Race at Kalkaska- pics

First race of the season was this past weekend at Kalkaska. Beautiful trails! It was our first "pro" race ever so it was pretty exciting.

Unloading Kuz


Harnessing Reb


All ready to go!


Hooking up (ignore the really stupid look on my face!)


Out of the chute!





After 6.6 miles....still truckin'!!


Notice the celebrity Border Collie

very cool!

How did you do? Is there a race anywhere downstate that people can come and watch, either the start or finish?
I worked on "Iron Will" a Disney movie about dog sledding and think it is cool to watch the teams. I know there aren't usually places to watch on the trail, unless it has check points.

I don't do any races long enough for checkpoints, so it's perfect to come and watch! You can watch teams leave the chute and if you can stand the weather for an hour tops, you'll be able to see every team cross the finish line. I have a race at Ft Custer state park and Lost Lake Scout Reservation (Clare/Farwell, MI) coming up and I'm running the Mackinaw Mush (which hahaha is definitely not downstate). If you really want to come watch, I can give you the dates. I'm also doing a few demos so just let me know.

I didn't finish very well in the standings, but that doesn't really matter because the dogs ran GREAT. We passed 3 or 4 other teams. Our time was way off what the winners did it in, but that's what you get when you step out of the rec circuit and run with people who are in dogs for money. We did 6.6 miles in 42 mins on Saturday and 43 on Sunday. The winner of the class did it in 33 and 28 I was really happy with how well we ran though. They didn't slow down once. Though my female up front is coming into season....so she refused to lead on Sunday....but the male up front was wonderful and ran single perfectly. It was all of 15 degrees on Sunday and they started to get pretty hot!

9 min off the pros sounds great!!!
Give the dates and I will see if I can make it to Clare. To bad there isn't one downstate :-( - all the UADers could come and root for you.

Hahaha that would be awesome. Ft Custer is the furthest south we have. It's in Battle Creek/Augusta, MI. We actually train there almost every day (headed there tonight and tomorrow for training....only about 30 mins from Kzoo tops in good weather). The race at the Ft is Feb 14 and 15. And Lost Lake is tentative for Feb 21 and 22. There's an end of the season fun run (with a sleeping bag start) March 7 and 8.

And if you're interested, this weekend I'm doing a demo in Rochester Hills (Detroit give or take I've been told) for a winter carnival. I'll be giving rides all day Saturday so if you know anyone who wants to take a spin, point them in my direction! Maybe I'll post my demo schedule in another thread so that people can see it and decide if they want to stop by......

Nice job! Cool pics. I'm hoping that some of the host club members will be able to email me pics of my boys running in the dryland race this past weekend. I got some of them playing around before/after... but none of them actually running.

Was just looking back at the pics... did the "celebrity BC" and one of your Huskies switch sides at some point? Looks like the BC is running on the left out of the chute and, in another couple pics, is on the right?

Anyway, sending you a PM about another sport event and a question about some of the upcoming MUSH events.

Congrats Annie you will be beating the big boys (and girld) soon. Bob asked me to see if the ML has helped either conner or if you have seen any results in the team as far as conditioning and coat ect?

Thom, Connor is a tricky case. Also, my grandpa was only feeding him half the regular amount, so we'll give it a few more weeks and see if the higher "dosage" helps As far as the sledmutts go though, YES, their coat is wonderful! Also, maybe I'm making this up, but I think it has improved their recovery time. It could just be that they're in shape, but we can run 3 days in a row 6 or 8 miles and they don't flinch.

Kel, yes, Nova was a little jerk and his obsessive BC personality told him that he simple could not run on the left side. I had two options, switch him or let June-o eat him (he was driving her CRAZY....all the pushing and barking ). June was fond of door number two....I could picture pulling back into the camp with an empty collar hanging on the neckline.

Haha... poor June. Yeah, it looks like Nova is kind of pushing her over in that first "out of the chute" pic... so I figured that was the reason for the eventual side switch.

That was so cool looking!!! And looks like so much fun!

That looks awesome Annie!

no it will really help the recovery time...and energy level...I have often threatened to take bo off it because I cant wear him out....great pics and bob said he will make sure you have plenty for alaska

Yeah I would really like to continue using it. I was gonna give him a call, but I figured I'll wait 60 days because it's been hardly a month yet and the bag says 60 days should show its full potential.

and he is stuck in hid house thanks to the ice storm