Two runs, 150 seconds, and a pair of 90-foot jumps: Brett Turcotte has waited 5 years for this very moment. There’s no single event in the world of professional snowmobiling that’s bigger or more consequential than the Winter X Games in Aspen, Colo. This is where riders get noticed, fans get made, and life-changing sponsorships get inked.
In other words, the X Games is to freestyle snowmobiling what the Super Bowl is to the NFL. Unfortunately for athletes like Brett, who have spent their entire adult lives becoming the best snowmobilers on the planet, there hasn’t been any Super Bowl at all for the last 5 years. The X Games hasn’t included snowmobiles as part of the lineup since the pandemic.
Making Ends Meet Without the X Games
So, what’s a professional athlete to do when the biggest event in their sport is put on indefinite hiatus? According to Turcotte, you put your head down and grind it out by any means necessary.
“You can be a professional snowmobiler and still make ends meet, but it’s not all racing. The X Games showcases what’s possible, but if you want to make a living behind a set of bars, it’s not all competition,” said Turcotte.
That means different things for different athletes. In Turcotte’s case, the last 5 years have been a mix of freestyle stunt shows, building a following on YouTube, and running an extensive backcountry clinic teaching other riders how to improve their skills.
As the de facto leader in the sport, however, Turcotte’s ability to turn powersports into a full-time job is a rare one.
Take fan favorite Rasmus Johansson, for instance, a native Swede who’s been making the trek out to the Winter X Games since 2016. Johansson is both a top contender and a Ski-Doo sponsored pro. When he’s not on a snowmobile, he makes ends meet with his hands, working as a full-time welder.
The same goes for gold medalist and Monster Energy teammate Willie Elam, who splits his time between freestyle shows and working at a powersports dealership back in his hometown of Twin Falls, Idaho.
The High Risk of Snowmobile Freestyle
Bearing that in mind, the return of snowmobiles to the Winter X Games this year is arguably the best news a pro athlete could hope for. It also means that the stakes are higher than ever to put on a good show, and that’s where things get interesting this year.
That’s because over the course of the X Games’ nearly 30-year history, Snowmobile Freestyle remains the only event to ever result in the death of one of its athletes. Extreme sports are all about progression, being the first to land bigger, gnarlier tricks with each passing year, but every level-up comes at a price.
Risk is one thing when it’s done on skis or a snowboard, but when you’re backflipping a 450-pound, 200-horsepower machine 90 feet through the air, the consequences of an equipment failure or missed landing can’t be exaggerated.
“It’s an inherent risk we all take, and everybody out there on that course is a professional who understands that risk,” says Turcotte. “You have to balance that risk/reward factor for yourself and really figure out what it means to you.”
Turcotte knows of what he speaks, both in terms of risk and in terms of reward. The man is one of the most decorated X Games athletes of all time, now with four gold medals to his name, yet he’s also no stranger to injury. Just this season, in fact, a crash during practice earned him four broken ribs and a hematoma to his right femur.
X Games Redemption
A thing like that would be enough to steer most of us into a different line of work, but pro snowmobilers like Turcotte are clearly cut from a very different cloth.
“That’s when I had the realization that I was really going to have to lock in and make sure I could get myself to Aspen. I’d like to think that those efforts paid off, and I’m stoked to walk away with two new medals,” said Turcotte.
This year was one of redemption for Turcotte. He narrowly missed landing a trick that would have almost certainly earned him a gold medal back in 2020. A nearly flawless run won him the gold this year, so it’s safe to say that 5 years on the sidelines haven’t tempered Turcotte’s appetite for risk one bit.
Things could have gone much differently for Turcotte; however, the man was so committed on his first trick of the night, a “kiss of death backflip,” that he overshot the landing area, effectively landing a 95-foot jump on completely flat ground. Unfazed, Turcotte then proceeded to land five more heart-stopping tricks, four of which were other equally gnarly variations of back flips.
It Breaks Man & Machine
It wasn’t until after the event that Turcotte realized he’d landed so hard that he’d broken part of the reinforced chassis on his sled. Luckily for Brett, his factory Polaris 9RXCR was the only thing he’d managed to break. Other riders wouldn’t be so fortunate.
Marcus Ohlsson, for instance, left the mountain on a stretcher this year after the landing for a standing KOD flip went sideways. Ohlsson was lucky enough to get away with a broken rib, a bruised lung, and some whiplash. He’s looking at 4 weeks of rest before getting back on the sled and training up for next year.
The same happened to Brandon Cormier, who sustained a neck injury while attempting the very same trick that won him a gold medal back in 2020, a midair body varial. Cormier narrowly landed the trick last time after hitting the bottom of the landing, sprawled out sideways on his seat. Whether it was sheer luck or skill that kept Cormier on his machine is still open for debate.
The death-defying display was almost certainly what sealed the win for Cormier back in 2020, but this year, we were reminded that risk cuts both ways. We’re also reminded that if you come to the X Games to win, you can’t do it without going bigger than anyone else.
The Risk Was Worth the Reward
Spirits were high when I caught up with Turcotte after the games in his team trailer, an 18-foot enclosure that he dragged all the way down from his home in Clearwater, British Columbia, Canada. Seemingly every member of his team was crammed in that little box, the music was loud, and every warm body had at least one cold drink in their hand.
By this time the news had reached Turcotte’s crew that his fellow riders were in good shape, all things considered, so there were plenty of reasons to celebrate.
“You know, I could slip off the sidewalk and injure myself, or tear my MCL kicking a soccer ball the wrong way. I’ve always grown up with that mindset,” said Turcotte. “There are so many factors beyond your control that contribute to that elevated risk we face here, but risk is a part of what goes into making that one golden moment.”
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