Levi Green: Iraq, Proven Progression, Tater Days

Levi Green, welcome back to the show, to the program.

Yeah, thanks for having me.

Sledder Cast season 3. You were episode three, I think, of season one.

Yeah.

Filmed that first batch over there in Hay Days. You know what? You're the only one we made into two episodes. I think cuz we went like almost like an hour and 45 minutes. We're like, we should probably chop this one up. We talked for quite a while.

Yeah, we did. There was a lot of stuff.

And we had some storm coming. All these memories are coming back now. We had stuff falling down behind us.

We did, at Hay Days. But a lot has happened since then.

Yeah. Couple years later, couple years older. For those of you who don't know Levi, okay. Brief intro, give everyone like a 30 second version of you.

Yeah. Grew up here in Twin Falls, Idaho. Started riding sleds with my dad when I was in diapers. 5 years old. I got my first sled, which is a 1980s Ski-Doo Citation. And every year he'd flip sleds, you know, find the best deal, get it up and running. And then that kickstarted my passion. When I was in high school, I had 509 Volume 7 and I watched that so many times like falling asleep to it that I burned out the disc and had to go get a new disc cuz that one stopped working.

And then decided I wanted to go into the military and serve my country. And so 3 days after graduation, I went to boot camp.

Did you make that decision many months before then or was it like graduated high school? What do I do now? Boom.

Years before. Yeah. I had developed an interest when I was with my great-grandpa watching World War II films and he was like, “I was on that ship.” And I was like, “Wow, no kidding.” and we're watching like a History Channel documentary of World War II and it was he was showing me like the USS Lexington which was in the Battle of Midway and it was one of the ships sank out there. I think it was like one of the first if not the first sank in World War II and he's like I was one of the few survivors.

Gosh.

I'm like holy crap. And then he was also on patrol boats in the Korean War going up and down the rivers and stuff like that. And so as a young kid, I was just like, “Wow, that's cool.” Like, you know, what he did there. And that kind of kickstarted my interest with the military. And then his son, my grandpa, got me into hunting. And so you know, out hiking, hunting, camping, and doing all of that. And I was like, man, this would be a cool job, you know, packing around a gun, camping.

And I'm like and I want to serve my country and like, very patriotic I love the US like it has so much to offer and beautiful country and so then I kind of developed the interest there and throughout the years you know just always watching movies watching you know talking to other vets and stuff and then when I was 17 I went down with my parents to recruiter's office and signed up for the delayed entry program and had a year until I actually graduated to where I could go into boot camp. But I was like I was at every everything like every PT they would do and every training they would do.

And then 3 days after I graduated high school, I was on the yellow footprints down in San Diego getting yelled at by drill instructors.

Wow.

For the Marine Corps.

Yeah. So, man, you got to remind me. How long did you serve for?

I was there, I was in for four years.

Okay.

I went into the infantry. That's just what I want to do. The recruiter's like, “Are you sure? Your ASVAB, you scored high enough. You can do what whatever you want.” I'm like, “No, I want to be in the infantry.” And so, he's like, “All right.” And so I did that. Went to 29 Palms, California. Was there with 3/7 and deployed to Iraq twice. First one was...

What year are we talking about here?

It was 15 and yeah 15 is when I deployed to Iraq the first time.

What was this? Remind people what was the state of Iraq in 2015? What was kind of the overall, you know, purpose and, you know, the objective of you going over there?

Yeah. So, it's a challenging dynamic. A lot of people think that it's all about money. In reality, the Islamic extremists really hate Western civilization and Christians and will do anything they can to eradicate it. And so there was a lot of evil with ISIS that was running through that area. They were taking over cities, towns over there in Syria and Iraq and basically like kidnapping kids, taking them through school and

Like brainwashing them all.

Basically brainwashing because a child is the most, oh, what's the word? Like vulnerable. They're very vulnerable and very moldable. So if you think about being a product of your environment and when you're in those learning stages and those adolescent stages really easy to mold them in to what you want them to be and just an example of how evil they are. On my second deployment I was with a platoon of SEAL Team 5. One of the intel guys had a laptop that was from one of the ISIS guys that had been killed.

So he was able to get that laptop.

Yeah. So it was a laptop from one of the ISIS guys that was killed and had a he cracked it, opened it up and then we were going through all the footage. They had a propaganda video that they were putting together where they'd kidnapped a kid from a village. Then because the dad was resisting letting his kid be kidnapped, they brainwashed that kid to basically, they put his dad in a car, loaded it with explosives in a wadi, which is like a big wash.

And then basically the kid in the name of Allah and like with some other words I can't remember exactly but he thought he was doing the just thing like the right thing because he had been brainwashed to believe like his dad's the enemy and needs to be taken care of.

Wait, are you saying that they brainwashed him to blow his dad up in the car? The kid.

