On October 9th, Clayton L. Neuman (age 73) oldest member of the original Neuman Racing Team of Minnesota, passed away after fighting a battle with cancer for 10 months. Clayton was a drag racing fanatic, and a fantastic engineer. He participated and attended many ISR World Series events, MSDRS events and traveled to Regina, Saskatchewan; Winnipeg, Manitoba; Riverton, Wyoming; Wisconsin; Iowa; and Michigan in support of the Neuman Racing Team.

In the 80’s, he can be remembered for his innovative rotary valved Arctic Cat motors with carburetors mounted on the front of the engine crankcases. Later, he developed his Arctic Cat based lay down, opposed 4 cylinder 800 engine.

Our own Dragcat from the Bull Sessions (AKA Paul James) had this to say about Clayton:

Clay began his racing career in 1972 when he bought a 72 Arctic Cat Puma. He had it modified by Amenrudes Performance, complete with Salisbury clutch and Hooker exhaust. They brought it to a local drag race, and it was driven by smaller and younger Lloyd Neuman. The machine won the race and the Neuman race team was born!

Bitten by the race bug, Clay next bought a 72 ext 650. Unhappy with its performance, he secured a more powerful 73 650 (pictured) and raced it all the way through 1976 against the likes of Marv Jorgenson and Bill Reynolds.

Sometime in the late seventies the engineering bug bit and he designed his own version of the 77z 250 motor. This engine featured crankcase mounted induction on the front of the motor along with special port design and other features I cant mention {wink, wink}. There was people in the shop taking bets that the motor would never run. Well, run it did, driven by Clayton’s son Steve, this little machine dominated the 250 classes for several years. Later a 340 was also built to this design and was driven by Clay.

in 1990 the bug bit again and he designed and built the 800cc opposed 4 cylinder sled that is pictured below. It was driven by Steve the first few years, and then by me for over 10 years to its retirement. This machine was experimental and served as a test bed for many ideas good and of course some not so good!

Clayton along with brothers Lloyd, Gordon and Frank made up the Neuman Race Team – a well known and dominant force in snowmobile racing for over 30 years. Personally I’d like to add that Clayton was a great teacher, boss, and all around great friend to have. I will miss him dearly.

Paul James, aka ‘DragCat’

Clayton on his 73 650 Cat...	…And his 800cc opposed twin racer.

You can read some pretty nice tributes to the late great C.J. Ramstad on his site, Snowpod.com right now. I’ve talked to C.J.’s partners, and they have assured me that as soon as they can get out from under the schock of C.J.’s passing, they will continue on with SnowPod.com.

I just got back from the ceremonies. All I can say is wow. The church was filled to overflowing capacity, with (my guess) over 1200 people there. It was kind of a “who’s who” of the snowmobile industry: I spotted and or talked with John Deere racer Jon Carlson, World Champions Stan Hayes and Jim Dimmerman, Roger Skime from Arctic Cat, Guy Useldinger, Ray Monsrud from Polaris, Loren Anderson from the Hall of Fame, Richard, Audry and Mike Decker, The Karpik brothers and so many more…. the list was really, really long. The extent of CJ’s network of friends and associates is pretty amazing.

The ceremony, for those of you who could not attend was a pretty eclectic gathering that could have only happened in America, and only for CJ and his son JJ. I’m sure both would have been pleased with it being much more of a celebration of life then mourning for the dead. There was dance, song, stories and memories. JJ’s guitar was out front, as was CJ’s old Panther. One speaker commented that “CJ is up there, right now… lobbying for more snow!” That got some big laughs. The huge amount of students there was testament to the fact that son JJ was well liked, and a blessed individual.

What I knew about CJ Ramstad was pretty limited, really. I knew of his love of snowmobiling, his enthusiasm for the sport, his love of photography and story telling. I knew he liked sushi. CJ fought hard for what he thought was right and the best for the whole sport.

I knew CJ mostly for his work (in particular his photography) which I found to be outstanding. But for all work CJ did, what I learned today was that work was but a tiny, tiny sliver of a life well lived. The rest – and the best part of his life – was his family and the relationships he fostered.

And today I think about 1200 people would agree.

As you probably know by now, CJ Ramstad and his son were killed in a head on collision last Sunday.

CJ and JJ have left behind wife Karla and daughter Marly, many friends and even more associates from the snowmobile, motorcycle and ATV business. CJ wrote several books, including the famous “Of Ice and Engines”, “Legend: Arctic Cat’s First Four Decades”, and “The Collected Works of Pappy”. CJ is widely known for his journalistic and photographic work for Snow Week, Sno-Goer, Minnesota Snowmobiling, Supertrax, All-Terrain Vehicle and Minnesota Off-Road.

If you’d like to share your CJ stories, please visit this topic on the Bull Sessions.

The funeral is Monday. May 14th 11:00 AM
Westwood Community Church
3121 Westwood Drive
Excelsior, Minn. 55331
www.westwoodcc.org
952-224-7300

For information on accommodations near Westwood Community Church, log onto www.chanhassenchamber.org or call the chamber at 952-934-3903.

To make a financial donation to the C.J. & J.J. Ramstad Memorial Fund, send your gift to:
CJ & JJ Ramstad Memorial Fund
c/o Beacon Bank
19765 Highway Seven
Shorewood, MN 55331
1-800-648-5507
Or email them at customerservice@beaconbank.com

To send the family your condolences, please mail to:
The Ramstad Family
c/o MSPN
9445 Minnetonka Blvd.
St. Louis Park, MN
55426

We’ll see you all there on Monday; I’ll bet CJ won’t let us do anything but have fun after the services. There’s a story and video on KARE11.com. I highly reccommend the video.

