2026 RIDE WITH THE CHAMPS story

[400brian]

The 2026 Ride with the Champs represents the 20th consecutive year I have attended the event. 20 years have brought a lot of changes. The group of Deere collectors and enthusiasts that became acquainted on JDSleds.com, and attended the induction of Robert Carlson back in 2007, have gone through all the life changes, trials, and tribulations that 20 years in mid-life brings.

2026 has us looking back to 1976, celebrating the 50th anniversary of Brian Nelson winning the Winnipeg to St Paul I-500 race on a Liquidator. It seems that this kind of snuck up on us, as the announcement that the 2026 RWTC would be a celebration of that win came later than I was expecting.

Nevertheless, I knew the Deere crew would rise to the challenge, and make this a memorable event. I personally committed myself to finishing the 78 Liquifire custom I have been working on for the last few years, in order to ride it on Friday’s Tribute Ride.

In true snowmobile project fashion, the work expanded to consume all of the time available. The sled came off the lift on Friday the 13th, and I drove it across a small patch of snow we had left to load it onto the trailer. I also drove on the Wife’s 76 Cyclone, and my 73 and 74 JDX8s.

We arrived at the Whitetail Lodge at 5:30 pm on Sunday the 15th. We had seen very little snow until we got to Wausau, and really no rideable snow until we got to Hazelhurst. Driving across the bridge in Minocqua, we could see standing water along the line of orange barrels marking the snowmobile route across the lake. Not very encouraging.

Shortly after arriving, I got a text from Wade Bennett asking if we wanted to meet them at Knockers for supper, which sounded good to us. So we spent the evening visiting with Wade, Mindy, Brock Weber, and Mark Elliot. They had been riding up in the UP the previous week, so we got caught up on the adventures.

Monday February 16th High 49 Low 24

Katy and I decided the best course of action would be to get outside early, and get a little riding in before the forecast 40+ degree temps. Monday morning found us out at the trailer at 7:30 am getting the sleds out of the trailer. The Cyclone is always hard starting after trailering it, but after shooting a bit of gas down each hole, it started and we got it and the Liquifire out and on the snow.

We headed west along 70, then crossed it heading south. There were a lot of bare spots in the trail with sand and gravel showing through to try to avoid. The purpose here was to see if the Liquifire was ready for primetime. It was smoking more than I thought it should at idle, and had poor throttle response on the low end. Once you got it spooled up it ran like a scalded cat, but Katy insisted on riding at 20 mph, which was not working out well for my ride. A couple miles south of 70 it was becoming apparent that the sled was becoming less responsive the further we went, so I turned around and headed back. We were just about back to the motel, when the sled died right across the road from the Shell Station.

Lifting the hood, I observed fuel lines that seemed to be pretty much dry. I felt of the fuel filter, fuel lines, and fuel pump, assessing the probability that I was suffering from vapor lock. Nothing was really warm at all, so I turned the key, the starter spun the engine, it fired up and I watched the fuel lines refill and the engine stay running! I was a bit surprised by this, but I latched the hood back down and ran the sled back into the parking lot and then back into the trailer. It appeared we had put on about 6 miles.

I fired up the trusty 73 JDX8, drove it off the trailer, gave it a splash of gas and headed east over to the SHOF Museum. The trail along 70 here was very poor in spots, there was snow in the ditches, but the trail was pretty much a brown ribbon. There was no one at the Museum, so I took a couple photos at the sign and we headed back to the motel. At 10:00 am, the temp had already climbed to 42 degrees, so we put the sleds back on the trailer and took the truck into town for breakfast.

We found the Wolfpack Cafe’ closed and for sale, so that took it out of consideration. We went a bit further down the street to the other little restaurant that we had never eaten at before, and had some pancakes and eggs.

We spent the afternoon hanging out at the motel. My friend Randy Gerstner arrived at the Rustic Inn just down the road around 3:30, and at 5:00 pm he joined Katy and I and the crew from Sunday night at Blink Bonnie’s for supper.

