Jenn's (first) race day

I have added a page about our dogs. It is on the sidebar at the right-hand side of the page.


Day One:

Early Saturday morning came in the form of freezing rain. It was race day. I have been on the committee that has been planning and organising this race since early summer and I have to say that after postponing the race once already, freezing rain was not what I wanted to see five hours to race time. For a week prior to today I have been grooming a trail to the point of obsession. It has wound up costing a lot of money; we broke one snowmachine and had it repaired, we broke a hydraulic groomer that tows behind a 4-wheeler with tracks on it instead of tires, which we also had break on us. This race was one obstacle after another; however, today was race day and I was up at 0500hrs to gather our gear, load our dogs, prepare their food, feed those left behind and then, get Jenn and Hunter ready, too, if need be. Normally, Jenn needs a few wake up calls but today she had Hunter dressed, a lunch packed, her race clothing on and a coffee for both of us by the time I was done my part. I think she was either excited or nervous. Probably both. We left in the pre-dawn darkness.

Leaving for the races



Although the race didn't start until 1000hrs, I had to be at the start line early so we could set up the road crossings, which included snow fencing down the middle of the trail for head-on passing, bales of straw on either side of the trail so the dogs knew to continue straight ahead and snow across the road so the sled didn't run over the bare road. Along with the two road crossings, we also had to set up for the 4-dog loop, which meant the placement of more bales of straw at trail junctions. On top of this, we also had just over eight miles of trail to groom. I parked the truck and trailer, set up the drop chain for the dogs and Jenn set about feeding the dogs in their boxes. By this time, the sun was starting to show and the freezing rain had turned to very fat flakes of snow.

After my grooming and setting up of the trail, I came back to the truck to help Jenn drop the dogs for a pee and I started to get her equipment ready. Hunter was wandering around the dogs and I knew Jenn would have her hands full until our race help arrived. We were expecting a few people to come out to help Jenn harness, hook up and get to the start line. I headed back out on the trail to groom the left hand side. The trail was about ten feet wide and the groomer is only four feet, so we had to make three passes. One snowmachine would tow the groomer and the other would pull three tires behind to smooth out the trail. These sprint dogs sure get the best trails.

At first, Jenn was concerned that I wouldn't be able to help her prepare for the race, but on my last go-round with the snowmachines she said that there were enough people around to help so I didn't have to worry. I had volunteered to be at one of the trail junctions in case a team blew through the bales of straw or a team and driver became separated. I was also going to relay the bib numbers of the mushers who were passing the half way point to the emcee so that he could relay, in turn, the information to the crowd. When I last saw her, before her first 4-dog heat, Jenn had quite a throng of people around the truck and the dogs. Some we knew, most we didn't and Jenn was being asked questions from all sides while trying to prepare for her first race. I was due on the trail, so I wished her luck and left. Hunter was with her cousins and Jenn's parents so at least Jenn was able to focus on her preparations. Since I wasn't there, I don't really know how things went, but Jenn was very appreciative of Stacey and Darryl, Rick and Brenda, Jim and Deb, her mom and dad, our neighbours, Bob and Linda and all the others who helped her. If anybody wasn't mentioned, it is my omission, not Jenn's.

From the speaker of my walkie-talkie I could hear Doug, the Trail Boss and emcee count down for Jenn's start: "three... two... one, go driver!" and shortly after that, across three farm fields, I could make out a figure on a sled: "well, she's still standing" I thought. A few minutes later around the bend comes Jenn with her team. They looked pretty strong still even though it was fairly mild for them. A smile and quick wave and Jenn was gone.

Jenn and her 4-dog team





Next came the 6-dog class and because of some confusion at the timers truck, Jenn was late for her start. Originally, she was told that there would be a ten minute break between the Purebred class and the Sportsman class, which she was running. When Jenn heard the emcee announce over the PA that she was supposed to be in the chute, she didn't even have a harness a dog and her gangline was still set up for the 4-dog race. As fast as they could, Jenn and anybody close by stated harnessing dogs and putting them on the gangline. In all the confusion some dogs ended up with tug lines on their collars, neck lines on their harnesses, some facing forward and some facing every other way. Jenn was forced to start behind the last musher. Before I tell the rest of the Day One, six dog run I should explain the trail.