The kid. The kid.

Oh god.

Pledges his allegiance, you know, the whole thing. Basically stated like his dad is bad and did wrong and needs to pay for what he did and then detonated his dad. So that's an example.

That's an example of the evil that people don't realize. And the reason like we were in Iraq, you know, during ISIS and everything and then before that too, there was a lot of stuff going on. But the war on terrorism is we're trying to keep people from the Western Front doing the same thing to us because there's what's called a jihad, which is war. It's a religious war. And it's basically like they're wanting to be the religion. They want to be like anybody believing outside of that is wrong. Needs to be taken care of.

Yep.

Well, we're in the third jihad and what that looks like is infiltrating from within. ISIS is just what you see. What you don't see is people getting into political seats. And try not to get too much into it because it's hairy.

Yeah.

But people getting into political seats that are pledging to Islamic countries and their Islamic past like stating like I will always be this before the US.

Wow.

Like I will always be for like Somalia before the US or something like that. Pay attention to that because that is exactly what the third jihad is. Instead of going by force, you go through refugee programs. However, coming in, getting into political seats, getting into prison systems, prison systems, you they'll start a like an Islamic service and then recruit because it's one, it could be offering safety while in prison. Two, it offers a community when you get out. So if you sell that, sell that protection and you sell that community when you get out, then they have somewhere to go when they're out of prison.

And now you're growing, you're growing that from within a country. If you look at what's happening in Europe, I think London the most is either London or Copenhagen. But the number one name is Muhammad. Isn't that wild?

In London.

In London. I want to say it was London, if not another major city.

Number one name.

Number one name. Number one most common name is Muhammad.

Yeah. Wow.

And you look at what's happening over there and it's like, holy cow. It's

Kind of spreading.

Yeah. Everywhere. And in Dearborn, Michigan, there is an Islamic mayor that just came in to seat and he changed the police patches. Now it has Arabic writing on them and they started doing call to prayer five times a day and which a call to prayer is when they over the loudspeakers within a city or a village start doing a call to prayer and everybody who practices Islam stops what they're doing and prays. That is scary because now you're building communities like entire communities within the US and that religion happens to conflict directly with Christianity and Christianity is what America was built off of.

Like I believe people should practice whatever they believe in, right? But if your practice involves hate and trying to eradicate another religion, that's a scary religion.

Yeah. And it's evil.

Very evil. Yeah. Not all are like I've met some amazing Muslims, amazing people. Great. And while I was over in Iraq, they were just so nice and so humble, all the ones I talked to. And they all just wanted to show us like how cool it is that they know things going on in the US. They'll pull up on their phone like like Demi Lovato or something doing this and they're like see listen Demi Lovato or like, whoever. And it's like yeah that's cool. And but at the same time there are extremists and quite a bit of them that are have been brainwashed that want to eradicate and so just got to pay attention to that.

Yeah. So was there any major difference between your second tour over there and how was how much time did you come home for like 6 or 9 months go back or was there a quicker turnaround?

Yeah. So I came back for a year. My first one was a little bit more kinetic. We had we were opening up a base that had been closed down for a while since the first bit in Iraq. It had been closed down, given to the Iraqis. Well, then we had to open back up and get the airfield secured and stuff like that so operations could take place in that province, which is Al Anbar Province. And there's a town just outside of there where ISIS would set up rocket rails in the palm groves. And so it's the rocket rails were to the east and the sun rises in the east.

So we have this big blimp that we would use to spot enemy and as our security and stuff. And this big blimp in our air tower happened to get lit up in the morning by the sun which becomes a great...

This is the blimp that you guys would use. You were telling me about this yesterday, right?

Yeah.

Crazy camera ability, just like crystal. You were saying like you could see a mustache like on a dude from outer space basically.

Yeah. Like miles away. And yeah, crazy capabilities. But, when you're facing the sun, you have glare. You have the sun coming directly in your camera. That town was perfectly in place where as the sun is coming up, they could set up and see and have a reference point to aim rockets at us. They would set up in the palm groves, but we couldn't see them because of the sun glare. And so as they're setting up, and mind you, these are homemade rocket rails where they're using like car jacks and stuff to like adjust the elevation. So, and then like just aiming by sight and then they would touch off the rockets and run.

And by the time the rockets were flying in, it was like there was nobody there.

Yeah.

And so we started figuring out where they were staging at in different locations and we got proactive. We couldn't really do boots on the ground activity at that point because Obama was leaving and there was there was a lot of commotion where people don't want troops on the ground doing their job because we don't want wounded vets. We don't want you know stuff like that. So there's a lot of backlash and a lot of political stuff goes in there. So, we had to get creative and we're like, “Oh, we got to defend ourselves because we're starting to take like effective rockets.” So, I was a mortarman.