[nick80lf]

[400brian]

Tuesday February 17 High of 44 Low of 18

Tuesday was dark and gloomy. The plan for the day was to get the Liquifire and Cyclone into the motel garage for a little work. A look out of the window revealed that the Rainville’s had arrived. It was pretty quiet in the motel lobby, Joe finally staggered out around 11:00 am.
I shot Randy a text and let him know what we were doing, then I dragged myself out and fired up the LF, and drove it into the garage.

Joe backed his truck up to the garage and unloaded his lift, we slid it under the LF and got it up in the air. The carbs on the sled had been rebuilt with “by the book” jetting. Looking at the plugs didn’t tell me much, but they were not coal black, which is what I was expecting. Based on the performance I was seeing, it was decided to open the airscrews ½ turn, and lower the needles one notch, in an effort to lean the bottom end a bit.

The next thing to do was center the track a little bit, and that was quickly taken care of. On start up, the smoking issue seemed largely resolved.

Next I brought the Cyclone in and got it on the lift. Last year when it was quite cold, I had put in a slightly larger main jet. With the much warmer temps this year I thought I would put it back to the book recommended size. So the 380 came out and the 370 went back in. The track seemed way too loose, so I went to work on getting it tightened up.
I looked at my watch and realized it was after 2:00. We piled into Joe’s truck and went down the road to Sister’s Saloon for a Burger.

Coming out of Sister’s we found it was raining, and the hardpack was turning to slush. We drove down to the Museum to take care of a little business, Randy got a chance to look around, I took a few pictures, and paid for the activities I would be participating in on Friday and Saturday.

Wade Bennett’s recently restored Dator was on display. It was the first time I had seen it in person, and it was resplendent in its fresh paint and decals!

Back in the garage I was by myself. I finished up the track re-tension on the Cyclone, then put it back into the trailer. Rainville wanted to ride my 78, I told him NO! Which prompted him to get on it and start riding around the parking lot in the slush.

I had gotten a text from the Clarks that they had arrived, so at 6:00 pm I think 12 of us gathered at Fibber’s for supper. Jason Peterson didn’t get to come out this year because of a family emergency, and he was missed.

[400brian]

Wednesday February 18th High of 33 Low of 29

They had been promising us that the rain was going to turn to snow overnight. What we had been seeing before we went to bed Tuesday night was it switching back and forth between the two. When I got up on Wednesday I was surprised to see fresh snow on the ground. Heading down to the lobby I walked out the door to assess what we had. It was very dense wet snow, maybe three or four inches, but it was compacting itself as once again it was misting as much as it was snowing.

We headed into town to visit the hardware store for a couple of small items. Back at the motel, Joe, Randy, and Tod Meyer decided to do a trail check on modern sleds. David Clark had taken a photo of the Bennett’s, Brock, Mark Elliot, and one other heading out across Big St Lake early that morning.

Katy and I called around and got a card game organized in the motel lobby. David, Andrew, and Matt Clark, and Kenny Waters came over and we spent the afternoon playing Swipe. This also gave us the opportunity to see who all was arriving.

The guys finally got back from their ride about dark. They had been up to Stillwater's, and Joe’s low mileage Skime Cat had dumped all its coolant out on the lake, and had to be towed back. The bunch of us headed over to Blink Bonnie’s around 7:00 for supper.

Before we retired for the night, Joe and I studied the trail map in the motel lobby. We were assuming the trail conditions would still be marginal on Thursday, but they had ridden across the lakes and found them to be fine. We had planned to ride to Boulder Junction for the Bogie Bash, but everything considered we decided to take a round about ride up to Stillwaters.

[400brian]

Thursday February 19 High of 30 Low of 28

We woke up on Thursday to find fresh snow on the ground once again! Conditions were far better than we dared to hope for or ever imagine while it was raining on Tuesday! It was going to be a good day!

We went out and got the Cyclone and 73 JDX8 off the trailer, and got the tanks topped off. Things were going so well that I tossed an empty fuel can in the truck and ran down to the Shell Station to fill it so I would be all set to go the next day.

