Iditarod 2008

[Stretch]

Alaska's annual Iditarod dogsled race started yesterday morning in Anchorage.

They'll do the re-start in Willow this afternoon, with 96 mushers vying to be the first into Nome, over a 1049-mile course.

I won't spend a penny on NASCAR shit, but I did subscribe to Iditarod Insider, so I could get daily video coverage.  Naturally, there's not a single minute of TV race coverage in the Lower 48.

http://www.iditarod.com/

[Stretch]

During my Alaska trip last summer...

My Bro and I rode from Anchorage to Seward for some sightseeing by boat.  We made reservations for an all-day scenic charter the next morning, leaving us with a few hours to kill...

Ever since I was a kid, I have been enthralled by Jack London's stories about the Arctic.  "White Fang" and "Call of the Wild", especially.  These two books are sort of the same, yet ass-backwards:

"Call of the Wild" is the story of a dog who turns wolf, and "White Fang" is the story of a wolf who turns dog.

Both dogs briefly served as sled dogs, and London goes into great detail describing the gear, sleds, clothing, dogs, and the mushers.  I've been a big fan of sled dogs and mushers, but down here in the Deep South, they're as rare as Transylvanian cowboys.

Lo and behold, 2004 Iditarod winner Mitch Seavey's place is just outside Seward, and he gives tours.  Hot damn, I knew what we were doing that afternoon.


He has over a hundred Alaskan Huskies in his kennel, and breeds dogs for other mushers as well.  These racing dogs are not the big, burly Malamutes and Siberian Huskies we see in the pictures (although many non-racing mushers do still run them).

These Alaskan Huskies are the canine equivalent of marathon racers:  smaller and lean, with not a trace of fat anywhere.  They can be all different colors as well.  




This is Tread, the lead dog on Seavey's 2004 Iditarod-winning team.  He was TEN years old at the time.  What a fantastic dog, a true champion in every sense of the word.  He's retired now, leading a happy life of eating, sleeping, and humpin' da biznitches.  :D


In order to train pups, Seavey and his people use these wheeled carts to get the dogs used to being tied in and working as a team.  Dogs are a lot like people, in that some simply do not get along with each other, so the musher has to figure out which dogs work well with each other and use those strengths to his best advantage.

During tourist season, They give tourists a two-mile ride on the carts:


Click on this photo for a video.



This was our musher for the day, Mark Resiska.  Keep your eye on him.  He's training to run the Iditarod race next year (starts the first Saturday in March and takes about 9 days to run the 1,100 miles from Anchorage to Nome).

This was one of the high points of the whole trip.

Mitch Seavy is one of the mushers in this year's race, although our tourguide, Mark, is not.  Too bad.  Maybe next year, though.

[aeronca]

cool pix. i used to see alot of those guy heading up there when i worked out on the flight line, not so much now in the hangar. this time of year i always find good mags about dog mushing on our frieghter's and combi's, if i find some i'll save them for you and send you a pm(so you can tell me where to send them), cant gaurentee anything though.sewards a neat place, wish i could live there. i alway's liked soldatna on the way out to homer. did you go to the sled dog museum in wassila? check out sue henery's books(murder mysteries) set all over alaska. :)

[Stretch]

I would love the magazines, if there are any to be had, thanks.  I'll gladly reimburse for shipping and your time.

I didn't know about the museum in Wasilla, even though we rode through there.  Next time, perhaps.

Sometime I'm going to fly up in the winter and go on a three or four day dogsled trip.




We rode through Soldotna (ate lunch there, if I recall), but we didn't really spend any time there... just passing through on the way to Homer and some halibut fishing.

Thanks for the heads-up about Sue Henery.  I'm an avid reader, and will look for them.

I've read nearly all of Tony Hillerman's mysteries set in the Navajo Reservation in New Mexico and Arizona (which I now love since visiting there on a previous motorcycle trip).

[aeronca]

here you go stretch baby http://www.adn.com/iditarod/. good race this year.   oh yeah, if you get up this way there's a dog sled team about 15 miles up the road from in index(home of big foot). will post more race results soon.

[Stretch]

Yep...

Lance Mackey crossed the finish line at Nome Wednesday morning at 2:48 Alaska time.  His total time for the 1039-mile race was 9 days, 11 hours, 46 minutes, and 48 seconds, average speed:  4.88 mph.  

This is his second Iditarod win... he won last year also.

He came in with 11 of his 16 dogs (as dogs get exhausted, hurt, or sick, they are pulled from the team and kept in a vet's care).

39 teams are still out there, heading toward Nome.

Badasses, the lot.

[Stretch]

And the race is over.

The last team crossed the line in Nome yesterday evening at 8:36 Alaska time.

This was Deborah Bicknell's first Iditarod at age 62.

Her time was 15 days, 5 hours, 36 minutes, and 12 seconds, for an overall average speed of 3.04 MPH.

[aeronca]

hey stretch, check this out.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/200 ... etrevealed

[Stretch]

You mean I'm always going to be this slow?

[aeronca]

october 14th on discovery chanel - there will be a reality show based on the iditarod. made by the same people that do the deadliest catch. looks really good.

[Stretch]

Sweet!  Thanks for the heads-up.  I will be on the lookout for it.

[AK Tiger]

Seward is a nice place to live.  I lived and worked there for 21 years before moving south to So. Cal.  in 2005.  Heck, I was even on the city council for a while!  Unfortuately the winters started getting to my wife and daughter.  It's not necessarily the cold but the dark that can get to you.  Of course, motorcycle season is only about 4-1/2 months long!  When it's a nice day, there's not a prettier place on the face of this earth than Seward.

Mitch is a really good guy; not spoiled by success at all.  It should be interesting to see what the Hollywood folks do to spice up the show.  I can only hope that they don't ruin it...

[aeronca]

man you aint kiddin about seward. everytime i go up to alaska i alway's make it a point to spend some time in seward. i wish i was rich - i would have a cabin up there. a couple of years back i did some halibut fishing out of seward and as we were steaming out of the sound there was a cabin off to the left in an inlet (looked like the only way in was by boat)- and right there i told myself - "self - you need that place".

[aeronca]

well, it seemed pretty good. COLD.