Iditarod Musings

It's a beautiful spring day in Kentucky. The daffodils are blooming in the yard and in delightful clumps in the front field. I just watched the University of Kentucky lose the SEC tournament championship but maintain their number one seed in the NCAA tournament. Yep. It's spring in Kentucky. Daffodils and basketball.

With that break over I returned to studying the Iditarod Trail and the extreme weather conditions the mushers and dogs are experiencing. The race started with temperatures reaching to a balmy 25 degrees F. in the afternoons and dipping down to -5 to -10 below at night. (Remember, they don't have much daylight this time of year). Now the lead teams have reached the Bering Coast with temperatures hovering around -30 degrees. The cold is beginning to take it's toll on both people and dogs. The mushers are beginning to find that keeping awake is harder as exhaustion and cold settle in.

This year the weather has been a challenge, even for Alaska. The old-timers are saying that this is the most snow they have ever seen. The trail in spots has been covered with an additional two feet of snow during the race. This creates some interesting challenges and some real strategies. The race committee marks the trail and breaks a path for the race. However, they only break trail for the first sled, trusting to the following sleds to pack it down and clear it for everyone else. However, if a musher decides to get an early start the trail breakers rush out to open the trail for them. Then if the others don't follow right away, the snow has a chance to fill the path up before they get underway. Then they are on their own to break their own trail. This is much harder on the dogs and slows them down. This is why rest breaks, while necessary, become a part of the strategy.

In addition to the hazards of running over rough trails at night in extreme cold, the mushers have to be alert to dangers of the four legged kind. Most mushers will carry a gun with them to protect themselves and their dogs. The biggest danger (literally) is a moose. The moose like to use the trails for the same reason the racers do. It's easier than fighting the deep snow. Consequently, it's not unheard of to run into a moose strolling down the trail. These guys are big, really big, and irritable, really irritable. Sometimes they will abandon the trail and let the dogs pass, but sometimes they will defend their right to the trail and just wade into the dogs. This is an extreme danger for the dogs and the musher. Sometimes the only defense is to just shoot the moose.

The problem then gets even bigger. It seems that in Alaska moose tend to use all types of trails, including highways. So killing a moose isn't all that uncommon, whether it is intentional or accidental. To deal with this and eliminate the waste, Alaska has a law that if you kill a moose on public land you can't just walk off and leave it as "roadkill". You have to field dress the animal and notify someone to come and get it so it can be used. This can slow you down considerably in a race, so every effort is used to come to a peaceful solution.

The lead is still held by Aliy Zirkle but she is being chased by a determined group of men. Aliy runs a team of small dogs and there has been a lot of speculation as to whether her little dogs can maintain the pace over the distance. Her dogs average 40-45 lbs. while most of the bigger teams will weigh 60-70 pounds. This could be a big advantage when strength and endurance are needed toward the end of the race. So far the 41 year old woman is making the 25 year old man in second place eat her dust....um....snow.

You go girl!!