From sunup to sundown, racers line up by the green flag to put their machines and their stamina to the test. It's the first time competitive snowmobile racing has been in Wausau in almost 20 years, and Man Made Lake in Sunnyvale Park is the spot for this oval track. With snow plows and scrapers, organizers carved out a 1.3 mile track and did their best to keep it smooth throughout the day. It's right on the lake ice, but slipping is not the problem that bumps are.

Teams of technicians fill the neighboring pit area to repair and tweak the small fleet of snowmobiles for the weekend of races. Racers hop from one machine to another as different classes and heats move down the schedule. The same person can race in the 600 cc class and the 440 cc class, but not the same machines. There are divisions for professionals, semi-pros, women's and even classes for teenagers. The goal is to be the first to finish the three, five or ten laps in each race, and racers will tell you the biggest challenge to hold on as G-forces try to pull you off on each turn. Soft hay bales line the track for those accidents, but racers need to concentrate on keeping the corners tight and holding their machine's path within the smoothest lanes.

The riders of Wahl Racing flew past all rivals in the main races during both days of " Wausau 525," the new oval race in central Wisconsin that honors "Flip" Merwin. Merwin died at the Eagle River Championships in 2003.

On Saturday, January 22, Terry Wahl won the Pro Formula 600 more than three seconds ahead of cousin Dustin Wahl and seven seconds before Jeff Ludwig. Sunday's feature was a similar feat, with their new chassis leading the pack and dueling only with each other for the lead spot of the Pro 440 Champ. They finished together in qualifying, too, and Terry swept all of his heats.

In that race the cousins from Greenbush, Minn. were again dogged by Jeff Ludwig of Kaukauna, Wis. for 9 of the 10 swift laps on Man Made Lake in Wausau, Wis. Terry broke out early but Dustin needed several laps to shake Ludwig's Polaris, which again crept up on the leaders near the race's end before mechanical difficulties led Ludwig to park it by the inside bales of turn 4.

"Jeff had some bad luck there on the last lap," said Terry Wahl, "and it was great to see Wahl chassis take all three." Third place went to Philip Maulton, who's not on the team but who rode a machine made by the Wahls.

Terry said the track was just his style for their Polaris sleds. He'd come south from Eagle River , Wis. , where he'd taken second place at the World Championship race one week earlier.

"Personally I prefer a flat track or not that much bank, and bigger corners. That's just more my style track. Eagle River is not my favorite track. It never has been," he said. "Three or four times a year we race lake races. It got a little bit rough out here, but it's just normal. You get a lot of sleds going around here chewing it up, it's just going to get like that. The bumps play a little part in where your back end gets off a little and you've just kind of gotta use your head out there and pick the good lines."

Perhaps most importantly, he said, "Get off to a good start. It's easier to run out front than it is to run behind, most of the time."

Fans think of the sleds with their smooth and aerodynamic shells with all of the decals from sponsors, but racers and their teams think of the blocky, bare machine under all of that. The exterior snaps off often to add fluids and check belts and gauges. Many of the features of a recreational snowmobile are stripped off to save a few ounces on the weight. Each team operates under the same guidelines for what can be in and near the engine, and their own skill is what squeezes out that extra speed.

Dustin Wahl said how glad he was to prove their brand new chassis worked. They were unveiled in Wausau and the difference showed largely in the rough, he said.

"You can kind of just drive through rough wherever you want to go, if you've got to go through there. The chassis is not going to do nothing stupid. It doesn't want to go right and send you off into the bails. It's looking pretty good," he explained. Wahl Racing was formed in 1981 by their father and uncle. Racers from the team have qualified more than 20 times for the Eagle River World Championship and won four titles there.

His new machine was tested in Mass. , said Moulton, but it wasn't yet reliable.

"We didn't have the weather there for testing and whatnot, so we didn't have the time on it. This weekend here really, we made leaps and bounds. It's just at Eagle River, trying to test, son of a gun, you're under pressure there, all the time, and you can't make a lot of big changes."

The race in Wausau , said Terry, was ideal.

"The people around here, the effort they put into it, it was just awesome. Some places you go and they're not fun to be at because the people aren't friendly."

Wahl said he and Philip "Flip" Merwin were good friends.

"It means more to me than any other race in the world as of right now," he said of his victory at the Wausau 525. 525 was Merwin's racing number.

Merwin was 28 when he died in Eagle River . He donated race winnings to hospitalized children, and that's where proceeds from the weekend went through "Flip's Fund."

"Flip always brought a smile and made everybody feel really good," said Jean Scheer, an organizer with WSA. On Saturday, she said, "The sun came out. There wasn't a dry eye around. He's here. He brought the sun. He's up there. He's really very much missed."

Both Merwin and Nascar racer Scott Wimmer were raised in Wausau . Wimmer signed autographs on Sunday and rode up on a sled to speak with the audience about his old friend. Would he ever race snowmobiles?

"Yeah, I'd like to get into it, but maybe I'd be an owner and not a driver. Maybe some day I'll come back up and own a couple sleds and watch them go around, but I sure enjoy driving them." It's a little scary, he admitted. "It's amazing how quick they are, how responsive they are. They can run this track really quick. A lot of fun."

It was a fun day for Rick Mueller and his Wausau family. His son who is nearly 2, Aaron, saw his first snowmobile races.

"He likes to watch it. He can endure the cold, and he really likes this. Anything that makes noise, he likes. He's got a little 50 cc Honda. He runs that around and he has a good time."

Through the weekend children were sledding on surrounding hills while their parents lined those same hills to look down at the racing that lasted as long as the daytime.

Only three racers qualified for the Pro Stock 600 Liquid. Nick Dolezal of Eagle River , Wis. kept his Ski-Doo right behind that of Jim Adams of Rochester , Minn. The two kept their turns tight and free of mistakes while Moulton followed in all ten laps from a good distance to finish third. The first two flags were switched for the Pro 500, with Adams taking second and Dolezal won first. Shane Felegy of Forest Lake , Minn. and his Polaris beat out Dustin Wahl for third place. This was Felegy's second race since recovering from a broken neck at a race at Watersmeet , Mich. Last year.

"No, I'm not scared," he said. "You think about it. About not falling off. That's what happened last year, I flew off the machine and broke my neck when I hit the hay bales." Yes, they're usually soft, but not that time.

"It had rained the night before and they were all frozen."

The top Women's Race, the Women's Pro, was won by Jody Rathke of Boyceville , Wis. , who schooled her daughter Ashley and left her in third place. Chelce Buzick came from Harwood , North Dakota to take second place. All four machines in the race were Polaris, but only Heather Olson competed in the Eagle River Championships the previous week. She took fourth.