Sleds started arriving..and arriving, until I believe we had 21 sleds in the parking lot. We got organized, got Cari and Richard out of the motel, got everyone fired up and did a parade lap around the parking lot, when I remembered we should call Stillwater’s and tell them we were coming. Joe went in to ask Kay to call up there, we made a couple more laps around the parking lot, and after cooling our heels for an eternity, Joe emerged and I led the group out and to the west along hwy 70.

As I stopped to gather the group up to cross 70 heading south, Joe comes up and wants to know where in the hell I am going? I told him, he says “you are drunk”, so I pulled out the map and showed him where I was going, he conceded the point, and we continued.

This is the same trail Katy and I rode on Monday, and with the fresh snow it is much improved! I am going to take the first right hand turn we come to. As I stop to gather everyone up, a Trailfire dies in the line. With the hood up, it becomes apparent that the fuel line is dry. They re-prime it and it starts and runs for the rest of the trip. I have no explanation for that.

We are now heading north. We re-cross hwy 70 working our way north, and then to the east. We have run this trail a few times in the past, and we came into Sayner exactly where I expected to. We regroup at the Sayner gas station, where Mike Carlson decided to change the fuel filter on his LF. James Lalk took the old filter and blew it out backward. A gob of brown goo dropped out of it, it looked like the problem had been identified!

Joe takes us north out onto Plum Lake. The section between Plum and Star Lakes is horrendous as normal. We drop down onto Star and head for Stillwater’s. Both lakes are pretty decent, fairly smooth, and while we are putting some dust in the air it isn’t blinding. It was a totally flat light day, so you can’t see any bumps, but it is fun to run a group across in a tight formation like that.

Once we are across Star Lake we arrive at Stillwater’s and lunch! We got the sleds lined up and took a few photos. You can’t see all of us as there are two rows. The staff had gotten the call that we were coming, and it sounded like they appreciated the heads up. The food was good.

Once we were done with lunch and got everyone through the rest room, we geared up and headed outside to look at the sleds. Andrew had a rattle coming from the secondary on his 800. Closer inspection revealed he had a bearing flange bolt that had backed out and was running against the belt sheave. I had a half inch wrench, and by putting pressure on the head with a screwdriver, he was able to get the beat up threads to start and tighten back up. Crisis averted!

All the sleds re-started, and we were off once again. From Sayner we took a little different route back, running across Big St Lake and then over to the Museum where Luke was displaying parts. By my odometer we travelled 37 miles on the Bogie Bash, and I believe the count was 9 bogie sleds that took part.

There was a good sized crowd standing around the tables talking with Luke in the upper floor at the Museum, so I pulled up a chair and chatted with Dan Dykstra among others. Eventually I took Katy and Randy back to the motel, put my sled back in the trailer, changed out of the riding gear, and drove the truck back over to the Museum. I chatted with Luke while he was packing up, and got the parts order he had brought out for me.

A bunch of us went up to Fibber’s for supper to wind up the day. Considering what we were looking at on Tuesday, things turned out great from where I was standing, the trails were snow covered and pretty decent. It was a good day!

[400brian]

Friday, February 20 High of 30 Low of 22

We awoke on Friday morning to fresh snow on the ground, and light snow falling. It was glorious!

For the Deere collectors, today was the big day. I was so happy to see the snow conditions improved to such a degree as we were seeing, and allowing the event to proceed pretty much as planned.

We went out and unloaded the 78 LF and Katy’s Cyclone. I was not very confident that the LF was ready for prime time, and if it wasn’t, it would be on the rope of shame soon enough. We topped off the gas, Randy Gerstner arrived on his 800, and we headed to the east towards the SHOF.

Interestingly, it was apparent that snow had been hauled in to cover the worst of the dirt and thin spots we had seen on Monday, it seemed that the local club was helping us out here. It substantially improved things.

