the reichard cup

A funny thing happened on the way to The Reichard Cup grass drag championships in Germantown, Wisconsin. It rained- and then it didn't.

You see, the event, held by the Southern Wisconsin Snowmobile Drag Racing Association, was an on again, off again proposition. Where last summer had been the "drought of the century," this late summer outside Milwaukee was verging on monsoon season. The ground by Jim Reichard's Yamaha/Polaris/Cat dealership, where the drags were to take place, was saturated. If it rained any more, the races would have to be called off or the water-skippers would have to be called in to hold their event instead.

As luck would have it, hard work by the participating snowmobile clubs and a lot of sunshine made the track hard and runnable.

But, Glenn Erlandson, Clyde Meyer and I didn't know that as we traveled the nearly 10 hours from Glenn and Clyde's home in central Minnesota to the race site on Wisconsin's eastern lake shore. Frankly, the sponsoring club didn't know if they would have the event either.

To the credit of the local clubs and their volunteers, the race was held. On race eve, fresh dirt was trucked in, dumped, leveled, rolled and raked over the wet, nearly flooded turf. Hay was blown over the dirt in an attempt to soak up additional moisture. And then there were a great many crossed fingers inspiring luck and sunny weather.

Race day started out gray with a threat of rain. Had we traveled all that way for naught? Then, instead of rain, the sun broke through and sucked up ground moisture. I had to figure that some racers with sensitive carbs would have to be going nuts as the moisture content changed from near tropical to merely bearable. Air to fuel ratios must have been going crazy for a few hours.

Another problem- or asset, depending on how well set up you were- arose. The new track surface, instead of being loose, was firm and extremely aggressive. Traction was excellent, in some cases, too good as some of the sleds had their clutches opening up too soon at the start and the machines were off their powerbands or burning belts and overheating the clutches.

On August 27th, the "Reichard Cup" was off and running. Most of the spectators never knew how hard the sponsoring clubs had worked or how close the event came to being a non-event. But, it was an event, the opening of the SWSDRA season. There were classes for "trail" stock to wild, no-holds-barred modifieds.

And there was a swap meet.

If I can add a little opinion here, I'd state that racing is fine and dandy on its own, but the addition of a swap meet tends to help attendance. Of course, it doesn't hurt to have a promotion minded snowmobile dealer ship like Reichard's Performance Center on your side either. This Yamaha/Arctic Cat/Polaris dealership worked hard to promote the event by sponsoring advertisements, purchasing special trophies and offering its site as the home of the event. While this year's swap meet was one of the first to be held in conjunction with the race, it drew participants and better as the word gets out and snowmobilers from around the area realize that they can sell, swap or buy some very interesting pieces of "snowmobilia."

I have witnessed one SWSDRA racing event in Forest Lake, Minnesota, grow from similarly humble beginnings to mammoth proportions over the past five to six years. The race provides excitement to draw people's attention, but the swap meet aspect keeps people coming back year after year. Swap meets can be the carnival's midway to the main racing events.

Still, it was the racing that we had come to join in. Glenn's pair of 1990 Indys had miles and miles of grass testing on them. He expected the Indy 400 to be okay, but felt the Indy 500 would do very well. Racing, being racing, Glenn was wrong. The Indy 400 won first in Stock C and Trail Stock C. The Indy 500s best finish was a second. It came out of the hole so hard that it "smoked" the clutches and by the time it recovered, it couldn't make up the difference in the short 650-foot long straightaway.

As Glenn said on the way to the race, this was to be a learning experience. It was. By the next race, the bucket of ice cubes used to cool down the Indy's heads and runningboard extrusions were gone. He now has an external water pump set up with quick-change hoses to slip into the Indy's stock cooling lines. In seconds the coolant is pumped out of the sled, fed around a block of ice, and fed back into the engine. To get tools and spare parts to the pits from the race truck, Glenn now has a high-wheeled cart. There is no more lugging the Indys in the pits. A new wheeled-dolly made that chore a one-man job. He even adapted a garden rake to smooth out the starting line for his holeshots.

Now, before you start saying, "Wow, how clever!", I must point out that the "Pro" dragsters already had most of the same equipment. But, Glenn and his new team learned that it wasn't for show, but for efficiency in the pits where time is critical. These racers in the SWSDRA are experts in making the most of time. To compete, you have to observe, pick up on the best ideas and fine tune them to suit your needs.

Well, did we win the Reichard Cup? No, it went to some hard charger in the mods if we recall right. No, we had to be satisfied with two wins, two thirds, and a second. That day's work was good enough for second overall in the season's point standings for stock racers. Of course, Glenn was still about 40 bucks shy of breaking even from what he had paid in for race entries. Obviously, SWSDRA racers don't compete to get rich. It's fun.

The Reichard Cup event was a success. The clubs worked hard and long hours. The racers put on a good show. The weather had cooperated. And we went home figuring how we'd beat these guys at the next race.