So, we started setting up our mortar at our max effective range of the mortar. Which was I think it was like 5600 m or something like that. So, quite a ways away, but we're still outside of the wire at that point. And so we got closer, had pre-laid in targets where we knew they were shooting rockets from and then had snipers flying a drone and watching. So as soon as we took a rocket and they touched one off, we knew where it came from.

Okay.

And so they touched one off, they spit out which target we spun up the data, got the gun on, and then started dropping rounds.

Jeez.

Pretty wild. But that's about all we were able to do at that point.

Mostly reactive type stuff.

And that's frustrating, especially, you know, and the goal isn't to you know just go out and kill people. But the goal is to make a difference. And when you're trained to do a job, you want to do your job. And there are a lot of vets that struggle. And I've talked to a lot that feel like they never did enough. They didn't get to do what they wanted to do. You know, things like that. And I will just say this, if you're a veteran, you did your, you know, what you signed up to do and you did the best you could and did your time, that's all that anybody could ever ask of you.

Yeah.

And like, don't think of yourself any less cuz I did that. I made that mistake for a while. You know, I envisioned going in and getting shot at constantly and like getting into firefights.

That didn't scare you at all.

No, because that's what I signed up to do. And you train for that. When you're trained and you develop that mindset of just pretty much accepting that any day could be my last and what's important is that you get home. That the brothers to the left and right of you get home and if I gotta die for that to happen okay and you end up fighting for each other is what it comes down to.

Two different types of brainwashing you've talked about here.

Exactly.

Right.

And there's a lot to be said about that.

There is.

You know the main purpose isn't always clear. The main purpose there was to prevent evil from coming onto our soil, but the closer purpose is make sure that each other gets home.

Yeah. When I said brainwash, I meant that in a very positive way.

It's true. It's true.

With the mentality that we have here versus what you were going into and fighting against over there. So, well, shoot, Levi. That was not a 30 second intro to you.

No.

I could sit here and listen to you. My father-in-law was in the CIA and he spent a lot of time in the Middle East and so we slowly get tidbits of you know different missions and operations that he was on and my boys have a huge fascination with the military and those types of movies. That's all we watch when we go down there. But I could talk to you about you know stuff like this for a long time.

Yeah. A lot of vets that have been through it and they don't like to talk about it. I didn't like to talk about it for a while because I wasn't proud of what I did for a while because I felt like I could have done more. Now I've come to realize that it doesn't matter. Like what I did is more than what a lot of people are willing to do for the country at 18, 19, 20, 21, 22. Yeah, man.

Gosh.

And so I learned to start taking pride in what I did. I learned to start taking pride in vets cuz I'd have a vet come up and say like, “Thank you for your service.” Or somebody says, “Thank you for your service.” And I'd like almost get guilty about it. Almost like, “Yeah, but I didn't really do anything.” It's like, no. Like, you know, I kind of got that out of my head when I started talking to other vets and hearing their stories, like, and vets usually only talk to each other. They don't really talk to other people about what they did,

Like open up. Yeah. Just to each other.

Yeah. It's hard to relate. And I started learning that when you talk and you teach other people that haven't experienced that about what the world looks like and what you did, there's a lot of value to that. And there's a lot of people that don't realize why we do what we do. Yeah. And why things happen the way they happen.

Yeah. Well, if it's out of sight, right? Like out of sight.

Yeah.

Out of mind.

Exactly.

If I don't sit down and have a, you know, chat with Levi about some of the things that he experienced. I don't know about what people are experiencing or have experienced over there, you know. And so I think there can be a lack of appreciation for that because you don't know you don't know what you can maybe hear of things but you don't really have like a personal touch to what what actually happened or what they went through. So

Well, that's cool. What's so funny is, this happened before the last time you were on the podcast. Not in between.

Yeah.

When we had you on the podcast a couple years ago, I think you were kind of just getting into Proven Progression

Right.

Maybe you had a like a half a season or you just had started

I think I just started that season earlier in the year.

And then you spent a couple years with Proven Progression, right? And Caleb.

Yes.

I could ask you a ton of questions. Our good buddy Chase Masson. I guess we could spill the beans now. I mean, because this won't come out until it's already basically come to pass. But, you're not working this season at Proven Progression anymore.

That's correct.

And Chase Masson is basically taking, you know, filled in kind of a spot that you once had there. But you've had like three years over there.

Two and a half. About three years. Like two years of kind of a full-time gig. During the clinic season. And then a couple times before that, I jumped in and helped with some clinics.

Yeah.

Random.

Yep. So, you've spent a lot of time witnessing progression in a short amount of time.

Yes.

What are some of those levers that you saw being pulled that allowed people to progress that fast in that short a period of time?