When we arrived, we had to look for a parking spot. In 20 years, I have never seen so many sleds out in front of the SHOF! I had advised a number of folks not to try to bring a trailer into the SHOF on Friday, to park elsewhere and ride in. That turned out to be prescient.

The first person I encountered after parking the sled was Chuck Moser and buddy Dan. Chuck had Jon Carlson’s 80 LF racer ( #58 ) sitting there , and after pleasantries were exchanged, he asked if I had tools to change Mikuni jets with me? I don’t have a huge amount of tools with me, but I did have a jet tool and a small crescent wrench in my kit. Chuck had found the sled running too rich on the way in and wanted to drop a size. I dug out the tools, Dan and I held stuff, and Chuck successfully swapped the jets without dropping anything in the snow! The sled fired right up and sounded good. Chuck declared victory, and I moved on to mix and mingle.

Looking through my phone, I found I failed to take photos of all the sleds in the parking lot. I was certain I had, but apparently I did not. I did get a decent shot of Brian Nelson beside the Dator he would be riding, along with the owner of the sled, Tom Rehberg, and ETD member Tom Otte.

All the riders had to sign a waiver and pay the entrance fee, to get a card to hang around their neck to get lunch at the Whitetail Inn at the conclusion of the ride. Once I had that done, I found a chair on the porch of the SHOF to relax in while we waited to depart. We had no idea of how this was going to be run, so I was not eager to be the first one out of the gate. All the action would be back in the pack, and a number of us thought that would be entertaining to watch.

Some instructions were given out in the parking lot, but honestly I couldn’t hear a word of it. Sometime after 9:30 a good sized group departed, so I got up and prepared to head out. The word was 100+ people had signed up, but I don’t know how many sleds actually participated.

We have learned a few things in the last 20 years. One is that the larger the group you have, the more difficult it is to keep them together. Just the road crossings will split everyone up. I was pretty confident that small groups would form, and outside of that, you would see few others on the ride.

We got in line to depart. I was leading Katy, Randy, and Cari Rainville out. We headed west along hwy 70, which meant several crossings of the highway before we went past our motel. As I said, that started spreading the group out immediately. We took the first turn north and headed into the woods with a good sized group. I had no idea what the exact route was. Andrew Clark had downloaded a map of the route onto his phone that he had shown me in the parking lot, honestly it resembled a maze. I knew where we were having lunch, and was confident we could find our way back to it.

As expected, sleds started dropping out almost immediately. A short way into the ride the entire line came to a halt. The head of the line was around a corner and out of sight. Joe and Richard came up behind us on the Dator. After some discussion, Joe got on the Sprintfire and rode forward to see what was going on. A minute later, Doug Oster pulled into the empty spot. He was wondering where he could get gas?

A short time later Joe returned, and said; “just go”. I pulled out and took off. We had now added Joe, Doug Oster, Kenny Waters, and Tod Meyer to the gaggle. As I had no idea of the route, I just followed the fresh tracks in the trail.

I was enjoying the ride provided by the cross country suspension and 2” thicker seat, but as time went by I could detect the fuel delivery issue I had seen on Monday rearing its ugly head. I loosened the fuel cap, and at first thought that had helped, but no, the issue continued to randomly come and go. We crossed hwy 70 heading south at some point. You have to understand the trails in this area are a maze that snake around, and it is difficult to maintain a sense of where you are.

Eventually the 78 began to run so poorly that I decided to stop and change the fuel filter to see if it would help. There was some visible trash in the filter, but I didn't think it was enough to restrict the flow. The sled fired back up and the lines filled, so we continued on. At first the sled seemed improved, but it didn’t last long.

We passed a sign indicating that we had entered Oneida county. I had to think about this a moment, then remembered that the Vilas county line wasn’t all that far south of hwy 70. Then I saw a sign indicating Buffalo Lake. There are a number of lakes on the south side of 70. I have fished one of them, and I have driven around the area in the summer, but I do not know it like the back of my hand.

