It’s sink or shred at Ione’s snowmobile watercross event

For riders skipping 400-pound snowmobiles across the Pend Oreille River there are only two choices – sink or shred.

In Ione, Washington, Sunday’s water cross was the focal point of the community’s Down River Days weekend. People traveled from around the Northwest to take part in the thrills and see a machine made to travel on snow glide across the water at speeds of up to 70 mph.

Although there are a few adjustments made to the snowmobiles before taking off, typically the stock seat is removed to avoid the foam being soaked, the suspension is lowered and the gas tanks are switched out for smaller ones. In case they don’t make it to the other side, a buoy is attached to rescue the vehicle from the bottom of the river.

Amber McGinnis, of Post Falls, has ridden in the event each of the last nine years. Her family has turned the weekend into a reunion, and this year eight people geared up to drive across.

She said the keys to a successful passage are to hit the throttle, keep the skis up and lean back.

“It’s exhilarating,” McGinnis said. “But when you make it to the other side it’s just like, ‘Hell, yeah.’ ”

This year, 40 sleds were entered into more than 50 side-by-side races. Some jolted over the water with ease, while others barely made it 10 feet before their vehicle slowly sank to the riverbed.

The event was founded by former Selkirk Trailblazer’s president Keith Saxe in 2003. The Down River Days previously ended with a hydroplane race, but interest waned and Saxe pitched the idea of the water cross, having seen it done in Alaska where he grew up.

Since then, the event has been a hit is the only one of its kind in Washington.

In other areas, the sport is known as snowmobile skipping or snowmobile watercross. The first official snowmobile watercross event was held in Grantsburg, Wisconsin, in 1977. That race covered about 300 feet on Memory Lake, much shorter than the quarter-mile distance riders traveled this weekend in Ione.

There’s no record of when the idea of riding snowmobiles across the water originated, but Colville’s John Walker said he and his brothers had been riding them on open water in Idaho since the early 1970s.

“To me, it’s so much fun,” Walker,78, said. “That and the water is not as hard to crash on as the snow.”

Walker did not compete in this year’s event because of a knee injury, but he said he wants to keep riding at least until he is 80. Last year’s watercross was the first time he sank.

“I was just thinking, ‘Oh, crap,’ ” Walker said. “Then I had to hurry up and pull the kill switch on my engine.”

The entry cost for racers is $25 with an optional $10 for divers insurance to retrieve vehicles from the river. This year, every rider paid the extra money for insurance. That’s not always the case. To this day, there are snowmobiles at the bottom of the Pend Oreille River.