If you have followed the quad industry over the past several years you have been able to witness a David and Goliath type of a confrontation in the marketplace. Polaris, a relatively small Minneapolis based company, has risen from what seemed to be nowhere to challenge the established Japanese manufacturers and attempt to unseat Honda as the number one ATV sales leader. It is not hard to see why Polaris has such a winning strategy. They have the broadest line of machines available (a total of 16 models for ’97), combined with some unique user friendly features, and that "Made in the USA" appeal. I wanted to see what all this hype was about for myself so I approached the good folks at R&R Sports to see if they would let some of the ORC staffers and myself try out a few of the new ’97 Polaris machines. R&R was glad to oblige and the adventure began….

It didn’t take much to collect several fellow ORC staff members to join me in the adventure. In the end, six of us plus several additional friends and a couple of perspective R&R customers made up the rider group. Riding experience ranged from over 15 years of ATC (three wheeler)/ATV experience on through to no ATV experience at all. Some had ridden off road motorcycles and some only street bikes. Of the group only two are current ATV owners. None had any previous experience with the Polaris ATVs.

We met at R&R Sports on what turned out to be a perfect spring like Sunday morning. We met there first not only to share a box of donuts but also to become familiar with the quads prior to heading out to the ride spot. The R&R Folks required us all to complete the Polaris sanctioned safety training session. This same training is required by Polaris before any customer is allowed to take their newly purchased machine home. As far as I know, this is the most aggressive safety program in the industry. The training consists of a short video presentation that covers all the standard Polaris features and functions. It also covered basic riding gear and riding techniques. A multiple choice test is given to make sure that the main points are absorbed and finally a short riding test is given to make sure that the rider can safely start, stop and maneuver the machine through a figure eight type pattern. All and all I think that this is a great program and a great way for new riders to get a safe start in the world of ATVing.