We eventually pop out under a powerline that runs northeast . We have ridden this before, but I have no idea where along it we are. Now, as we are riding along, we have seen Deere sleds crossing trails, coming directly at us, it is mayhem. We came upon a group with a hood up, so we stopped to check in. It turned out to be the group Brad Wheelock was with. First off they needed a knife to cut a fuel line, so I handed them mine. Once that was taken care of, Brad confirmed that we were close to the turn into St Germain.

We continued on. I believe we stopped and looked at a turn off that would have taken us across Pickerel Lake and then directly to the Motel, but there were no signs indicating where it led, so we continued on to the next intersection that took us right into St Germain near the Thunderbird Bar. We stopped so Doug could get gas, and we picked up Joe Borris ( the guy from Florida ) on his Spitfire here.

Once Doug rejoined us, we continued through town and then west. As we passed the SHOF, I saw the #58 LF sitting just inside the parking lot as if it had been towed in. I later learned that it had made the ride, but Chuck had run it out of gas right there where it sat.

As we came to the Motel, Katy and I peeled off and put the sleds in the trailer. We went to the room and changed out of our gear, I grabbed my JD snowmobile book, and we took the truck over to get lunch.

[AirborneX4Special]

[400brian]

Grrr.

[400brian]

By the time Katy and I got over to the Whitetail Inn for lunch, the bulk of the riders had been fed. In fact, we stood at the buffet for a minute waiting for burgers to be brought out. We grabbed a table in the bar to eat, and Craig Marchbank stopped by for a moment to chat with us, and ask how things were going.

Dick Teal was the speaker after lunch. We had met Dick back in 2007 at RJ Carlson’s induction, the event that started all this for many of us. We are all 20 years older now. Dick is still quite sharp, and we learned a few details that we didn’t know. He says that he regrets taking the counsel of people who advised him against pushing the IFS design into production. The argument against it was that it would force buyers into buying larger trailers to haul the wider machines. Looking back now, Dick says it is pretty obvious that the market was ready for IFS, and that Deere could have led in that market.

Dick couldn’t answer a few of the questions asked with any new insight, because he didn’t come to work for Deere at Horicon until April of 1974, and his initial assignment there was to fix the problems they were having with clutching. After the presentation, several of us had Dick autograph our JD books. Later that evening I added Tom Otte and Brian Nelson's John Hancock.

Katy and I headed back to the motel to rest up for the fish fry that would also be held at the Whitetail in a few hours.

The Fish Fry was well attended. Remember that the Deere Crew began this tradition in 2007 when a meet and greet was held at the Museum the night before the RWTC. And then in earnest in 2008 when a dozen or so of us went to the 19th Hole for supper. It grew every year after, until it became an official SHOF event.

The food was good, and the speakers for the evening was a panel including Enduro Team Deere members; Tom Otte, Craig Knudsen, Doug Oster, Brian Nelson, and Willie Anseeuw.

At the end of the day, I felt that the Reunion Ride as an event had lived up to the hype.

Back at the motel, I found myself out in the garage. JR’s Dator’s chaincase adjuster had backed off, and the chain had taken to jumping gear teeth. He claimed it had just started doing it. However, on disassembly a fair amount of metal was found in the bottom of the case. After a casual inspection, it appeared that most of the metal came from the chain rather than the gears. The chain was cleaned up, the case wiped out, the chain reinstalled and adjusted, the cover installed and case filled with lubricant. There is a shield between the chain case and the exhaust, which makes access to the chain case or adjuster pretty difficult when everything is assembled.

[400brian]

Saturday, February 21 High of 22 Low of 16

Saturday began early. I was out in the parking lot around 6:30 am. The first thing I realized was that until Rainville pulled out with his truck and trailer, I couldn’t get anything out of my trailer. So, I tossed my fuel cans in the truck and ran down to the Shell Station for fuel. At 6:53 AM, while I was filling my cans, my phone rang. It was our support driver’s wife calling to let me know their truck was stuck in the driveway at their cabin up near Bent’s Camp. OK, this was not good news.

