Chris Boyle, out of our home base area of Flint, Michigan, is on his first ride with the Darkside Team in Quebec. He has known our leader, Craig Willour, since about 1999 when he first started riding. Actually, he was with Craig on his first ride out of the Gaylord area when he first found his love of snowmobiling! Back then he was on a Polaris 500 2-Up.
These days, Chris rides mostly out of Raco in the Upper Penninsula, where he rides with his friends, and friends of the Darkside Team, Dave, Corrine, Mikey and Big Brian. He has done many rides with his wingman Big Brian around the U.P., usually they do their own version of Loop the Yoop the first week of February. Their Loop is usually a 6-7 day saddlebag ride, and averages around 1200-1400 miles on their annual trip.
These days, Chris is riding a 2013 superior Ski-Doo product, a 600 E-tec. He currently has around 13,000 miles on that sled, and his goal is to get to 20,000 miles so he can retire it and hang it from the rafters in his garage!
Following Chris from home is his wife, Dena. She also enjoys the sport of snowmobiling and enjoys many day rides with Chris and the gang out of Raco, when she isn't "married to her job" as Chris puts it. She has even done a saddlebag ride with Chris to Drummon Island, near the U.P.
So far Chris is enjoying the ride, he is loving the scenery and the people we meet on the trail. Hopefully he will be back next year as well.
The one thing Chris is disappointed about is that our former Co-Leader Jim "Jimmer/Ole" Olender is not on the ride with him. Ole has beat Chris up for years to come on this ride, and Chris was looking forward to the ride with him, hopefully next year Ole!