Snowmobile Racing

For those of you that aren't familiar with snowmobile racing, it may suprise you that they do in fact race them, and they also do it in the middle of summer! I'll admit that it is weird seeing a snowmobile being operated without snow, but it's fairly popular in the northern states, and these are drag races. 600 feet in about 6 seconds or so.. snow is not required when you're running the snowmobile for such a short period of time. They have semi-professional races and professional races. The payouts are generally not that big unless you're racing in the pro circuits. Well, my father has been doing this for a while and has done well enough that Yamaha Corporation gave him a snowmobile to race! Here is a picture of it in action:





You can see a bigger picture of it on Yamaha's website here


My dad does all the technical work and testing for the snowmobile and has one of his friends do the driving. This sport is similar to horse racing. Every pound counts and they find the smallest person that can handle the snowmobile to put in the drivers seat. They were entered in a couple of classes this year and managed to win one class. Not too bad for their first year on the pro circuit. My dad also didn't get the snowmobile from Yamaha until the last minute. He was going to quit racing all together due to the overwhelming costs involved unless Yamaha gave him a snowmobile to race. They waited until the last minute to make sure he was serious. You don't just give a $9,000 snowmobile (before setting it up for racing) to every Joe who says they are going to quit racing, even if they've been very successful on the semi-pro circuit. I don't necessarily blame them for that, but it would've been nicer to get things tested and set up correctly before the season started.