Back at the motel, Rainville had the truck running and was preparing to head over to the Whitetail Inn. I told him what was going on, and as soon as he had pulled ahead, I got the Cyclone out, topped off the tank, then tossed the fuel cans in the back of his truck.

At 7:27 AM I was getting my tool kit into the Cyclone and preparing to leave when my phone rang again. They had gotten their truck unstuck by figuring out how to shut the traction control off, and were heading our way. Good News! I fired up the sled and beat it over to Breakfast. I bypassed the signup line and headed directly to the breakfast buffet. By the time I was finished the line had thinned out and I was able to go directly to Jamie and sign my waiver. They were out of bibs, so I didn’t have to wear one! I took a photo of our sign up sheet, we had a good sized group this year.

They cut us loose after the group photo, and we headed to our sleds. We got everyone lined up out on the trail, and eventually departed with 17 riders. There really was no trail broken in the ditch alongside C, so we ran down the hwy a bit and ran north across Big St Lake, came off near Fibber’s, then turned onto the trail and made tracks towards Sayner.

The trail was pretty decent, and we pulled into Sayner without incident. We were polling everyone to see if everybody was in good shape to put the hammer down and run across the two lakes to our north, when my phone chimed. 9:09 am, it was Jamie asking us to hold up at Sayner, Mark Resch was trailering a sled and rider up to join us. OK, this has never happened before. Mark pulled in around 9:30 with Joe Borris and his Spitfire. Now we were up to 18.

We ran across Plum Lake, gathered everyone up and were riding through the ungroomed rollers heading for Star Lake when Rainville’s Dator died. It showed good spark and it had fuel, but it did not run! Duane Gjerseth came up with his modern Polaris and took him in tow. I had to take the point now, and took the group across Star Lake and pulled into Stillwater’s. Duane had just gotten the Dator pulled in when the owner came out and told us that we were early but he would accommodate us. We felt bad that we had to tell him we were just waiting for a trailer. The trailer was a few minutes out, so a number of the guys went in to use the restroom or get a beverage.

Gary, our support driver, rolled in a short time later. I stuck my head inside the door and invited Rainville to get outside and get his sled loaded up. So once again the Sprintfire came off the trailer. The Dator was pulled up to the ramp and I invited the onlookers that were under 60 to go ahead and push the thing on, as I was not going to touch it. There was some concern that there weren’t enough under 60 to get it done, but they got it on and we shut the doors. Joe thought I should lead, so I led the group north on trail 7.

Often, 7N is rough. But on this day it isn’t half bad, and we cruised north at a nice pace. When we got to the intersection of 8W I stopped to gather everyone up before we made the turn. It soon became apparent we were missing a few. Eventually a couple of the stragglers came in to report that a Sportfire was dead about a half mile back. A few minutes later Duane came in with it under tow. A quick look showed dry fuel lines, so the call was made to tow it into Boulder and put it on the trailer. The rider of the Sportfire was Dirks Mclaughlin, and I believe someone said he was in the 8th grade. He was riding with us along with his father Doug.

Joe took the lead heading west on 8. This trail is a gravel road in the summer. As such it is wide and straight, and usually smooth. A few hundred yards down the trail we hit two of the biggest whoopdies I have ever seen. I swear they were 3 feet deep! I felt like I had broken my back on the first one, and the second was like a cherry on top. I shook it off and kept going, but it hurt and I was not happy. I found out later that Andrew Clark came right off his 800 along with the seat, and Randy Gerstner dinged his knee on the edge of the hood of his 800 on the landing. I assume everyone behind them saw the carnage in time to avoid them.

The 10 miles into Boulder Junction was rougher than we liked, but we pulled into town without further incident. Our trailer was waiting for us at the gas station, so I fueled the Cyclone then headed inside to hit the head and purchase some ibuprofen. Once the Sportfire was loaded and everyone was squared away, we continued west on 8. The trail west of Boulder was actually pretty decent, so we spooled the sleds up and pounded it out. We pulled into the Rustic Roadhaus just south of Manitowish Waters around 1:00 pm. Jamie had called and told them we were coming, so they were ready for us.

