Wednesday — February 11, 2004

Novice joins fundraiser in Sawtooth Valley

Snowmobiling could become addicting

---

By MATT FURBER
Express Staff Writer

Snowmobiling is not an activity I have participated in since I was about 14 years old when my cousin Jack Frost was teaching me to drive. It wasn’t a very successful lesson. I slammed the sled into a tree as I throttled uphill through a turn in northern Michigan, a place where the outdoors came alive for me. The night of my lesson, however, the only thing that opened for me was my forehead from the impact with the windshield.

Way Out Women, official riders on a relay fundraiser for breast cancer research, take a break at Redfish Lake. In the back row are Becky Wagner, Rene Neumeyer and Mickey Sutton. In front is Cris Reninger with one of her survivor eggs she painted with slogans like "Mork Mobile" and "Yolk Transport." Sitting next to her is Johnee Miller, who at 72 was the oldest person in the ride and the most experienced. Express photo by Matt Furber

Jumping forward over 20 years, snowmobiles have become entirely different machines and I have learned a thing or two about physics and driving. Non-the-less, when I showed up at the Mountain Village Restaurant in Stanley last Friday to join a group of 21 riders participating in a breast cancer research fund-raiser, I was more than a little apprehensive thinking about my adolescent performance.

I had been invited to ride a snowmobile with an Idaho team riding a leg of a relay called Way Out Women, sponsored by Polaris, a Minnesota-based company committed to fundraising and celebrating its 50th anniversary.

"The goal is to raise the profile of women in a male dominated sport," said Mickey Sutton of Nampa, one of the six official riders invited to join in the relay and ride a Polaris snowmobile 900 miles through Idaho.

Each leg of the journey to Minnesota has official women riders chosen for their commitment to the cause and their experiences with cancer in their own families. Some of the riders are breast cancer survivors themselves.

The Idaho group included both the youngest female rider, Rene Neumeyer, 29, whose daughter Khadija, 8, a snow-cross racer, joined in, and the oldest, Johnee Miller, 72, a breast cancer survivor of eight years, who has been riding snowmobiles with her husband Zee since 1962.

Four legs of the relay, two in the United States and two in Canada, are set to converge at the Polaris factory Feb. 20.

The Idaho Way Out Women rode from Priest Lake, in Idaho’s Panhandle, to West Yellowstone, Mont.. I joined them on the stretch through the Sawtooth Valley, from Stanley to Smiley Creek.

Trinity Boss, of Meridian, joined "Way Out Women" on a leg of a relay race and breast cancer research fundraiser from Alaska to Minnesota last week as riders completed a 900-mile ride through Idaho. Boss and the other 21 riders took a break in the Sawtooth Valley at Redfish Lake. Express photo by Matt Furber

After breakfast and a quick orientation to my machine, a powerful red and yellow Polaris 800 with the name Snow Dancer stenciled on the bright red windshield, we headed out on our ride. I was nervous to be responsible for another person’s property, but the owner, Chris Reninger, another relay member, took me under her wing, caring for my well being like the bag of eggs she painted and carried in honor of people who have suffered from cancer.

I was getting more and more comfortable on the machine riding in the company of the women, who are passionate about both snowmobiling and raising awareness for women’s issues.

Every day of the trip there are guests who join the ride to represent women’s organizations. Amy Davis, executive director of the Idaho Women’s Business Center in Boise, an organization that helps entrepreneurs get their ideas off the ground, joined the group with me.

"She does so much for women," said Sutton who herself raised over $3,000 in pledges.

Feelings of resistance to a technology that I had not embraced because of my bias for quiet ski tours were beginning to fade. In the company of our 22-person snowmobile posse that included some male fundraisers, like Gary Cvecich, an Idaho Department of Transportation employee from Stanley, and Bob Jarrett, a neo-natologist with a practice in Nevada, I was flushed with the good energy and positive sense of purpose and fun. I was also beginning to get a sense of the horsepower under the hood. It was time to cool it when I finally got the sled stuck. Reninger encouraged me to stick to the groomed trails, for a while. The sport could become addicting. The adrenaline surge was intoxicating. In my mind I was getting ready to throw down a credit card, call some friends for pledges and keep riding to Minnesota.

Roseau is only a few miles from the Canadian boarder. Upon arrival all four teams plan to participate in a Guinness Book of World Records bid for the largest group ride in snowmobile history.

As we raced for Smiley Creek and the shuttle to Rexburg, where the riders would hand off their sleds to the Wyoming contingent, I found myself behind a cloud of snow. It was being kicked up behind 8-year-old Khadija giving me a run more my money as we streaked across the open valley at nearly 60 miles per hour.

Clearly, the future of the sport for women has been secured. As we pulled into the parking lot, Johnee Miller was there with us grinning from ear to ear.

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.