Futures Takes Flight - Alworth Scholarship

Hometown: Baudette

High School: Lake of the Woods High School

College: University of Minnesota Duluth (bachelor's)

Field of Study: Mechanical Engineering

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After two summers working at Polaris Motorsports, Derek has forgotten about a desk.

Derek Zimney’s childhood was filled with motors and machines. He started riding snowmobiles when he was five years old. His father was an automotive mechanic. Zimney spent his youth in Baudette, Minnesota riding around and working on with dirt bikes and snowmobiles. He thought, for a while, that when he grew up and got a desk job the work he filled his childhood with would only be a hobby. After two summers working at Polaris Motorsports, Derek has forgotten about a desk.

In the summer of 2007, Zimney returned to Polaris Motorsports for his second summer as an engineering intern. When he arrived his boss put a pile of information in front of him and told him to “go at it.” He considered a variety of problems and sometimes he didn’t know the answer. He walked around the work facility, asking questions and learning from his co-worker’s experience. And the solutions weren’t always, and aren’t always right.

Zimney and other Polaris’ engineers are working on machines that will hit the market in five or six years. Zimney can’t divulge any details of his work. What he was able to share is that Polaris, like many other vehicle manufacturers, is responding to what Zimney calls “America’s clean fuel trip.” Making smaller and more efficient machines to meet the public’s demand means that Zimney and his co-workers are making all of the parts inside of a snowmobiles smaller and more efficient.

Making cleaner snowmobiles is something that Zimney has a lot of experience in. For the past two years he has been taking part in the annual Clean Snowmobile Challenge, hosted my Michigan Tech in Houghton. The competition consists of teams comprised of engineering students that take a production snowmobile and rework it to be cleaner, quieter, and more fuel efficient while still letting it be a fun for riders.

That isn’t always easy. Zimney says many times the proposed solution doesn’t work. The cost gets too high or all the pieces don’t fit together. But he has found that many small failures can, in the end, produce results in unimaginable ways.

“Making mistakes can help you to find new alternatives. You have to go out on a limb.” Zimney and his University of Minnesota Duluth team took the right risks and ended up winning first place at last year’s competition. The Clean Snowmobile Challenge also demonstrated Zimney’s talents. As a result of his involvement he was offered yet another internship with a major snowmobile manufacturer, Bombadier. In the end he decided to return to Polaris.

But how does a kid from Baudette who loved snowmobiles find such great opportunities?

Zimney says, “You have to make opportunities for yourself.”

After landing his Polaris internship he continued to work hard and take risks. He would go up to co-workers and ask them what they were working on, listen to their ideas and offer his insights. While was always trying to learn, he said he was genuinely interested in the products that he enjoys taking out into the Minnesota winter.

“If you are afraid of failure, you are in the wrong industry. If you can’t accept failure you will not enjoy your work.”

“You can’t just go and do your job, or you will never excel,” Zimney said. “If you are afraid of failure, you are in the wrong industry. If you can’t accept failure you will not enjoy your work.”

And what’s not to enjoy? Zimney is working with his favorite toys. He has learned that engineering allows students opportunities to improve our lives and their own; and that it doesn’t have to be boring. He describes engineering as the process of taking a product— any product-- from beginning to end. Which means everything from making initial calculations to riding the newest snowmobile.

“You can never start early enough pursuing your interests.”

Fifteen years ago, Zimney started riding snowmobiles. He didn’t know he would one day be working to make his snowmobile faster and more fuel-efficient. But Zimney says, “You can never start early enough pursuing your interests.”