Recently, Midwest Vintage Snowmobile Racing hosted the Andy Englund Fast 50, A memorial vintage snowmobile race on Long Lake in Isanti, Minnesota, celebrating the life of Andy Englund. Andy passed away unexpectedly in 2012. The Englund family was a big part of this sport and, to this day enjoy putting together a race in honor of what Andy loved to do.
This type of racing is all vintage snowmobiles, 1973 and older, with single-cylinder engines. As one might imagine, this makes for entertaining fun that keeps spectators and riders alike interested in more!
The Fast 50 is a 50-mile Endurance race, 16 laps total, with 4 major classes.
- HD (engines that came with HD-sized Tillotson Carb)
- HR (engines that came with HR sized carb)
- Enticer (Yamaha Enticer 250cc budget class)
- Women’s (all snowmobiles piloted by female drivers)
This event has been going on for many years, but in the past few it’s been difficult to keep the interest going for these older sleds. Organizers were ecstatic about seeing the entries of this years event at 61 total participants. This is double what past events have been in recent years and shows great signs for racing in the future.
Winners of each class for 2026
- HD – Zach O’Mara
- HR – Jay Englund
- Enticer – Cody Thomsen
- Womens – Emma Ramacher
MWVSR has a full series dedicated to this era of snowmobiles; they run multiple short track races on Rush Lake in Rush City, MN. See their website for the schedule and the extended list of available classes.
If you have an old vintage Arctic Cat, or some other vintage snowmobile, and might want to give this series a try, check out the Midwest vintage snowmobile racing website and come check out an event!
Enjoy the images showing Arctic Insiders’ own Zach O’Mara, and some of the entertaining fun of the short track night race they do each season.
Photos from: Amanda Stepaniak Photography
See a lot of interesting mods on the old Puma chassis. Nice work. I think it’s great that Cats first real race chassis is still being driven angry 56 years later….. Timeless design that inspired other seventies race sleds.
Could you imagine a vintage Puma racer with the modern 400 lc Cat single? 65 hp and light weight. Hmmmmm.