Snow Goer February 2026 | Page 9

As of February 1, Denis Le Vot will head BRP as its new CEO.

Le Vot is a former top executive at Renault Group. During his tenure at Renault, he turned the subsidiary Dacia into one of Renault’ s top-selling brands. He will replace the retiring Jose Boisjoli, who led the company for 22 years and worked at BRP for 36 years.

“ The automotive industry shares multiple similar market dynamics with the powersports industry, and we look forward to drawing on his wealth of experience in this sector,” said Barbara Samardzich, lead independent director for BRP.

The French Le Vot is an engineer by trade. He joined Renault Group in 1990, where he gained experience and expertise over the next 30 years by holding several leadership positions in marketing, sales, after-sale services, operations and supply chain management. He’ s worked in multiple countries including the U. S. but not Canada.

Each winter, the double-deck Portage Lake Lift Bridge, connecting the Michigan mainland to the Keweenaw Peninsula, converts its lower level into a snowmobile trail. The lift bridge drops its bottom deck down to near-lake level, and the top deck serves motor vehicles. In early December, trucks brought in 32,400 cubic feet of snow for the 1,310-foot bridge span. In all, the job required 60 dump truck loads and about five hours to complete. The Keweenaw Snowmobile Club, the city of Houghton, the Michigan departments of Transportation and Natural Resources, and the U. S. Coast Guard worked together to make it happen.

In this Snow Goer tech tip, we walk through the key steps for removing a Ski-Doo Gen 4 hood and replacing the spark plugs— two procedures that open the door to a wide range of maintenance tasks on these sleds.

Denis Le Vot

NOW!

Ski-Doo Gen 4 Hood Removal & Spark Plug Replacement

CREDIT: VISIT KEWEENAW

Nelson, center, on a clone of the snowmobile that he used to win the 1976 I-500 cross-country race

Nearly 50 years after winning the

1976 Winnipeg I-500, Brian Nelson was back on his John Deere Liquidator taking a lap around a field. The machine, a duplicate of his original race sled, was painstakingly restored by vintage enthusiasts in North Dakota, led by Deere fanatics Roger and Wyatt Kram.

The restoration was inspired by the Snowmobile Hall of Fame’ s planned 2026 tribute to Nelson and the“ Year of the Deere” theme for its annual gathering, held this year on February 20-21 in St. Germain, Wis. The sled will be the grand prize in its fundraising raffle, drawn that weekend.

The Krams located a 1976 John Deere Liquifire 340 last March to use as the sled base. The Liquidator at its base is very similar to the Cyclone and the first generation Liquifire, Wyatt Kram said.

Then they started to collect parts— including a restored engine, delivered in person, from Saskatoon.“ This build was made up of new and NOS parts that would fit many models, restored parts from other models, custom fabricated parts just for the Dator, and most importantly aside from the VIN number are the rare parts that we managed to find to complete the build,” Kram said.“ We have said that this beat-up Dator tunnel on a shelf may have never been restored if it wasn’ t for this undertaking due to the large number of rare parts needed to complete it.”

By December, everything was in place to piece the clone together on a designated build day. Among the crew who came to help was Nelson.

Raffle tickets cost $ 10 and can be purchased online at www. snowmobilehalloffame. com.

FEBRUARY 2026 / SNOWGOER. COM / 9