The Rathwell Snowmobile Derby looked a lot different this year, with very little snow until the day it happened. President Bailey Delf says they felt that despite the lack of snow, it was important to go ahead with the event.

"There's so much work that goes into this derby. With all the volunteers, it's well over 100 people with shifts and timeframes to work throughout the day. It's really hard to move our event, so we had to go through with it. It's our 50th, we knew our community is resilient, and people always come out."

He says the event saw a smaller crowd, but felt good about the funds they raised throughout the day.

"We were down a little bit on attendance. We had probably between 300 and 400 people, where last year we were closer to five or six hundred people. So, we were probably down about 50 per cent on attendance, but we still did about 20 per cent better on gross revenue."

The event saw them give away three big prizes: a snowmobile, a Traeger Smoker, and an Elkhorn Resort & Spa gift certificate. Winners were announced on the event's Facebook page.

Delf notes that the organizers want to get younger people involved in it to help ensure the event continues in the future.

"It takes a lot of people. As generations get older, I'm really trying to get the younger crowd involved in this. We grew up attending the raffle derbies on Sunday nights before the school week, hang out with your friends and try to win some prizes. I'm trying to get the young crowd in there to replace the older generation so they can sit back and watch us try to fill the shoes they've put in place."

Delf added, he thinks this is a event which holds a lot of pride in the Rathwell community.

"If there's one thing our community can do well, it's put on a snowmobile derby. That's our thing that we do."

Winners of the prizes were as follows:

- 2024 Ski Doo - Dan Collet

- Traeger Smoker - Tom Coutts

- Elkhorn Resort & Spa Gift Certificate - Bud Frizzley