Bright Colors – Grab the shades bro, the Ski-Doo color pallette just go a little weird for 2015. We suspect someone up in the Valcourt Industrial Design studio may have dropped some acid and took a trip back to a bit more vivid time. With the Freeride color combo featuring magenta spindles and rails and what Ski-Doo calls Manta Green taking top honors for the “what the hell were you thinking award”. Seems dealers may have been less than pleased with the color choices too, as not long after the Ski-Doo spring dealer meeting did Ski-Doo also offer the always safe color option of black on most key models.
Two Way Throttle – One of the items Ski-Doo brass bragged about during the new model dog and pony shows this past winter was their new easy to rotate iTC throttle block, allowing for the use of finger throttle. It’s a cute feature and one that has been used long before 2015, most notably aboard the Yamaha Inviter. Yup that one was a sales success wasn’t it?
No More Trail Fan – With the expansion of the 900 ACE into more and more trail models, we’ve lost another classic learner sled this year with the MXZ 550 fan going the way of the Dodo bird. Sure the ACE is high tech, but we can’t help but feel there is still a place for the simple to operate and lightweight 550 fan in the marketplace, especially for the next generation of riders.
See Through Handguards – Fads come and go, and while handguards have their virtues, especially on the snocross track, could this be a fad that is waning? Don’t tell that to Ski-Doo though, they just invested in new tooling to come up with a transparent design. However if we have another repeat of this past winter, we will just opt for a bigger window instead.
