For two years, no ATV could give the Yamaha Grizzly a run in the Mi-TRALE/Y-101 ATV Super Challenge Series. Race after race, from one town to the next, the Yamaha Grizzly would win the TOP DOG Class. The Yamaha Grizzly also took the top 3 positions at 7 consecutive ATV Super Challenges.
That all changed in the 2005 Mi-TRALE/Y-101 ATV Super Challenge Series. At the first event in June, the Suzuki King Quad, driven by Michigan's Jeff Walters forced a Nashville, Tennessee driver, Eli Gustafson, on a Yamaha Grizzly into the second of a Double Elimination feature. Walters pulled off the upset and was the first to derail Yamaha's TOP DOG reign of supremacy.
Then Walters came back to defeat a different Michigan Driver, Jason Sullivan, on a Grizzly at the second event. Walters and his King Quad went undefeated at that event.
Now it's the Grand Slam finale, Ewen, Michigan, Saturday, September 24th. This ATV Super Challenge is a part of the Ewen Log Jamboree and takes place at the permantly built ATV Super Challenge track in this Western Upper Peninsula community. It will be at this event that Tennessee's Gustafson is set out to put Yamaha back in Victory lane.
Walters plans to win the ATV Super Challenge Grand Slam in the Top Dog Class, and prove that the Suzuki King Quad can do all that an ATV Super Challenge requires. That is the ability to not only run through water and mud, have the power and traction to make it over the hills, the handling to carve into the tight corners, the suspension to ride over the bumps and hit the jumps hard, and at the end, the braking neccessary to stop within the parameters of the "Stop Box."
The ATV Super Challenge series has two drivers racing side by side. This concept is catching on in different parts of the US. The Wisconsin ATV Association has already run 2 ATV Super Challenges, and will have their final race of the season the week after Michigan's event, September 30th to October 2nd. The Wisconsin ATV Association ATV Super Challenge finals will take place in Gillett, Wisconsin.
While Wisconsin and Michigan follow the same rules for an ATV Super Challenge, the two circuits have different class breakdowns. The Mi-TRALE/Y-101 ATV Super Challenge series only has 4 classes. Two are for the 2-Wheel Drive machines, and 2 are for the 4 Wheel Drive ATV's.
Plans are in progress for the 2 states to combine their ATV Super Challenge Series into one Regional Series in 2006. For more information on the Mi-TRALE/Y-101 ATV Super Challenge Series, contact Skip Schulz at 906/884-9668, e-mail at: sschulz@jamadots.com or go to: www.wupy101.com
For more information on the ATV Super Challenge in Gillett, Wisconsin, contact Gary Pemrich at 920/604-2040 or go to: www.atvsuperchallenge.com.