Having the right equipment for what you're trying to do. So, a lot of people will show up as an upper beginner, intermediate level rider and, they'll be on a turbo sled and it's like, that's awesome. Like, turbo sleds are great, but if you want to progress in a technical riding sense, you're better off learning on a bone stock 850. Yeah, naturally aspirated sled or a 9R and working that way. The reason being is that the turbo, the extra power of the turbo will wear you out faster. It's more to manage and the bottom end isn't as snappy and crisp, which makes technical tree riding and those aspects a little bit harder.

Yeah,

They're a little bit heavier, too, than a naturally aspirated sled. So one, it'll work you more, and two, if you have an NA sled that's lighter, it has more of a bottom end, you can ride harder, longer, faster for most of the day, compared to a boost. And it's all about getting reps, right? So, if you do two reps on a boost and you're smoked or you can do five reps on an NA, well, you're three reps ahead.

Yeah.

Then you times that by days. Boom.

Yeah. Okay. So having the right tools for maybe the level at which you're at currently for the job that you want to do.

Exactly. And if you're like say for example, if you're wanting to do bow ties, hop overs you know all of those things and you haven't learned the foundations like and then also another aspect is let's say you don't get a ride, you know, 50 70 days a year like a lot of pro athletes do. Let's say you get like 10 days in a season or 15 days in a season. You got to make the most of each one of those days in order to progress. So, it makes more sense to be able to put in those reps on those days.

And with that, just making sure that the equipment for what you're trying to do if it's hop overs and bow ties and that the sled is set up for that or accomplishes that. Is if you have a 165 or a 175 sled and you're trying to do hop overs and bow ties, you're going to have to work harder than someone with a 155 or a 146.

Yeah.

So, well, okay, I'm going to add a follow-up question to that because that answer tells me I don't need to go to a clinic like Proven Progression. I just need to choose the right tool. But you've obviously seen the progression that people make while attending a well put on riding clinic, right? So with that in mind, what are some of those things that you that maybe are everyday occurrences that people go through during that clinic like that does speed up the progression side?

I would say a big thing is, you can see something on social media, you can see something on YouTube and

Like something someone's done on the machine.

Exactly. Like you could see a bow tie, whatever on YouTube on the internet and stuff, but until you see it in person and where people are doing those things and have it broken down, it can be a little bit more challenging. Some people are like monkey see monkey do. And we've seen people show up at the clinic, they watch one bow tie and they go do a bow tie and it's like, “Dude, it took me years to like get the bow tie down.” Yeah. Took me years to get the hop over down. Like, and then some people just monkey see monkey do.

Yeah.

And the people that monkey see monkey do, they don't always benefit or I would say that they don't benefit as much from a clinic unless they haven't seen that in person or want to see new stuff in person. Then they can see that level of rider.

Yep.

Yeah. But with Proven Progression, what's really cool is all the different levels and all the different exposure you get at those levels. Like beginner is like learning how to start your sled and go down the trail and then getting off trail a bit and then like the introductory to to turning the skis and carving it and getting it on one ski. Like that's beginner clinic and Caleb does one of those a year. Then intermediate clinic is a step up from that. That's where you've been doing beginner riding for a while. You're sidehilling. Now you want to get better at sidehilling and wrong foot forward. You want to start doing switchbacks on a hill.

Not hop overs, but switch backs. Just going side to side while climbing up a hill and then being able to put it on edge coming down a hill and do an uphill or like a downhill U-turn and go back up. You know, that's like the intermediate level rider. And then once you get good at those and you've mastered those and you're starting to look into like bow ties, hop overs and you know aired out re-entries, you know, the much crazier riding in depth. A lot of people don't get to see those different levels and some people try to run before they learn how to crawl or walk. Kind of comes down to the monkey see monkey do thing.

You know, you get like intermediate level riders that don't know how to switch back that are trying to do hop overs. It's like learn the foundation first.

Yeah. Did you ever see anyone come through on a beginner level and in the same season they come back through and they're in like an advanced clinic like did that is that you ever see anything like that?

No, but we had one guy he's from Utah. He's just the most humble guy, Steve. And he'd come he started as a beginner. I think it was a beginner or intermediate was learning how to sidehill. And mind you, he's like I want to say his mid-40s and now he's doing aired out bow ties.

Wow.

He's doing aired out bow ties. And when I first seen him, he was learning how to sidehill.

That's crazy.

It's cool.

Yeah,

It's really cool. And he just so freaking stoked loves it because he's like he and he keeps coming back because he's like every time I come back I get better.

I see. There's progression to be had.

There's progression to be had.

And for me, I got my start with Caleb when he opened up his clinics the first year. I saw it and I was like, I've been watching his YouTube. I've seen his Instagram. I'm like, I got to go to that cuz like one, I want to see like what a pro rider does and looks like to see if it is, you know, anything crazy. And I thought I was a pretty good rider when I went. I showed up and it was him and Kyle Saxton working it and it was like, I think the first full clinic. He had one just before that year. But it was like the first full advance clinic. And I showed up and I'm like, “Oh my gosh.” I got humbled fast.

