Iditarod 2018 discussion

[Frozen Chosen]

There is an incredible turnout here at Willow, n yesterday on 4th Ave... more than I've seen over the last 5 yrs! This sport has increased in popularity n fans!

Heading down onto Willow Lake ice now.

Frozen

[braider]

Frozen - come to chat if you can
chat/

[fladogfan]

Froze is streaming from the restart
https://www.facebook.com/unk.sonny.3

Better than ITC...

[elsietee]

More tidbits from vids:

• Mitch Seavey trains all summer by running in the middle of the night. Says his temp cut off it 48°F/9°C, so he has to be done by 4 am in the summer. Dallas has a refrigerated treadmill.
  
• Larry Daugherty became the first Mt Everest/Iditarod person last year - which is what Steve Watkins what trying to achieve the previous year but there was the earthquake and resulting avalanche that wiped out his camp and six members of his team at Everest Base Camp (Steve was up at 19,000 ft so missed it). Larry searched for Steve's lost ID belt buckle with a metal detector - didn't find it, but did find various items from Steve's camp, which he put in a memory box for Steve and presented it to him at the start.
  
• Tim Muto's team: Six dogs of his own that he got from Brent, the other ten are from Linwood Fiedler.
  
• Dee Dee wants to try agility with her lab, and a Pekinese. She also wants to do dry land racing - two dogs and a bike. And work with service/therapy dogs. So a whole lot of new disciplines.
  
• Temps are forecast to be mild - but Michelle Phillips doesn't trust it not to turn weird.
  
• They have put in a new trail just after the Happy Steps - apparently there was a side hill that was tricky - this is where Doug Swingley wiped out, and Dee Dee also got bashed up a few years ago. They found a work around - doesn't make the
  trail any shorter/longer, but will be a lot better for mushers.
  
• The thought is that with all the soft snow, the further back you are, the worse it'll be - with a big trough.
  
• Ray Redington says it might be a case of being OK, so long as you stay on the trail - but a few feet off the side, you won't be able to run. He doesn't mind stopping them on the trail, but getting them started back up again in deep snow is bad. He hadn't run his 16 dog team except for the last ten days because of lack of snow. He's had to run them in groups of 6. Then went up to teams of 8... he didn't run a team of 12 until the Knik 200. They have plenty of power, but 16 dogs is a lot...
  
• Monica Zappa's favorite dog, Dweezle, who overcame illness as a youngster and became her #1 dog - was diagnosed with heart failure this fall, so he's out of the team. But he's doing much better now - on three different kinds of heart meds. Since he's been sick, she hasn't been away from him for more than a day, so it's going to be tough. Tim (Osmar?) is going to stay home with him, and they're not sure if he'll be able to sneak away to get to Nome and leave him with the handler at home.
  
• Jessie Royer said they've been able to train in deep snow and her dogs are used to the warm weather. She's running a veteran team. She has 14 dogs in the team that will run in lead, so shouldn't have a problem with leaders this year. One dog Ranger is ten and has run 8 IDs and Lucy who's nine and has run 7, she feels fortunate to still have them on the team and looking pretty good.
  
• Mitch says the inland trail after Elim is 8-10 miles longer and will be harder, and you won't want to be on it with a tired team.
  
• Hugh Neff's dog George Kastanza (sp?) is on his 13th 1000 mile race.
  
• Kat Keith's team is a combination of dogs that she and John have had on their past teams - so a veteran team. Says she has big dogs that do well powering through deep snow drifts.
  
• Kelly Maixner says he's "retired" because he doesn't actually own any dogs [I will try and find out who's dogs he's running]. The biggest concern in his house is whether or not he'll miss the first visit of the tooth fairy to his house - his daughter is
  about to lose her first tooth. At the ceremonial start, he was debating running by the office to get some Novocaine to "help it" along before the restart.

[elsietee]

Started with 15 dogs:

Larry Daugherty
Zoya
Emily Maxwell

Started with 14 dogs:

Tim Muto*
Misha Wiljes
Marcelle Fressineau
Tara Cicatello
Bradley Farquhar

* * * *

Edited to add:

* Re. Tim's team size:

...I am very thankful for the veterinarian pre screening, blood work and heart observations that take place. I just got word that Cal's bloodwork is not ideal, and I have decided to not risk his health, and leave him behind for the race. It is sad, but so happy to have foubd out ahead of time! Love that guy. U Turns bloodwork also came back showing some less than ideal results so I am bringing him in as I type to get another blood test for confirmation. Paws crossed that it was a fluke and that he can be on the team!! Thank you everyone!

Then in the last day or so:

"Our blood work for U turn came back, and it simply isn't in his best interest to run, so we leave the starting line with 14 athletes."

I'm pretty sure both of those dogs are Brent dogs.


Danny Seavey:

Team size. 16 dogs is way too many for anything. It's so much too many that Mitch and Dallas resort to carrying them because in Mitch's words 'I'm scared to have all 16 pulling.' Team size doesn't matter as long as they have 10 or more running. Don't get alarmed when you see teams dropping dogs early, especially at the first checkpoint. Any dog dropped in Yentna was a known weak link before the race, and the musher only started them because the rules said 16. The smaller team size isn't alone an issue PROVIDED the remaining dogs are healthy. A lot has been made of Nick Petit winning all the mid distance races, which was an awesome feat. However, the reason he didn't face much competition in those races is that it takes a toll on a team to race every weekend. It's why so few horses win the triple crown. Berkowitz wrote a good summary of Nick's dog situation in the ADN, it's worth keeping an eye on.

More here at:
https://www.facebook.com/seaveysididari ... 9661924242

[elsietee]

Something to consider - from the SP Kennel blog:

...the Red Team [Aliy] is at 74 and the Black [Allen] at 69. Obviously that means Aliy passed Allen. Aliy often says the worst passes in a race are between our teams because the dogs know each other so well and they know the voices of the mushers so well. If Aliy says “on by”, ALL the dogs think she is talking to them, and vice versa.

Per Squid Acres Kennel
~8 pm AK time:

Currently resting at mile 67. Present temperature 16 degrees, with a low tonight of 10, high tomorrow 28. Sundown was 6:37. SS

[elsietee]

Final post for the evening:

Danny Seavey's take on dog abuse, etc in mushing:
https://www.facebook.com/dannyseavey/po ... 2054915990


Per the Insider team - weather coming in Monday and Tuesday, so flying for the coverage might be tricky.

[mira]

Thanks elsietee! You are great on on finding info as always!

I can't remember so many teams starting with less than 16 dogs, but I think it is a good sign.

[fladogfan]

Danny is quite a thinker, a lot of interesting ideas there.

Who was it recently wrote that he thought one of the problems with sled dog races is the dogs are so young, well in elsie's snips there is Jesse running a 10 year old and a 9 year old, who have respectively run 8 and 7 Iditarods. And then there is Hugh with his George Kastanza who is on his 13th 1000 mile race, doesn't that make George probably 14 years at least?
Age and experience mixed with younger dogs are needed to help make a good team. That's just my opinion.

[braider]

Hugh's dog has most probably run both the YQ and Idit in the same year/s.