Iditarod start photos

I met up with Sadie and her friends Jen + Kara that were here from Michigan on vacation and headed to the Snow Goose for dinner last night. They have a great little brewery on site, can definately recommend the ‘Hook On IPA’ 😉 I was then up early for that little dog sled race starting today – these dogs were feeling the early start too:

This guy had the right idea though, whinning until he got some attention:

I was taking a lot of photos my OM-1 35mm SLR before the start of the race as the dogs were being readied, so hoping I get some more good photos from those films. I then skipped a few blocks away from the startline to 4th + Cordova where the teams make their first turn to watch the teams come by, starting with the honorary lead off:

The first corner was causing the mushers a bit of excitement as the teams were raring to go and not wanting to slow down much! A few teams spilled, or came close, and the trail sleds (used to help weigh the team to keep speeds down) also had their moments, such as Bob Hickel’s helper:

Aliy Zirkle managed to keep things upright taking a tight line round the corner:

Some mushers such as DeeDee Jonrowe were around before the start chatting with fans – I played the Bethel card to get her attention, and she also signed a t-shirt for mom 😉 This is DeeDee taking a gentle approach to the first turn:

Karin Hendrickson had a very colourful team, and also taking a fairly easy corner with her dogs:

Wanting to have a little fun, and confuse spectators a little, Jeff King put on a pair skis to be pulled by his team in front his sled:

Lance Mackey decided to have his own fun, kicking up the snow leaning round the corner:

Another musher kicking up the snow was Hugh Neff:

Managing to at least keep the sled upright as the bounced around the corner, Jen Seavey then had to play catch-up to get back on the sled with the dogs not exactly slowing down to help!

As opposed to Timothy Hunt, taking a slower + wider route with his good looking team:

I have a bunch more photos and high-res versions of these ones uploaded in to this Iditarod set on Flickr after making the most of the highspeed internet at the hotel 🙂 It’s been a busy day, though great fun, and I was so glad to have got to experience the start of the Iditarod. Sadie, Angie, Jen + Kara were around at the startline as dog handlers, though not sure which teams they ended up with. I’m guessing they made it back to Bethel as haven’t heard from them.

This evening I headed to Arctic Roadrunner for dinner with Damond and his wife which was really nice, and tomorrow I’m planning on heading along Turnagain Arm to the wildlife center as the weather seems pretty good and will be nice to see all the mountains in the winter time. So long as the flights play nice, will be getting the evening jet back to Bethel tomorrow.