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February 16, 2006

Finally race day is here.................... tomorrow!  Tasha is taking "her" top 12 kids for the UP 200; Gimli, Clark, Mick, Mouse, Vinnie#1, Yooper, Boom, Luke, Big Ben, Razzle, and Bert.  I am giving three of my crew to lead the yearling teams so I am left with 9; Lips, Sisu, Quill, Arlo, Sebastion, Hairy, Starman, Max, and Zip.  I am really excited about our two yearling teams in the 200 (the one year olds are in bold)!  Jim will be running; Goose, Bonfire, Cassie, Dash, George, Gretzky, Monte, Munster, Pimp, Rott, Weiler, and Yzerman.  And Jake will have; Happy, Tops, Basil, Cheech, Chong, Dill, Incredible, Jack Jack, Jerome (Iginla), Sage, Tsunami, and Violet.  Tim Vandermeulen will be running Mudslide, Tornado, and Pop in the Midnight Run and another friend of ours Amanda Vogel will be running Purple and Jump.  The dogs are really sick or running our same trails so they are going to love the new scenery.  Another note, of the 23 yearlings above, only two are females.

A couple of days ago I helped Jim and Jake clean teeth and trim nails on the yearlings.  They have those guys SO MUSCLED UP!  The one year old boys are like furry rocks with happy tails.  They are so solid.  Mentally I think they are a really immature bunch so I am curious to see how well they do with the craziness of the start.  One way to find out.  The picture above is Cheech, a one year old male.  Kind of looks just like his dad Maple doesn't he?  The future looks BRIGHT!

February 11, 2006

I have renewed faith that our society is still tough.  We have been getting tons and tons and tons of snow!!!  Even with all of the snow, our tour guests and ride guests are still showing up and having the time of their lives.  Ann Easter, a brave Iditarod follower from Indiana (go Colts, Oh they lost) even got tackled by our birthstone puppies and lived to tell about it.

The Iditarod training has been tapering down a little.  Yesterday Tasha and I went on another 40 mile run with the crew and everything looks good.  Our trails now are a combination of plowed roads and soft and punchy trails so the dogs have a good variety.  Touring has been in high gear, so some of my team has been running the fun 20 mile loop a few times a week in addition to training.  The dogs seem to like having a "substitute teacher" on the sled from time to time.  The UP 200 is less than a week away and then we are off to Alaska on the 22nd.  We still have room for one more driver if someone is interested in spending 4 days in a vehicle with 16 dogs.

February 04, 2006

Well the Iditarod drop bags are on the way to Alaska.  Only doing one team this year seemed so easy compared to two teams last year.  For next years race our kennel is planning for three teams so I think I better start packing now.

Each drop bag is labeled with the name of the checkpoint in which it will be delivered and is filled with all of the supplies that I will need during that point in the race.  In all, the shipment weighed just under 1,900 pounds, with over 95% of that being for the dogs.  The bags are shipped in insulated boxes and are frozen at -20F before they are packaged.  They are shipped across the country to Washington where they are loaded onto a barge and transported to Alaska.  The Canadian and American Governments still have their peeing match going on over this mad cow fiasco and the border rules seem to change daily so we decided to ship our beef around our neighbor to the North.

Other big news: The countdown to the showdown is on!  I will be running the second UP 200 team now not Brandon and I am going to knock Tasha down a place in the standings.  I am even going to give Tasha her choice of dogs and then proceed to cross the finish line at least 26 seconds in front of her.

The final hair tally shows leave-it-be with one more vote than cut.  I received a ton of great advice through the e-mails, one of my favorites (obviously from a guy who lives in Wisconsin),

Thanks Jake!

For those interested I am in the process of adding a bunch of dogs to the for sale list.

January 27, 2006

So far it is 5 cuts to 2 leave it be's but a lot of people have asked for a picture.  Here is a picture of my hair as of this morning.

January 26, 2005

MY DOGS ARE BACK!  As you all know, Tasha had a great run in France and she did not hurt any of my dogs.  I have narrowed my Iditarod team down to 19 dogs and they are as follows with their ages: Maple-6, Mouse-6, Goose-6, Vinnie #1-6, Quill-6, Shad-6, Tops-5, Sebastion-3, Bonfire-3, Starman,-3, Big Ben-3, Razzle-3, Bert-3, Boom-3, Yooper-3, Luke-3, Arlo-2,  Harry-2, and Clark-2.  I really want Gimli and Mick on my team but they are still too skinny and are not eating well enough to make up for the lack of pounds.  All 19 of the dogs have competed in at least one Iditarod and except for Sebastion are trouble free dogs.  Sebastion is still having a hard time getting along with others when Brandon has been running him.  After today and with the exception of the UP 200, he will be run by only me.  I have zero tolerance with aggression so we will see if he adapts into my team.  He is a superstar but he also has to play by the rules (no Randy Moss' or T.O.'s on this team).

One change of plans that we have encountered is not running the John Beargrease Sled Dog Marathon.  This year the Beargrease switched their race date back to January from March which works out better for our schedule.  We wanted to help support this change and had entered two teams in the Marathon.  Unfortunately we had a hard time getting timely accurate information from the Beargrease and we decided to just run dogs here.  Our trails and conditions are more like the Iditarod trails anyway and it will work out better for our main objective.  Maybe next year we can help bring the Beargrease back up to its old reputation of being a world class event.

I would like to mention our handlers/guides extraordinaire at this point.  While Tasha has been gone Michele, Jake, and Brandon kept this kennel going!  A huge thanks to all three of them because it would have been a lot harder without their help.

One other non-Iditarod related thing; my hair.  I have not had a hair cut since Nature died in the spring.  It is kind of a foolish symbolic idea but in a weird way it helps me with her loss.  When Tasha returned from France she told me the hair has to go.  Please e-mail your opinion and I will keep a running total of yes's versus no's.

January 5, 2006

All entries for the next few weeks will be in the "La Grand Odyssée" section.  Check it out.

January 3, 2006 (go, go, go)

Crazy!  After the tour of five, we had another low maintenance group of eight new professionals and then two days of rides to give at a ski resort.  I would love to tell you about the wonderful group of 8 but we leave for Chicago today to get Tasha and my, I mean, her dogs to France.  This morning I will take the 14 dogs for their last run on American soil for almost a month.  The roster includes: Bert, Yooper, Big Ben, Starman, Vinnie #1, Mouse, Razzle, Shad, Boom, Maple, Mick, Gimli, Clark, and Luke.  We leave by 3 P.M. and then a tour group of 5 comes this evening.  We have been planning ahead but the schedule has been so full that everything feels last minute.  That is the way I want to live.  Oh yeah, I almost missed it in this organized chaos, Happy New Year!

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