After last appearing at the Winter X Games in 2020, sleds made their return on Friday with Snowmobile Freestyle as the final event of the opening night. Even with the five-year hiatus, Brett Turcotte proved he still has plenty left in the tank by taking the gold medal.

Turcotte had finished sixth in the last Snowmobile Freestyle event, but won gold in that year’s Snow Bike Best Trick. He recorded the highest score of the eight competing riders with a 93.33 on his first run that saw him pull a double Rock Solid. Despite getting red flagged for being too slow going into what he hoped was his final jump, his run impressed the judges to quickly put him on top of the leaderboard.

For his second run in much heavier snow, Turcotte went for a KOD flip and multiple seatgrab flips. Like the first attempt, he wanted to go one last time after a final backflip but ran out of time.

“Every morning, I wake up and I get to look at the ones that are on the wall. This one I think means the most to me,” said Turcotte. It is his fourth gold and ninth medal as a whole. “Coming back from a huge break, not actually knowing if I was going to make it to competition, I was pretty busted up in November. To share the podium with two of my good buddies, we all ride for freestyle shows from KSFMX, we’re out here repping. There’s a reason why we’re the best in the world.”

Polaris teammate Cody Matechuk, who three-peated in Snow Bikecross from 2018 to 2020, improved from his KOD-filled first run via an effort that ended with a super can-can. Still, his Run 2 score of 92 just missed out and he had to settle for second.

2020 Snowmobile Freestyle bronze medalist Willie Elam of Arctic Cat joined them on the podium. He went aggressive out of the gate on Run 1 with backflips on all six jumps, each coupled with nac-nacs or seat grabs before wrapping up with an extension. The nacs continued as his approach in Run 2 and he culminated with a Superman, enough to push him into the 90 range.

The event was overshadowed by nasty crashes for Marcus Ohlsson and Brandon Cormier. Ohlsson, who also crashed in his debut in 2020, tried an unorthodox approach of starting Run 1 standing on his seat like a Jet-Ski. However, he couldn’t complete the Superman backflip off the first jump and the sled nearly landed atop him. Ohlsson had been dealing with a shock issue in practice.

“He was willing to send it and put it on the line, but it’s tough to see a homie go down,” said Turcotte. “We’ve been training all week. As Monster Energy teammates, we hang and train a lot.”

Cormier, the 2020 Snowmobile Freestyle gold medalist, crashed in Run 2 after setting what was ultimately the fifth best score of the night. He began the second run with a series of flips that included a backflip with an extension, Cordova, KOD, and Indy. However, he lost speed before attempting a body varial. Cormier managed to let go of the sled before impact.

One could attribute the accidents to increased aggression, perhaps from the pent-up energy of the snowmobiles returning after five years away. At the same time, the sleds have seen a power increase since 2020, with models back then being between 500 and 600cc whereas today’s sleds are often 800–900cc. This in turn means riders can get higher and go for more rotations.

Rasmus Johansson, a fellow Swede and friend of Ohlsson who placed fourth in 2020, had a first run highlighted by a Rock Solid at halfway, a heelclicker, and Indy flip. Run 2 was far less successful as he went for a slower approach, flipping at low speeds on his first two jumps. Johansson sped up a bit for the third flip before dropping back down. A last KOD flip wrapped up a frustrating run.

X Games rookie Kyle Saxton was the first rider on deck, kicking off with single backflips on each of the first two jumps. He upped the ante for his second run, but perhaps did so too much as he struggled with rough landings from going too deep.

Saxton and Daniel Shaffer’s best scores were tied. Shaffer opted with a lean-back, nac-nacs, a seat grab and a tsunami to go out on Run 1, then continued with the lean-back and a no-seat can-can in the second.

Snowmobile Speed & Style, the second snowmobile event of X Games Aspen, will be on Sunday.

Results

Rank	Rider	Run 1	Run 2
Gold	Brett Turcotte	93.33	89.33
Silver	Cody Matechuk	91.00	92.00
Bronze	Willie Elam	88.00	90.33
4	Rasmus Johansson	84.66	82.33
5	Brandon Cormier	83.00	N/A
6	Kyle Saxton	75.33	74.66
7	Daniel Shaffer	75.33	69.33
8	Marcus Ohlsson	52.66	N/A

Featured image credit: X Games