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The final five riders to earn a trip to the prestigious ESPN Winter X Games Snocross, featuring the World Snowmobile Association's (WSA) Pro Open class, were decided in the shadow of the Seven Clans Casino just south of Thief River Fall, Minnesota.
After a full slate of round robin qualifying rounds and a last chance qualifier (LCQ), the 14 pilots who made it to the final were ready, all knowing that only the top five would be heading west in less than a month. The field leapt off the start line and into the track's final corner, with Brad Pitlik (Magna Vehicle Interiors Ski-Doo) pulling a great holeshot, and using the inside line to exit in a lead he would hold to the finish. But, the battle behind him was just beginning.
Johnny Mold (Speedwerx/Chevy Trucks Cat) and Carl Schubitzke (Woody's/Dodge Trucks Polaris) began what turned into a race-long scrap for second. Nick Hutchinson (Forest Hutchinson & Assoc. Cat) and Aaron Scheele (Dimmerman Bros. Cat) got into a serious scrap for fourth, which seemed perhaps to slow them up just a little.
Meanwhile, Semi-Pro Mike Schultz (Bristow's Polaris/Polaris Industries Polaris) who had qualified for the final by virtue of a fourth place finish in the LCQ, began an impressive march toward the front. Schultz finally reached the Scheele-Hutchinson scrap, turning it into an intense, 3-way dice for the final two qualifier spots.
While Pitlik was easing away from Mold, who in turn was keeping Schubitzke at bay, the next three were fighting it out. Suddenly Scheele lost some momentum, Schultz zipped past and opened up just enough of an advantage that Scheele just couldn't reel him back in by the checker.
The Snocross portion of the ESPN Winter X Games will run at Buttermilk Mountain in Aspen, Colorado, January 16-18, 2002.
The actual television coverage of the X Games will air in early February on ESPN.