I see that Dorothy Mercer had already been inducted into thee snowmobile hall of fame. Click this link and scroll down to 1993 when she was inducted, click her name and you’ll read a very nice blurb about her. Dorothy will be missed.

Just read on snowpod.com that Polaris racer Dorothy Mercer passed away Friday, March 9th, 2007 in Crystal Nevada. Dorothy was well known for creaming the competition in not only the women’s class in the early 1970’s races, but often in the men’s as well. Dorothy rode the Polaris X-2 to a world record in 1970. She raced the Winnipeg to St. Paul race many times, finishing very well several times.

I had a chance to meet Dorothy at the Polaris 50th anniversary a few years back. She was great fun. Her first words to me were, in fact, “Hi Larry! How the hell are ya??” Like she’d known me for years. She was something special and will be missed.

I’m pretty much speechless as I write this, I cannot fathom that it is true… but it is. In a random act of senseless violence, an intruder (now arrested and charged) broke into Tracy and Hilary’s rural Waseca Minnesota home, shot and killed Tracy and his 13 year old son Alec. WIfe and mother Hllary was also hit and air lifted to the Twin Cities, at first in critical condition. I’m told she is doing better. There other son, Zak, was at a neighbors house that night.

Tracy was a huge supporter of everything vintage. Tracy collected, restored, rode, raced and worked on vintage sleds every chance he could. I found Tracy to be one of those guys that just couldn’t (or wouldn’t) say a bad word about another person.

In getting ready for the Polaris 50th anniversary a couple of years back, I spent a lot of time with Tracy. He painted the chassis and hood on my 74 Polaris Stan Hayes 650 Snopro, as well as the hoods of both my 77 Polaris SnoPros, and did the put on the decals and did the pin stripe work on all three sleds. He wouldn’t hardly take any money for several days worth of work, not matter how much I insisted. “I’m just honored to have gotten to work on such rare sleds” he kept saying.

More than anything, Tracy LOVED drag racing. In the last few years he was instrumental in vintage drag racing. He was a major organizer of a drag racing event in his hometown of Waseca, Minnesota. This year was no exception. Tracy was looking forward to the event this coming weekend.

I spoke with Chris Hanson of the MSDRS this morning, and he tells me that the race this weekend will go on – Tracy would have wanted it that way – but will be a memorial for a great guy and his son. Tracy spent many hours along with Travis Boesch setting up the classes, writing rules and soliciting money for the prizes. The MSDRS will be donating all proceeds from this weekends event to the fund raiser being setup for the Krueger family. We’ll have more information on how you can donate to that fund, as details become available.

UPDATE: TRUST FUND ESTABLISHED
A trust fund has been setup for Tracy’s family. You can send any size donation to:

TRACY KRUEGER FAMILY BENEFIT FUND
C/O Round Bank
200 2nd St. NE
Waseca, MN. 56093

In the meantime, I hope anyone who can make it will come down on Saturday. There will be a benefit dance for the Krueger family at the VFW in Waseca on Friday night. Tracy’s sled collection will be on display. I’ll be there on Saturday to try drag racing for the first time – something Tracy wanted me to try since the day I met him.

Details on the event can be found at the MSDRS website. There is a discussion already going on the Bull Sessions, complete with some great memories of Tracy.

I’ve told this story before… but now that there is video to back it up, I felt like I needed to re-tell it. I met Dan Rose in about 2001 or 2002. At the time, he wanted to sell all his vintage sled stuff off. Between me and Doc Jim and some friends of ours, we put a deal together, and it came back to Minnesota from New York in a huge rental truck.

In the pile of sleds and parts was the 1973 650 Starfire in the video below. Dan had restored it with all NOS parts, except for the motor. Instead of the 650 73 motor, he installed a 75 650 PDC motor. Dan loved to ride, race and show off this sled, and kept a running list of every sleds whose butt he kicked with it. Although having a 650 PDC motor was pretty cool, Dan told me his dream was to restore it as a 73 800cc Starfire. He had a lot of the 800cc motor parts – but they were not in a good enough condition to restore.

When I brought the sled home, Doc took the motor and built his 75 PDC from that. I found an NOS 800 kit, and Doc put that together also.

Check out these videos from Gary Merrit. How fun was it to discover these the night before Christmas and hear a 75 650cc PDC running – just for the thrill of hearing the pipes.

I didn’t know these guys, but if they liked sleds, they were friends of mine. Jim and Cory passed away on AUgust 12th in a car accident – there is a very nice memorial to them at RebelSleds.com.

Sad news to learn today that vintage restoration/collector guy Butch Jurgens of Flandreau South Dakota, passed away April 4th in a hospital in Alabama. Butch had been battling lung cancer, and was in the hospital all of February. He is survived by his wife Gwen and two daughters. Funeral arrangements have not yet been made, but a memorial is in the planning. The memorial will be April 13th, Our Redemmer Luthern CHurch, Flandreau, South Dakota, 9:00 AM to 10:30 visitation, Memorial service at 11:00 AM. You can email Randy Pistulka for more information.

Many, many of us who got into this hobby a few years ago know who Butch is. He restored Starfires & TX’s, and helped almost all of us find and restore a ton of sleds. Butch sold off all of his sleds in about 2000, Bud McCallum got some of them, and collector Steve Rothfork had some of them. Butch always went to the big shows in Granstburg, Haydays, Milbank, Waconia and more.

I met Butch at the show in Milbank, South Dakota several years back and found a kindred spirit in his love of the history of sport, in particular Polaris and Polaris racing. Butch had said he thought about writing a book about it. By the end of the conversation he was requesting me to write that book. I was honored, flattered and inspired.

It’s on the way Butch.