I was like, “I do not know how to ride compared to what these guys are doing. They're doing bow ties.”

Freaking pinballs on the mountain, dude.

Oh man, dude. Those two are wild. Get them together. But it showed me what was possible in a sled that my mind couldn't comprehend with where I was riding and who I was riding with. It's like, “Holy crap.” Like, social media, YouTube does not do this justice. And that got me really excited. And we also like the environment is everybody wants to see everybody get better. Like like somebody lands their first hop over, everybody is like heck yeah. You know, like that support and just that camaraderie of like stoke. And that got me fired up. That was like this is cool.

Yeah.

And I know that's possible because I just watched it. And so towards the end of the season, actually it was like April of that year.

Okay.

Yeah. I think it was the 2021-2022 season. I couldn't get anybody to ride with so I was like just reaching out to everybody. I reached out to Caleb and I'm like, “Hey, like I know this is kind of crazy, but like I can't find anybody to ride with. Are you still riding? Like I'd like to link up and ride.” Cuz I just wanted to ride. Like I didn't care who it was with as long as someone was willing to ride.

And he's like, “Yeah, we're headed to Cooke City to go build jumps.” And he's like, “You're welcome to come.” He's like, “Just bring a scoop shovel or something.” I'm like, “All right, I'll be there.” And so drove to Cooke City, got a hotel room with Garrett Bennett and we just all went out and started shoveling jumps. I'm like I've never shoveled one of these before. Like I've kind of used a shovel to you know kind of clean up something that was natural but like we're stacking snow you know and it's like this is awesome.

And then that kind of started it and I hit a couple of jumps with them, and one was like a 100-plus-foot jump. I don't know how big it was but it was good size. That opened up the door when he said you should come out to my jump clinic next year. He's like I'm gonna hold a jump clinic. I was like all right. So, I kept that in mind and I'm like, I'm gonna see if I can hold him to that. And so,

Just blowing smoke. Yeah. Call him out.

Just kind of like, you know, he's like, “Hey, when's your jump clinic? Like, I'd love to come out and, you know, be a part of it.” And, “Hey, when is it?” And then he finally told me and I was like, “Sweet.” And he's like, “Yeah, you come out.” And he's like, “If you just want to like help out here and there, like that'd be awesome.” I'm like, “Okay.” And so I go out there, I'm like, he's not having me pay for it. I'm just going to, you know, just kind of have me come out and be a part of it. I think kind of more as like a friend. And I was like, I'm going to make the most of this opportunity.

And so I busted my, you know, busted my butt and did all sorts of stuff to try and help. And Chase was actually there and I met Chase at the jump clinic.

What was he like 14 years old then or what?

Yeah, we were all trying to feed him steak. So it was really cool. But that's how I got my start is I just busted butt. And then I told him I was like, “Anytime you need help, let me know.” And tried to create that opportunity. And it did. Eventually he needed a full-time, you know, someone that could wrench on sleds, someone that could show up and guide and you know, come and help with clinics. And I learned I love helping people. It's so fulfilling.

Awesome.

I think we got off topic. My bad.

No, you're good. We didn't get off topic. We're still on the topic because as far as your boss goes.

Yeah.

How is Mr. Kesterke as a boss?

Awesome. So, he does whatever he can to take care of you. And he's very driven. So he's all about trying to show you ways to create opportunity for yourself even within his business. And he did and he recommended a couple things. I think the right person who lives in the area or is single and has a good summer gig working with him would do so well and flourish if they're able to fill that position, which I think Chase is an awesome person to fill. But yeah, Caleb's awesome. Extremely driven. One of the most driven people I've ever met.

He's the type that'd be you know, get done with a clinic, go do like 3 hours worth of emails, and then go wrench on sleds till like 3:00 a.m. And then get up and do the next day of clinics like just to get stuff done. Like that's

Keep everything going.

Yeah.

Rolling.

Yeah. And then outside of clinics, like he's still the most driven person I've ever met when it comes to snowmobiling. He'll do the same thing. Get done with a full day's ride, skip dinner to do a track swap for the snow conditions so that he has the setup he wants for the snow that we had that day. For the next day.

Wow.

And then, yeah. So being around that is really cool.

Yeah. So that's Caleb, you know, as a boss, was there much difference between boss version and friend version?

Boss version, he had to stick to his guns and obviously it was like he it's his program and things, you know, if things need to be done and whatnot, then he has to hold to that. For me, I tried to maintain it like proactive and then just remain flexible, like understand like he's got a lot on his plate and so anytime thing things happen like I'm just going to expect like be flexible essentially. So I had to understand going in that, hey, there's friend us and then there's you're also my boss.

