If you’ve been watching Polaris and its short list of pure 2-uppers found in its snowmobile roster, you could easily say the bloom is off the rose when it comes to 2-passenger touring sleds. We’re not so sure.

The Polaris approach has been to put focus on the versatility of its 600 and 800 Adventure series when equipped with a 2-up seat and forgo the concept of a dedicated 2-person sled. But is there less demand for fully equipped twofers than in the past?

We can remember in the early 1990s when the first 2-uppers were offered. Those first touring sleds created a groundswell of interest and it wasn’t long before all four OEMs had a bunch to sell.

To be fair, there are still a lot of regions where 2-uppers sell really well and it depends on the nature of the trails there (smooth, wide and high speed) and the acceptability among their peers of buyers who want to ride with a companion more than by themselves. However, today, with prices increasing and more and more variations on long tracked sleds available, the picture is changing.

The Polaris Adventure series and Cat’s Pantera 3000 and 7000 can be used as single passenger rides and look neither bulky nor out of place in that role when touring add-ons are removed. What will turn the corner with public opinion is if these double-duty-tourers can offer handling and performance comparable with a sportier sled and still be warm and comfortable enough to keep a second passenger happy.

Probably Ski-Doo has the most 2-rider-specific line-up of any of the OEMs. Its Grand Touring SE and LE are certainly derived from other models like the Renegade but are very much targeted at a certain kind of touring rider who rides 2-up most of the time.

On the other hand, Ski-Doo has fallen in line and created a Swiss Army Knife, multi-purpose sled in the Enduro. Will the Enduro (when an aftermarket 2-up seat is in place) become the 2-up sled of choice for the kind of touring customers Ski-Doo has fostered for so long? Even if it did, we’re not sure it would appeal to Ski-Doo’s Quebec market that much (2-up sales are very strong there).

It remains to be seen if industry-wide 2-up sales will fall, maintain or maybe even take an upsurge. We can pretty much guarantee one thing, however: Touring sleds are going to look, be equipped and behave a lot different over the next decade.

For the last couple years we’ve been fighting the industry urge to create a new definition of what a crossover sled is.

Originally, a crossover was a 137-inch trail sled with either a 15 or 16-wide track. If you’ve owned or ridden one of these sleds you know how great they are on trails and how well they work in powder. To us, that was the definition of a crossover sled. Apparently, that’s not correct anymore.

Today’s crossover is a 141, 144, 146 or even a 154-incher with an uncoupled, modified mountain skidframe and a 1.75-inch or deeper-lugged track.

We were pretty adamant the OEMs had some screws loose on this definition until we had a chance to sample a couple of new sleds this year. First was the new Polaris Switchback Assault 144. This new AXYS-based sled is incredible! Honestly, it trail rides every bit as good as anything else with a coupled skidframe and its combined lightness and power-to-weight ratio makes it unstoppable in powder.

One sled is not enough. Next, we rode Cat’s High Country Limited. This sled is available with either a 153 or a 141 uncoupled skidframe. We were shocked again. Although it is so close to being a mountain sled (especially the 153) we couldn’t believe how good a job Cat has done with this sled’s suspension calibration.

It, too, rides trails beautifully and with it’s various track combos is flat-out awesome in deep snow. Yeah, it really is a crossover and oh, we should mention both the above sleds handle on trails with surprisingly good agility, despite their longer tracks.

We were curious to see if Ski-Doo could match Polaris and Cat with ride compliance in this category. The unchanged-for 2017 Backcountry and Backcountry X, although delivering a decent ride, are not quite up to the Assault and High Country’s trail riding level this year – but are very close.

Those two Ski-Doos are laser-focused on the freestyle market and really prioritize powder performance first. We fully expect a re-calibration next year, though, because the competition has definitely delivered.

Not to be undone, Yamaha has come with a B-TX series in both the SideWinder SE and LE and these sleds come in 153-inch lengths. We rode them last March and walked away amazed. For sure, there’s no shortage of power and they still ride and handle really good on trails.

So, I guess we’re converted. The new breed of crossovers really, truly are just that: Crossovers!

It’s interesting how the Side x Side biz is playing right into the hands of the sno-mo-biz – or maybe it’s the other way around?

In any case, the emergence of amazingly powerful, tightly packaged, CVT friendly engines being used in high performance SxSs have “snowmobile friendly” written all over them.

Polaris is the SxS leader with over a 50-percent share of the market and a stranglehold on the hero-building Pure Sport segment with the company’s RZR performance vehicles. Polaris’ snowmobile division is locked in the snowmobile business’s number two market share position but has remarkably achieved this without a serious 4-stroke powered offering.

The Pro Star series of SxS 4-stroke twins include at least two and possibly three variants we suspect will fit into the current AXYS chassis. Pro Star 4-strokes are all DOHC twins – most displacing just under 1000ccs and fully CVT compatible. In fact, Polaris off-road vehicles use what is a virtual copy of the legendary P-90 Polaris snowmobile-derived primary clutch.

Throw in this reality: Polaris doesn’t want to be a “me-too” entrant into the 4-stroke snowmobile market. Using the lightweight Pro Star engine platform would likely put the company in the enviable position of “lightest 4-stroke snowmobiles” category.

The 100-hp normally-aspirated Pro Star would be a shoe-in to compete with Ski-Doo’s MX-Z and Renegade ACE 900 models claiming 90 ponies. The second Pro Star we think makes sense in an AXYS chassis is the latest 168-hp turbocharged variant of the RZR 1000. With Arctic Cat and Yamaha stealing the top performance spotlight with their new Yamaha-built 180-horse turbo triples, the acceptance of 4-stroke engines in sleds just got a huge shot in the (swing) arm.

While on the topic let’s talk about Ski-Doo’s obvious opportunity to participate in the turbo 4-stroke game. The new Maverick X3 Turbo – a dead-on competitor for Polaris’ RZR Turbo, is powered by a tight, lithe 3-cylinder 900cc ACE mill kicking out 153-hp.

This engine is CVT ready and maybe more importantly, the power-pack looks so compact those of us in the snowmobile media strongly suspect what’s going on. They (Rotax) could easily have spread out the components in the X3 engine package and saved jing on tooling. We suspect Can-Am intends to spread the cost of development of this all-new ACE turbo over more platforms – including snowmobiles and PWC.

This time around it looks to us like the snowmobile industry is going to benefit from the exploding popularity of ultra-high-performance SxSs. Ski-Doo is already in a good spot in the 4-stroke market with three popular engine offerings (1170cc triple, ACE 600 and ACE 900). However, the company needs to behave like the leader they are and not let Yamaha and Arctic Cat steal the high profile, brand-building cache that comes from offering the highest performance snowmobile available.

Stay tuned!