From what I understand, the race is not a very pleasant experience for the dogs.
Have you ever seen dogs running this race? The main problem mushers have is holding these dogs back. Everyone mourns the loss of a dog including me. These guys live to run and if they die they die doing what they love. It’s not up to bunny kissing, tree hugging, earth worshiping and misguided do gooders to decide what Alaskans and their dogs do.
The dogs are born and bred to do this.. NOT doing it bothers them.. They can hardly wait to get mushing.. They love it.. Its Mackay that suffers most.. not the dogs.. Grizzly Adams and Jerimiah Johnson were punks next to Mackay...
Check out the miles a wolf has been tracked in a day and you will appreciate the sleddog’s love of running. Being chained or penned or being indoors, is what is hard for them.
If not, view the pics an gimme anudder report.
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(you hosin me, aintcha)
If Norman read your comment, he'd chuckle [not so you could hear it though, he was too much of a gentleman.] Norman participated in 13 Iditarods, running his first one at age 72. Completed 6 with his last finish being in 1990 at the age of 84.
He talked his way onto the Byrd expedition, gathered hundreds of sled dogs and sailed to Antarctica. This was a primitive jaunt into where no man had gone before. 'For Vaughan, it was always been about the dogs rather than the poles. When asked why Shackleton and Scott both failed to reach the pole, he replied: "Because they didn't have anyone who was really good with dogs."'
'Vaughan admired Roald Amundsen, he says, "because he knew dogs". "And of course, Amundsen understood the part nobody else talks about: you have to eat the dogs. Matter of survival. It's 25 pounds less food to carry."'
Vaughan said he "hated that part ... but it had to be done, and I had to do it. Of course they know. I tied them to a stake with a very short leash and gave them a second bullet if they needed it."' Norman was rarely without his .45.
In the spirit of the Iditarod, gold, supplies and serum, I think of Norman, a man among men, with his dogs ...pitting themselves against nature. It's what the Last Frontier is all about. It's what these dogs are are all about.