So I'm not going to make that challenging as much as I possibly can. So just kind of being proactive, you know, taking the initiative on a lot of stuff. And then a friend version really there's I think we've maintained that quite a bit. Like even just through clinic season is just we just shoot the crap on the mountain and when I saw that something needed to be done or someone needed to be helped, it's like I just did it.

Didn't wait for them.

Yeah. Then there never had to be that friction.

Yeah. That makes you know boss version not have to come out as often, right? Like you get to kind of stay in that that friend version mode and and if there ever needs to be correcting, it happens. But if not, then

Yeah,

Get to stay in friend mode a little bit longer, right?

And I made mistakes. There were times where it got frustrating and you know and I admit to that like I maybe didn't have the best attitude in certain points that were frustrating but you know ultimately he would recognize that and see that I was frustrated about maybe a certain situation and then, a little bit later, when I would still be a little frustrated, he'd shoot me a message and be like, “Hey, thank you for everything you're doing. I appreciate it.” Dude, solved it. I was no longer frustrated.

Yeah.

And having a boss that's willing to, you know, understand like, “Hey, I know this might suck. But it still needs to be done.” And then show appreciation for that. It's like awesome. Like I mean you can't ask for a better leader really in that situation.

Cool. Most I mean most people don't really see that. I don't think they see that version maybe unless you're there in person at a clinic, right? But no, I think that's some cool experience that you get to take with you. And

Like we said earlier, you've got different plans this upcoming season. Some life changes.

Yeah.

A few life changes.

Few.

Right. So, for those who want to kind of stay in the loop as far as what Levi has got going on, what are some of those changes?

Yeah. So, I ultimately had to make a decision like do I start a business or do I start a summer job that allows me to go do clinics? And I, you know, I'll be honest, I was struggling financially. Made poor financial decisions and at the end of the season this last year guiding I wasn't able to take advantage of trips to Revelstoke. I wasn't able to ride cuz I couldn't afford it and man that wrecked me. I was like I'm so passionate about this. I want to go do these things like but at the same time like I have to make that adult decision of financial responsibility because it's expensive

And you got to have a roof over your head too.

So started looking around and I wanted to get into sales because I wanted to learn how to connect with people better. I wanted to learn the people skills and then also to like better help people with things. And I come across an old job position for insurance with Farm Bureau of Idaho, who I've been with since I was a kid. And I reached out and they're like, “Oh yeah, we don't have anything.” You know, all different agents I'm reaching out. We don't have anything, but you talk to our manager and the manager manages agents and their agencies. It's like, “Okay.” He's like, “Oh, yeah.

I don't have anything, but you know, shoot me your resume and I'll take a look.” I'm like, “Okay.” Show him my resume. He gives me a holler and he's like, “Hey, I like what I see here. Like, let's sit down and have an interview.” Like, okay. Pulls me in and he's like, “I don't have anything for you, but I have a guy who's looking to retire and he could use some help getting his numbers up so that his retirement's better.” I'm like, “Okay.” like that'd be awesome. And he's like, I don't know if he's up for this, so I'll talk to him and then see if he's willing to sit down with you. It's like, okay, that sounds good.

And I prayed to God for this opportunity. Like I prayed to him. I'm like, I need help and I want to make a difference. I want to help people. Like just show me a sign. Give me a purpose. And so I prayed for this opportunity and dude he provided in the most incredible way. He provided that whole opportunity. Sat down with that gentleman. Our values align. He thinks sledding is the coolest thing. The manager thinks sledding is the coolest thing and he rides too. And I had a three-hour interview sitting down with the gentleman that I'm working for right now. And we hit it off great.

And since then, I've just been focusing and remembering my purpose. My purpose is to help people. Like selling insurance, everybody needs insurance. Like, yes, it's sales. I don't treat it like that. I treat it like helping people. And, side note, I'll have my own agency come December 1st.

Really?

So, I'll be building my own basically business. Within a business.

Yep. So you get to scratch that, because that was one of the decisions you were trying to make earlier. Do I start a business, or something else. In a roundabout way.

Yeah.

Cool part about this is insurance is about networking and creating, you know, that client base. Well, I can call around and talk to people about sledding most of the day.

A little bit about insurance.

I get paid for it. It's like that's awesome. I get to help people and talk about sledding like all day long pretty much. And the other part of that is with networking that opens up the door for having conversations that also help grow the sport. Yeah. So, like my snowmobile club has the Magic Valley Snowmobile Grass Drags every year and they've been doing it for like 30 years. I'm like, why don't we turn this at our fairground? Why don't we turn this into like basically what the Sno Barons have done over in Minnesota and have a West Coast, you know, event that brings everybody together and really grows the mountain side of things.