[400brian]

I guess we spent about an hour at lunch ( which really hit the spot! ), but now we needed to push a bit as time was getting short. We got the sleds fueled and headed east. The gas station next door to our lunch spot was unexpectedly closed, so it was good we had fuel on the truck.

We were back in Boulder at 3:30 pm with everyone seemingly running well. One of the riders inquired if a half tank was going to get him back? I had premix left in my can so I told him to top off. It is a long time til boating season and it would just be sitting around in the can back at home.

Once we were back on 8 heading east, Joe dialed it back a bit as everybody is starting to feel a little beat up by now, and this kept us in a tight group. Also, I found out at lunch that when Andrew Clark had come off his 800, the seat had come with him. So he was sitting on a seat that was sliding forward, backward, and side to side. I asked him how he was making this work? Clenching the seat with his butt cheeks or what? JR gave him a bungy cord to help hold it down before we left the Rustic Roadhaus, but it still must have been miserable. I was looking for those two whoopdies we had hit, and it wasn’t hard to pick them out. I should have stopped and taken a photo of them. I swear those must have been left over from last year! Trail 7 south hadn’t degraded too badly, so it was a fairly pleasant run back down to Stillwater’s. Gary was waiting for us at Stillwater’s, but we just waved and cruised through.

The run across the two lakes was uneventful, and we had beat Gary and the trailer into Sayner, so I shot him a text that we were through, then we put the hammer down. When we got out to C, Joe wanted to shoot down the shoulder to save time. I hadn’t been keeping close track of the time, but I agreed. When we pulled into the Whitetail parking lot Gary was waiting. I looked at my phone and it showed it was 5:30 pm.

After getting some things taken care of, I rode over to the motel, made my customary victory lap around the parking lot, then put the sled on the trailer. Joe pulled in with the trailer, I helped get him parked, then we headed in to get changed to head over to the banquet.

The banquet was a sell out, I had to park way out in the back of the parking lot.

And that was a wrap for the 2026 RWTC.

We had a granddaughter’s birthday party Sunday afternoon, so we were on the road fairly early Sunday morning. There were several inches of fresh fluff on the ground that morning, but the road was clear. On I-39 just north of Merrill we saw a police car with its lights on stopped on the left hand side of the road. As we got closer we saw a pickup and clamshell trailer way down in the median, and then an F-150 buried in the snow on the edge of the median. I didn’t quite understand what the issue was, then our truck broke loose and got squirrely! I stomped on the brakes to kick the cruise off, everything straightened out, and we continued on at a reduced speed for a while. There was absolutely nothing visually different about that section of road!

Home by noon in plenty of time for the party.

In hindsight, we could have come up a few days later and stayed a few days into the next week, as conditions were getting nothing but better as we left. Still, it was a great time with friends new and old! Booked the room for next year on the way out. It appears they are sticking with the third week in February next year as well.

[AirborneX4Special]

The Dator was pulled up to the ramp and I invited the onlookers that were under 60 to go ahead and push the thing on, as I was not going to touch it.

Definitely a job for the youngsters.


Thanks again for the writeup Brian. Always fun to read and see the pics.

[jep_800]

Excellent write-up Brian. I am looking forward to next year, without any unforeseen family medical issues, God willing

[nick80lf]

Looking at the photo of the line of sleds on the Friday ride....bet that sure was interesting.

[High Top]

Looks like you guys had a good time, glad there was some fresh snow. I was hoping to possibly join this year but we had booked a ski trip for the same time. I was also hesitant to make the long drive without knowing if my freshly overhauled liquified was trail worthy…… good news to report on that…. We had a February snow and I was finally able to get that thing out on snow and put some miles on to see what it would do. It ran very well and wow when you get that thing on the pipe……..just hang on!!!! Fingers crossed next year we can get at least the liquifire and sportfire up to tag along!