture looks nasty steiner.....i wouldn't want to hit that at 60 .....

 

[guardrail]

A couple of years ago I was riding with two of my friends. I was the middle sled. We were spread out pretty good, probably about 100 feet or so between us. All I remember was coming out of a corner and getting on the gas, then next thing I know, I was flat on my back looking up at the sky, with the wind knocked out of me. My sled was about 50 yards in front of me idling. Turns out a deer must have been spooked by something, and was running through the woods and tried to jump over me. Took me right off the sled, busted my gauges, windshield and broke the shield on my helmet. It must have knocked me out for a couple of seconds, because I still don't remember the actual impact. My buddy behind me caught the end of the whole incident. He saw the deer on top of me trying to keep running and kicking me in the process. I ended up with 2 cracked ribs and a headache for a couple of days. I guess something like this was bound to happen sooner or later. I have 14k miles on this sled and about the same on my last sled. I've had a lot of close calls with deer before, I guess my luck finally ran out.

 

[Cubby]

I have 2.

First one I was cruising the trail around 80 kms when all of a sudden there was a huge snow drift. I slowed down but the sled became airborne. I fell off backwards like a starfish - arms and legs straight out to slow me down. My neighbour was riding behind me and said the sled flew in the air and landed perfectly 20 ft down the trail. It just idled there waiting for me. I only sprained my thumb. I installed a tether right after that.

Second time i was cruising at 60 kms down a trail when the lower balljoint bolt on my right ski broke. The ski spun around and the sled flipped on the left side (have it on video!). Luckily no damage to me or the sled. I never did find out why or how the bolt broke but I replaced all the bolts just in case and carry the old ones as spares .

I am older and wiser now.

 

[cannondale27]

Wow really makes ya think. All close calls that could have been much worse.

Been a few but one I remember best. Was just dark. Had been riding all day. Guy leading our group of 4 is the type who insists on leading all the time. Never takes turns. Anyway he was going slow in a real nice section for quite awhile. Guy in back of me kept coming too close for my taste and I decided to pass. I still believe he sped up but anyway I really couldn't see trail right until I got in front of his lights. When I did all I saw was black. Huge hill down. I braked hard even dragging my feet. Launched off sideways I still landed almost 3/4 of the way down. Hit so hard Sideways I could not hold on. Ejected me but my right foot got caught in stirrup. Still remember getting dragged and tossed around like rag doll. Sled only rolled once I believe. The hard sideways landing actually derailed the track. Windshield gone and helmet visor ripped off. Ride home really sucked. Don't know how I didn't break ankle at least. NosPro knows the guy I decided to pass. Similar thing happened another time with NosPro behind me but the launch and landing were successful! When guys say you look like ET on th flying bike in front of moon you maybe are a bit too high! I don't ride at night like that anymore. Too many surprises.

 

[jamieren]

Really 'nice' stories guys. Having a non-grievous and non-wrecking incident is just what a guy needs to keep his mind on safety. Personally, I think I'm going to put a sticker on the inside of the windshield where I have to look at it every time I ride "don't be stupid!".

 

[cannondale27]

Really 'nice' stories guys. Having a non-grievous and non-wrecking incident is just what a guy needs to keep his mind on safety. Personally, I think I'm going to put a sticker on the inside of the windshield where I have to look at it every time I ride "don't be stupid!".

So true! Ever notice most bad things happen right when you are just thinking MAN THIS IS FUN! That should be first warning sign.

 

[yamahaguy]

You never know when your buddies will have a camera rolling!

 

[steiner]

In my 2nd season of sledding a buddy of mine and I headed out to his cabin one night by sled. Was about 50 miles of ditch trails and the last 80 miles are in the bush trails.
Being fairly new to the sport of sledding and sledding at night I was a taillight diver. Where ever the red light would go I would go.
About 25 miles into the ride out we stop and chat for a bit and continue on. A couple of minutes later my visor starts to fog up. Looked down to see if I forgot to plug it in and yup, I did forget to plug it in again.
Stopped as it was a two handed procedure and took off again. My buddy did not notice me stop and fumble around with the cords had continued on his fast pace.
My precious taillight that I was following was gone and I felt a great need to find it again. So off I went full flipper down on my 97 700sx to catch the 06 Apex taillight. Things were going rather smooth as the trail in the ditch was well maintained. The mile road intersections were gently swooped up and down allowing for one to carry good speeds over them. So, in my infinite wisdom I decided not to slow down where he would slow down. This meant not slowing down as much for the intersections. As a couple of miles pass, things are going extremely well and I could barely see that taillight out in the distance. With the next intersection was coming up and I let off just a little as I take the gentle swoop up to go over the road and then I saw it. A giant 3 foot snow bank left by a grader was dead ahead and the groomed trail that I supposed to take took a sharp left to go back down into the ditch .. There was no time to turn or grab some brake. I readied myself for the flight of my life. Off I went into the dark sky. While airborne I had some free time so I decided to count. Why?? I don't know but I did. "1 one thousand, 2 one thousand , 3 one thousand". After the 3rd one thousand I knew this was not going to be a great meeting between me, my sled and the bottom of the ditch. Pushed myself far back onto the seat and prayed for a graceful impact. Landed hard on the skis. The the rest of me caught up to the landing with my visor just kissing the top of the windshield. The impact jarred my wrists to my shoulders. "Dang, that hurt". After a few moments I gathered myself together and inspected the sled for obvious damage which none could be seen. Off I went again to chase that stupid little taillight but at a much safer/slower speed over them intersections. My buddy did stop and wait for me and to talk about his near miss with a snow bank. Told him that I had no problem with that snow bank. I hit that sucker straight on.

 

[4StrokeAddict]

My buddy did stop and wait for me and to talk about his near miss with a snow bank. Told him that I had no problem with that snow bank. I hit that sucker straight on.

 

[NOS-PRO]

Wow really makes ya think. All close calls that could have been much worse.

Been a few but one I remember best. Was just dark. Had been riding all day. Guy leading our group of 4 is the type who insists on leading all the time. Never takes turns. Anyway he was going slow in a real nice section for quite awhile. Guy in back of me kept coming too close for my taste and I decided to pass. I still believe he sped up but anyway I really couldn't see trail right until I got in front of his lights. When I did all I saw was black. Huge hill down. I braked hard even dragging my feet. Launched off sideways I still landed almost 3/4 of the way down. Hit so hard Sideways I could not hold on. Ejected me but my right foot got caught in stirrup. Still remember getting dragged and tossed around like rag doll. Sled only rolled once I believe. The hard sideways landing actually derailed the track. Windshield gone and helmet visor ripped off. Ride home really sucked. Don't know how I didn't break ankle at least. NosPro knows the guy I decided to pass. Similar thing happened another time with NosPro behind me but the launch and landing were successful! When guys say you look like ET on th flying bike in front of moon you maybe are a bit too high! I don't ride at night like that anymore. Too many surprises.

I know exactly who that 1 person is.....

Yup, you were definitley ET that night. Bad part was either the snow dust or lack of signs didn't tell you about the huge hill coming up.

 

[steiner]

I know exactly who that 1 person is.....

Yup, you were definitley ET that night. Bad part was either the snow dust or lack of signs didn't tell you about the huge hill coming up.

LOL. I felt more like one of the Wright brothers on their first flight into the unknown. My previous attempts for flight where 20yrs ago on a Sno Jet. I think atleast one ski had left the ground once
Headlight did not shine upon my impending meeting with the snow bank until it was far too late.
For some reason the groomer operator decided to cut the trail back down into the ditch about 10 feet to the left instead of going straight across and then down.