FLY Riders Earn 9 of 15 Medals at Winter X Games
Boise, ID – This past January 27-30, in Aspen Colorado, the largest winter event in the nation was held: Winter X Games. The weather was anything but perfect; however, blue skies and warm temperatures kept the riders happy and ready for action. FLY Racing showed up and did what it does best: WIN! Out of 15 medals possible, FLY Racing’s snowmachine athletes earned 9 of them.
Thursday night was the opening night and snowmobile freestyle was on the menu. This event is a very competitive event and has a tough group of experienced competitors. FLY riders Heath Frisby, Joe Parsons, and Colten and Caleb Moore all came out with the same goal in mind: take home medals. Caleb came out and showed everybody his smooth style and perfection of back flip variations along with several other tricks earning him the bronze medal with the 3rd best score.
Friday played host to the speed and style event. This is perhaps the most adverse event in the fact that athletes are judged not only in what they can do in freestyle but also how fast they can motor through a tough snocross style track. FLY Racing’s Joe Parsons, Heath Frisby, and Cory Davis stomped all the competition by taking home the gold, silver, and bronze medals. Joe Parsons came out and used his previous snocross experience, combined with his show stopping freestyle performance earning him another gold medal. Joe has earned gold at X, several times and is one of the most medal-winning athletes to perform. Heath Frisby came out and even though he has no snocross experience, relied on his life long riding experience and dominating freestyle to earn him the silver medal. Cory Davis had a terrible dirt bike injury this past summer in which he almost lost his foot. He came out and showed the world his dominating snocross style and smooth freestyle earning him the bronze. A perfect sweep of the second day of competition for FLY Racing!
For the final day of competition, FLY Racing showed its strength to the entire world in snocross, adaptive snocross and snowmobile best trick. The snocross was everything one would expect, exciting and full of action. FLY’s own Ross Martin was a very determined racer hoping to take home gold and unfortunately jumped the start earning him a 10 second penalty. After the penalty, he found himself towards the back of the very talented field of racers. Ross piloted his Judnick Motorsports Polaris race sled through the largest, toughest snocross track all the way back to second place and won the silver medal.
Next came the adaptive snocross final. The adaptive snocross is a class of determined racers that aren’t going to let their disability keep them sidelined. “Monster” Mike Schultz came out of the gates strong and never looked back taking the gold medal sporting FLY Racing’s new developmental snow gear. Jim Wazny battled a bad wrist and fought hard all race earning him the bronze medal in this class. Both Mike and Jim are using high tech prosthetic legs and a very technical mounting system on their machines to help them maintain control of the high horsepower machines. Congratulations to Mike Schultz and Jim Wazny for taking control and showing the world of disabled people that you can truly achieve whatever you set your mind to.
The final event for FLY Racing, snowmobile best trick, proved to be the highlight of the week. There was huge air, big tricks, and lots of controversy involving this event. Joe Parsons, Heath Frisby, and Colten and Caleb Moore came out hungry and driven to prove to the world they are the best freestyle athletes in the world. Heath Frisby came out strong and made a very clean, perfect run showing his years of experience and drive, earning him the silver medal in this event. Both Colten and Caleb Moore came out to prove to the world that the two brothers from Texas, that although relatively new to the sport, they are and will be a force to be reckoned with.
Caleb came out and by the time he finished his second run, was sitting comfortably in 3rd place. Colten, driven by wanting to beat his brother, was out of medal contention after his first run. He then wanted to show what he was made of and pulled something the world has never seen or heard of. Colten started his second run as if he was going to hit the ramps but then took everybody by surprise. He ran towards his machine and at the last second, his brother Caleb came out on the track with his machine. Colten hopped on the back and away they went. In the best trick event, you get two runs but only get to hit the freestyle ramp one time. Colten, on the back of Caleb’s machine with Caleb driving, hit the ramp and pulled a double person Indian air back flip! Imagine hitting a 70 foot ramp jump with somebody on the back of the machine and doing a back flip Indian air, insane, and took the entire X Games community by surprise. This trick caused quite a controversy and Colten received no points for what he did. In talking with the boys afterwards, they knew this would be extremely difficult to judge but wanted to show the world what they are capable of doing on 500 pound machines.
All in all, this was the best winter snowmachine event the industry has seen. Record crowds, extremely nice weather, and the level of competition have elevated the sport and will be remembered for years to come.
FLY RACING WINTER X GAMES MEDALS:
Freestyle
Bronze - Caleb Moore
Speed & Style
Gold - Joe Parsons
Silver - Heath Frisby
Bronze - Cory Davis
Snocross
Silver - Ross Martin
Adaptive Snocross
Gold - Mike Schultz
Bronze - Jim Wazny
Best Trick
Silver - Heath Frisby
Bronze - Caleb Moore