Like gets all the pro riders there, gets all the big manufacturers there, gets all the vendors there, gets mom and pop off the street. And it's like, so if we get, you know, it's around Halloween, so if we have a trunk or treat and all the vendors and the swap meet and racers are having a trunk or treat, we promote that and create a Halloween themed Tater Days essentially.

Yep.

We call it Tater Days. I jumped the gun on that, but

Spilled the beans on us.

Yeah. But we get that now we're getting people off the street that aren't even, like, don't know anything about powersports or aren't into powersports. Kid hops on a little sled or in a side-by-side, looks at mom and dad, he's like, “I want one.” Dad starts getting in his head like, “Yeah, this could be a fun family thing.” Like, “This is cool.” Next thing you know, he's over at the swap meet looking at sleds for the family.

Yeah.

Or he's down at the dealership looking at sleds for the family. Like, that's how we grow our sport. We create that sense of community and something that's exciting and then we expose people to it. And kids are, like I said earlier, like they're at a vulnerable stage. And if we surround them by hardworking people that are working hard for these expensive things and around something that's a lot of fun, like we're going to develop people from a young age that are effective members of society and working hard to either go out and get a good paying career or start a business and building that.

Yeah. Well, they get to see, oh, I want this experience or I want this nice thing and I got to see what hard work did in order to get that thing. It didn't just poof and there it was.

Yeah. And you get them start like you show people it's okay to start out on like an old iron or like just a little sled or whatever just to get started. You get your toes wet and you have good experience with that. People get passionate about sledding. People get driven. It becomes their like the reason why they show up to work every day, reason why they do what they do. And that's how you get the growth of manufacturers is because when you start cultivating that from a young age and focusing on those younger groups, they're going to work hard to get the newer stuff.

Yeah.

Because they get more passionate and they're willing to work hard and do what it takes to get to that point.

They want the right tool. The job that they want to do.

Exactly. And that's how you sell and you create that community that really helps the manufacturers quite a bit, which they've been struggling a little bit. Like they've had to do, you know, budget cuts and stuff like that. And it's hard to see because those budget cuts, it's like a snowball effect. Like you take one company and that they're, you know, have a pretty good presence and then you see that cut back a little bit and then they no longer have that presence because the budget cut. Well, then events kind of they're not as fun.

They don't they're not able to go to events and then that triggers other companies that may not go to the event. Then the event gets smaller. Then there's less effort put into the event and there's less people who show up to the event.

Snowball

And then boom. Yeah. It just keeps trickling. Yeah. You get rid of you know, you get rid of 120s and 200s. Well,

What are the kids going to ride? Yeah.

What are the little ones going to ride? That's those are the ones that are going to be buying the new sleds down the road.

Yeah.

It's like, no, we got to focus the other way. Like not focus on what we have currently, but focus on the future. Invest in the future that will then grow.

So, the cool thing is, with insurance I was able to go to my snowmobile club two and a half weeks before our grass drags and pitch to them in a meeting that hey let's turn this thing let's call it Tater Days cuz we're in Idaho like most Idaho name you could give it and add a swap meet and let's try to grow this thing and they were all about it they voted for it so we moved forward changed the name to Tater Days and went out and just started networking my head off And basically

I saw you at the last SnoWest show, Utah.

Yeah.

You were networking, bud.

Yeah. And we were grinding hard for two and a half weeks. And you know what? We grew the event from 450 people the year before to like 1,200 people. And we had 50% more racers come out for a total of 164. We raced from like I want to say it was like nine o'clock is when races started to might have been earlier, but like nine o'clock to I think it was 7:45 is when the last race was. It was dark. And the club was like freaking out because it's like there's money on the line and we're racing into dark which has never happened and it's like this isn't really safe.

And so but we end up doing it, made it happen and then got a lot of excitement. Can-Am sponsored it. Polaris sponsored it. Klim sponsored it. Cody Spencer came out. Dustin with Klim came out. They brought their sleds and they battled it out. They used to do it back in the day with grass drags. And Dave Wagner was a huge part of that. He got me in touch with some of those guys and you know he's got a big heart for the sport, very passionate about the sport and we're gonna make some great things happen.

Awesome. Let's throw it out there into the world here.

Yeah.

Can you bring that out west and replicate what they've built? I don't know. What do you think?

I think... oh, go ahead.

No, go ahead. We're asking them. Because I think that's a valid and a great question.

Yeah. One of the big questions is, well, there's a lot more snowmobilers over there, so you're going to have a lot more traffic. It's like, you're right. There are a lot more snowmobilers out there. The biggest thing with business or anything is like you have a problem, find a solution. The solution is let's get people off the street that aren't into these sports here. Let's increase our market for these events.

Yeah.

