Bogieblog

Iditarod Musher Recreating Origins of Race

The inspiration for the Iditarod race was the dog-sled delivery of life-saving diphtheria medication to Nome by Leonhard Seppala and his dog team.

In a sign of the times, this year musher Larry Daugherty is carrying empty Covid-19 packages.

Too Much Snow?

Taking a peak at the Iditarod website and took in this article.

Usually they adjust the course because there is not enough snow. This time there is too much snow to make for good grooming of the trail (eyebrow deep) when their time would be better (more efficiently) spent on other parts of the trail that need attention.

Veteran musher, and NH native Aliy Zirkle had to scratch because of an accident that gave her a concussion. She has placed second in several Iditarods and has consistantly been in the top ten. This was to be her retirement race, not the way anyone was expecting it to go.

For up to the date news and current standings, visit the Iditarod home page.

More from the 2020 Iditarod

Congratulations once again go to NH native Aliy Zirkle for winning the Leonard Sepala Humanitarian Award. This is the 6th time she has won the honor, which is designated to a musher whose team demonstrates outstanding care of their race team while remaining competitive.

From the FB page:

Read more about the award, and what it represents on the Iditarod Official Website

Quote from the story: “This award is the most coveted award for mushers and has great importance to the race and to the Iditarod Trail Committee in its mission to promote excellence in dog care. Aliy continues to impress us year after year with the outstanding care she provides her team,” said Dr. Nelson."

Iditarod 2019 Top 10 Finishers

Apparently there wass an exciting finish for this year's Iditirod as the top two finishers were just seconds apart.

3 women were in the top 10; Jessie Royer, Aliy Zirkle, and Paige Drobny.

Congratulations to everyone who entered the race, whether they finished or not. These are the toughest of the toughest athletes (people and dogs) and I can't imagine the physical and mental fortitude that they have to have to participate.

And of course kudos go to all the volunteer race officials, veterinarians, pilots, trail breakers and dog handlers who make sure race participants are taken care of, and watched out for as much as possible.

Aliy Zirkle First Musher to Halfway Point

Aliy and her dog team won the GCI Dorothy Page Halfway Award in the Checkpoint of Iditarod. She is a particular favorite since she is a NH native.

 

She has since dropped in the standings as she is taking one of her mandatory breaks at the Iditarod checkpoint. Only time will tell how her strategy works out.

Still Here

Still alive and well. Just nothing going on to write about.

Try Ripley's Journey with the latest SpaceX launch from Space.com or from Space Flight Now 

Or the Iditarod is starting and here is an article about one of the dogs from 7 different teams.

Lipizzaner Stallions In Goffstown, NH

While the folks were in town, the Lipizzaner Stallions were performing locally, so we went to see the show. It was at a small arena at a therapeutic riding facility, so we were fairly close to the action. Since I didn't take my camera that has better zoom abilities than my camera, most of my pictures were limited to shots of the horses in their stalls. But that just means I was able to focus on the performance rather than focusing on trying to take pictures - so all was good.

 

Aragorn was the Big Boy of the group. Not only was he taller and more solid, but he held his head very high and proudly throughout the performance.

Apparently one of the horses was in time out - LOL

 

And, the one action shot I got; it was toward the beginning of the show as they were showing a horse being "cart driving" from another horse. Apparently, although appearing to be a simple type maneuver, is challenging to train especially when using all stallions. It was probably even more difficult as they were using a young stallion as the "cart" horse. And this particular horse (Achilles),we were to learn later from the announcer, is full of himself and vying to become the alpha stallion as they had recently retired their alpha and the horses are in the process of sorting out their hierarchy. Additionally, post tropical storm Hermine was off the coast and the pressure change was affecting the horses' attitudes and sensitivities.

Had a great time and I hope the folks enjoyed it too!

Aliy Zirkle Team Running in First

Aliy Zirkle's team is still in first and have arrived at Shaktoolik. Wishing her a safe and speedy trip for the rest of the race!

Iditarod Update

Aliy Zirkle was the first to Galena for this year's Iditarod and got some well earned prizes and awards. She is currently showing as second on the leaderboards, but she has doen some amazing running this year and still has 14 dogs, so she is certainly a strong contender. Go Aliy!

SNAFU

I was going to post about several things, but as usual lmy black cloud is following me around. My 1.5 year old desktop computer died. So, along with all the snow removal and trying to keep this place warm (can you say 1k worth of propane used in the last month? Not includint pellets of course). I will just go crawi in a hole and  try to figure out what I did in a past life that was so bad that all this bad karma follows me.