Posted on 01/29/2014 10:11:18 PM PST by onyx
It's almost IRON DOG time! This is one of the busiest times of the year for us with lots of guys wrenching in the shop and training on the trails and frozen rivers. Todd and his partner are full speed ahead gearing up for the world’s longest and toughest snowmachine race traversing over 2,000 miles of frozen Alaska.This year we’re very excited that Todd’s SkiDoo team and three other teams riding SkiDoo are racing for a very worthy cause! They’re launching the “Bring Home the Pink” campaign to raise money and awareness in the fight against breast cancer. All the money goes directly to help women in need. In fact, they’re working with Breast Cancer Focus, an Alaska-based organization run entirely by volunteers, in order to ensure that the donations go to fund efforts that will directly help women.
You can learn more about “Bring Home the Pink” and please make a pledge to support this great effort at: Breast Cancer Focus Alaska
The Iron Dog goes from February 16-22. Keep your eyes peeled for some rough and tumble manly men putting their testosterone to good use in efforts to support women! Kudos to the sponsors and supporters! By the way, notice the pink ski tips in this photo of the SkiDoo snowmachine. Nice touch, guys!
This is Todd’s 21st Iron Dog. He’s won it four times. I, naturally, am rooting for "the old guys" (as Todd humbly introduces this amazingly arduous race’s veterans), but I'm so enthused about every single racer with the guts to do this.
It'll be a blast again this year keeping you abreast, er... updated along the trail. I shall do so primarily from inside my warm and safe house.
"Bring Home the Pink!" Go Team #11!
- Sarah Palin
You betcha !
GOOD TO SEE YOU!
We’ll try to closely follow his race with an ongoing thread and new threads that we can update via Sarah’s FB posts.
Sounds great! I try to follow it while over here, too.
I just love the Palins! What a great family!
I just hope she doesn’t wear a jacket with a corporate logo.
Real AMERICAN Men!
Putting Panty waists into Palintations!
I Hope this Race is as Awesome as Last Years! :D
Here is the FAQ page link for anybody interested. Also, there is an Iron Dog Facebook page that is public - the teams are out practicing and checking trail conditions so there are lots of pictures and some write-ups.
From Iron Dog:
Attention Racers!! It’s official. Our GPS tracking will be conducted using a new device this year. Every sled will be required to mount a SPOT Trace. We’re testing units with a few riders right now. The brackets will be here in time to install at the Tech Inspection (Feb 8th).
http://www.findmespot.com/trace/
some rough and tumble manly men
______________________________________
Either a male is a man or hes not...
Viva el MEN !!!
:)
I do, too.
God bless and keep you.
Has she done that before?
Thank you so much for both of your most informative posts.
I hope you will be with us throughout the IRON DOG!
LOL.
You’re right!
BIG Iron Dog fan for a couple of years now .... I’ve stayed up all night, watching teams before. :-) Thanks for the threads - please add me to your “ping” list, if there is one for Iron Dog!
Thank you so much. You will add untold information and insight to the IRON DOG threads!
Welcome!
Our Ping List is actually Sarah Palin’s Ping List, but we will make a special note that you’re on it just for the IRON DOG.
We follow the RACE because of Todd Palin, which you have no doubt already ascertained.
You will probably get the most information by reading the Pro class rules at this link: http://www.irondog.org/wp-content/uploads/Iron-Dog-2014-Rules-Pro-Final.pdf
The riders are in teams. They ride the same machines so these guys have to be great at “wrenching” ... lots of repairs take place on the trail. BOTH riders have to cross the finish line - if one is towing the other, that counts! Interesting things happen - one year, a team broke down & some spectators had a similar machine ... a part was pulled off that machine and put on the racer’s machine ... so there is now a rule “Participants are prohibited from accepting parts, safety gear, fuel or oil from anyone, except at official Iron Dog checkpoints and as provided in 13.2.”
There are various check stations along the route - you can check out the map that will be used during the race at this link: http://www.irondog.org/race-category/pro-class-checkpoints/ The “layover” times are in the rules - for example, northbound to Nome, Up to four (4) Layovers will be required Northbound. Three layovers will be fixed at eight (8) hours each and a flexible layover at (6) six hours for a northbound total of thirty (30) hours. Flexible layover may be used on its own in Skwentna, Puntilla, Rohn or McGrath. A layover of 6, 8 or 14 hours is REQUIRED in McGrath. The first 14 hours of layover MUST be taken before
leaving McGrath. What repairs/when you can do them is also controlled. Some of the teams with “high power” sponsors can afford to have their own plane fly parts/gear, etc. to them at various checkpoints - most of the small towns have some sort of airport. Either last year or the year before, one of the planes went down with a fatality & another severe injury, so even being a support crew can be dangerous.
Once they get the GPS going, you will see the team numbers showing up on the map (or at least that is how it’s been in years past). A change in the rules - Participants must install units for optimum performance as directed. Todd Palin & his partner have been “famous” in years past for having rare or no GPS signal (units packed up in their gear? who knows!). Now the GPS unit has to be in brackets mounted on the sleds so the satellites can pick them up.
Nome is the halfway point - lots of major repairs take place there ... btw, repair time is part of their total time. They get a 15 minutes off the clock to check out their snowmobiles and figure out what repairs/parts are needed, then when they start wrenching, it’s on the clock.
There are two “classes” ... Trail and Pro. I think the Trail just goes to Nome, with Pro doing the entire course. Todd Palin is Pro class. You are considered a ‘rookie’ until you have finished an Iron Dog.
Read through the FAQs at this link - it will answer a lot of questions .... http://www.irondog.org/faq-category/general/
This page has the checklist for the racers (you’ll be surprised at the gear they carry ... then again, in Alaska, you have to Be Prepared!). Also there are the rules, etc. which will give you additional info. http://www.irondog.org/racer-checklist/
I hate to admit how involved I get - even keep my own spreadsheets on teams and times. Year before last, one of the teams crashed - I saw the GPS stop moving & figured they’d had a breakdown, then word started filtering in about the crash. One of the racers was badly hurt & had to be airlifted out ( a whole village & their nurses helped get him off the trail & stabilized). I sent him a FB message that he was in my prayers .... actually got a thank you note back a couple months later with the update that he had a full recovery, which was terrific to hear.
Warning - Iron Dog can be addictive!!! If you think of anything else (this is the ‘shotgun’ approach - I’m just blasting you with a lot of general info), let me know and I’ll do my best to point you in the right direction or find the info for you. :-)
I was watching a youth soccer game this past fall in Epping,NH and saw signs for ‘grass drags’ snow mobile races. You could hear the machines screaming throughout the games from a distance. I thought, ‘how popular can these races be in October with no snow’? I drove by between games and all you could see as far as the eye could see was cars, snow mobiles, and people. An ocean of spectators. It was eye opening. I think they also race across water.
Thanks for the info and links. I'll be keeping an eye on it.
Thanks for the ping!
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