Bunke Racing Claims 52nd Annual I-500 Win

SAULT STE. MARIE – Bunke Racing claimed its eighth International 500 Snowmobile Race win on Saturday in the 52nd running of the annual event.

Aaron Christensen brought home the win for the #74 Polaris to secure his sixth I-500 title, while teammates Gabe Bunke and Taylor Bunke, won their eighth and third titles, respectively. The eight wins for Gabe Bunke and Bunke Racing puts the organization in a tie with Corey Davidson Racing for all-time wins.

“It’s a good accomplishment, things go good here,” Christensen said. “It’s a long day and it takes a lot of strategy, some luck, always some luck, but it’s a long day. You know, you can’t just race wide open from the start to finish. Things will never make it, so you got to play the cards a little bit. It’s always unpredictable whats going to happen, it’s always tough to predict the weather, but the track ended up pretty good for how much ice they had and we moved it around and it ended up pretty good.”

The No. 37 Faust Racing Polaris came home in second place, 6.965 seconds behind Bunke Racing, while the No. 28 Nelson Racing/D.L. Polaris was third, four laps behind.

A new temperature record was set Saturday, as the air temperature at the 10 a.m. start was 35 degrees, breaking the previous record of 33 degrees set back in 1987.

Joe Buczek
MISportsNow.com