You do that. Now the numbers are there and now you're building the sport because people who aren't into it are starting to get interested in it and they're curious about it. And so you build recognition, you build the sport. Well, then what happens? Well, now when you have an event that grows and builds, you're going to have the trickle effect, that opposite of the dwindling. You're going to have this the industry grow and you're going to have other events like this like SnoWest out here, which is awesome. I've been coming to them forever. You're going to see those start to grow, too, because now you have more. Yep. More human capital. Yeah.

Yeah. And really the goal is that we need to do what we can to grow the industry.

Yeah, obviously I 100,000% agree with that because if there's no snowmobile industry, we don't have a business like Deviant Ink, right? So, yeah. We try and support as many events as we can. We like going to them, like attending them. We like sitting down and chatting with people on podcasts at them. And dude,

I think they're kicking us out. Do you see what's going on right here?

I've been looking at you most of the time. I just look up and I'm like, “Holy crap, half our booth is down.”

Yeah.

But yeah, I think what you're doing with Tater Days is cool. You've had this itch

Yeah.

That you've expressed to me for a while, over a year, I think, as we first started chatting about it. It'll be cool to see where this goes. Yeah. Excited to kind of follow the different version of Levi. You know different occupation still same drive and passion.

Yeah.

And see how you're able to make all of that work together and be a positive person in the sled space.

Yeah. So I see my purpose now. I see that take my experience in the industry, take my passion for the industry. I still want to push myself as an athlete. Like I, you know, still want to get upside down. Like that's, you know, I want to be an athlete. That's just a childhood dream of mine and I'm still chasing.

But you know, one of the other cool things and I just I would like to touch base on this real quick. The Idaho State Snowmobile Association, every state that snowmobiles has a snowmobile association. And the Idaho State Snowmobile Association is who goes and keeps our land access open and they work together with the clubs, the snowmobile clubs. The clubs provide the funding for the Idaho State Snowmobile Association, which keeps lands open. Right now, there's some big changes happening for Idaho come January 24th. And our club president, who's younger and pretty excited, is going to be the next ISSA president.

He's wanting to revamp the ISSA and bring awareness to it. And one of the ways he's doing that is bringing a position that they're looking at voting me in for. And that's an event coordinator where I go around with clubs throughout the state of Idaho and help them build events that benefit them, increase member participation and things like that. Memberships have been down for a while because it's been like a, oh, that's how we've always done it and that's how we're going to continue doing it and or a drunk fest out on the mountain. Like the poker runs and stuff have been pretty not family-friendly.

And so a lot of people are like, “No, I'd rather go rip and have fun.” It's like, how do we change that?

Yeah.

Well, I have a couple of ideas and one of them is

Put Levi out of work.

Yeah. One of them is we have a warming hut area that is awesome for a family to get to and pretty big warming hut. What if a club sets up a barbecue, sells burgers, sells hot dogs, makes some money for the club, sells cocoa, chocolate, hot chocolate. We build with a cat, or the groomer, build a little kitty track for the kids to come out and rip all their 120s, 200s because we got to focus on them. Build something where the kids come out and they're just like having a blast. Do some hill climbs right off right from the warming hut like right there. Hill climb drag races and there's spots to build jumps with already natural booters

Like a little terrain park almost.

Like a little, yeah. All within eyesight of the warming hut.

Yeah, that's cool. So now you get to expose kids to the jumping, kids to the drag racing, drag racers to the jumping,

And vice versa. Big family event.

Yeah,

That's cool. That's something I would show up to. Like if we're building jumps, like that's what I'm interested in. That's what our age group's interested in.

Yeah.

And not everybody wants to go do that.

Not everybody gets to see that either.

Yeah. So if we create that like you grow that event, you grow membership participation because like, we just show them like hey for us to keep doing this just sign up be a member that helps support this that help keeps it going

And it's very inexpensive. Yeah.

Like very inexpensive.

Yeah. Cool.

Looking to do that all over the state of Idaho. Work with clubs. Do that. That'll be next year if everything goes as planned, in 2026.

Or December.

Well, we're looking at possibly if it all goes through in January, possibly in April doing an event in right near Burley, Idaho at Pomerelle. Got to talk to them. Got some stuff in the works. Be on the lookout for that cuz if that ends up working out and we can move forward with that, that's going to be a party.

That's all Donkey Kong.

Yeah. Like let's I'll just say jumps, drag races on a lake on a frozen lake and hill climbing all within an eyesight.

Wow.

Yeah.

Okay. Lot of fun. Well, we will keep an eye out for that and when this goes when this is published, it won't be too long until potentially that happens as well. So, as far as timing goes, great timing. We're getting kicked out here. We've got people. We are like the last little section of our booth here. But Levi, thanks for coming on. A two-timer here at Sledder Cast.

Yeah.

And, we're excited to follow along and see what your next moves are in helping grow the sport of snowmobiling. So,

Thank you. Thanks for having me on and all your support, man. I appreciate it.

Cool. Okay. All right. Thanks, guys.

Thank you.