By Stephen W Clark, AmSnow's Western Editor

It has been quite a while since my last blog here on AmSnow.com and with winter fast approaching I figured now would be a good time to post a little update with what's been going on over the last few months. Following an extremely hectic winter last year that was full of travel with assignments stretching across the snowbelt from the West to the Midwest things finally slowed down in late Spring.

I spent the summer photographing motorcycle races and track days on weekends while spending many hours behind the keyboard writing articles and sorting images for this winters AmSnow magazines. I'm not going to complain because my summer workload allowed plenty of time for several extremely enjoyable motorcycle trips where I rode some of the best roads in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.

I have decided that the same mountain roads that I slip and slide along all winter in a truck are a lot more enjoyable on a motorcycle. One of the highlights of the summer was the last snowmobile ride of the year in June on the annual snowmobile camping trip with the guys from MotorFist.

In a way I consider HayDay's the kick-off to the snowmobile season, as it's the first time I get to see all my industry friends again. This year AmSnow mountain test rider Josh Skinner and I drove the 1200 mile trip east to Minnesota with a quick visit to Mount Rushmore on the way. It was a fun trip but on the way across Nebraska we decided that airplanes were better suited to such long trips. HayDays was hot and dusty but as always a great event with thousands of eager snowmobiles milling the show.

Things have been a bit of blur since HayDays with shows and dealership open-houses almost every weekend. Working with my marketing clients in the snowmobile industry I have traveled to shows in Colorado, Utah, Washington and a several here in Idaho. The shows this year have been excellent; following a winter with great snow the snowmobilers are really excited for this winter. Many companies in the industry have reported excellent sales this winter and many dealerships are really happy with their sales. Considering the general state of the economy I would say that the snowmobile industry is doing pretty well.

Here in Idaho winter is fast approaching, it is a little later than last year as by this time last year we had already ridden several times. I have heard of some guys riding already but this year I have decided to resist the temptation to get on the snow too early, as it always seems to lead to broken parts. Josh was able to sneak out of his day job for a 40 mile road ride already before flying off to Asia for a work trip.

The show season is winding down now and the first ISOC snocross race at Duluth is coming up soon. Ill be making the trip out to Duluth over Thanksgiving weekend to cover the event and we should be able to start riding when I return. I'm super stoked to get back on the snow again and start logging miles on the AmSnow test sleds and really curious to ride the new Arctic Cat's this season. We spent some time on the prototypes last spring but it's always difficult to form much of an impression in a couple days, so it will be nice to get some seat time on the production machines and form a opinion on how this new chassis really works.

I'm going to try and post as many updates on here as possible this winter but with travel and other deadlines I'm not making any promises. Keep an eye on the West Report in every issue of AmSnow for what we have been up to and in the March issue we will have a comparison between the 2012 mountain sleds with the performance data on each machine. I for one am really curious to see how the new Cat is going to stack up against the others. Hopefully the snow keeps falling and we can all be on the snow before too long.