We had 1- and 2-dog skijoring classes as well as 4, 6, and 8 dog classes, so we needed a trail that was at least eight miles long and preferably with no head-on passing. The latter we accomplished with snow fencing and bales of straw; the former we accomplished by zig-zagging the trail through the available farm fields. The first three fields were the most severe in terms of zigs and zags: in some places one part of the trail was separated from another part of the trail further along by 50 feet of open, snowy fields. This meant that although a musher might be two minutes ahead of Jenn, they may be only 50 feet apart.

Even though we took great care to provide adequate trail markers, one of Jenn's lead dogs decided: "To Hell with this zig zag business, I can just cut across here to the trail and save us all some time!" By the time Jenn was able to stop the team she was into the softer, unpacked snow and her snow hook wouldn't hold. Olive, the disobedient leader refused to listen to Jenn and wouldn't stay on the trail. What was she to do? With no snow to hold the hook and no trees to tie to, Jenn somehow managed to get Olive back on the trail and running again with a fifteen minute deficit. She was nearly fuming when she passed me, at which point she decided to move Olive out of lead.

Jenn and her 6-dog team





The rest of the race was uneventful. I came back in to the staging area because there was a gap between Jenn's race and the 8-dog Pro race during which time we held a Kid and Mutt race. Hunter didn't enter, but her two cousins Lauren and Owen decided that they'd like to run it so we brought out Ruby, the secret wepon, for them. Ruby was great; she pulled Lauren first, then the two boys of a friend of Jenn's from work, then Owen. Ruby ended being the best (no bias here, honest) dog out there mostly because she managed to run straight and not stop to sniff, pee or climb the snowbank. Lauren came first overall. I finally had a chance to mingle a bit with the folks around the truck and then it was back out to the trail for the last class of the day.

Ruby: Kid and Mutt dog extraordinaire.



Lauren, Hunter and Owen





Once the day was over, Jenn and I ended up talking to the musher who was parked beside our truck. He was a member of the race committee. His wife was nearly two hundred kilometers away and he didn't feel like going to his lodging right away, so we decided that we'd go home, feed and water our dogs and then meet for dinner. We sat and ate and talked for nearly three hours and then it was off to bed for us.


Day Two:

With the majority of our gear already in the truck and Hunter having slept over at Jenn's parents house with her cousins, we were not nearly as rushed as Saturday. I loaded the dogs again and fed those being left behind while Jenn made the coffee, which I eventually managed to spill. Hers, not mine. Yep. Good start to the day for her. The temperatures on Saturday night were around the -10C mark and everything was pretty icey in the dog-truck area. We, the trail groomers (all two of us at that point), wanted to get out on the trail as soon as possible to see what the above zero temperatures during the race, combined with the packing action of sleds and dog feet would do when combined with freezing temperatures. It was as we had feared: the trail was glare ice underneath frozen balls of icey snow. We started to groom the trails and quickly came to the realization that the race was going to be severly behind schedule, if it went at all, because of the ice. Not only would it make the steering of sleds very difficult, it would cut the feet of the dogs. All we could do was keep grooming and try to scrape as much ice off as we could. The problem with this was that the snowmachines couldn't pull the groomer when it dug into the crust because the tracks would just spin; it was that icey.

We ended up hooking two snowmachines together. I towed the snowmachine that towed the groomer. This worked for a bit, but since the machine I was on was liquid cooled, overworked and unable to get snow on its cooling fins, we soon overheated it. I ran it back to the staging area and got another one. This one we had more success with, but managed to blow three sparkplugs out of the other machine. It wasn't looking good. Back at the starters truck, the mushers were getting antsy. Some had seen the trail and agreed that it would be of no real benefit to run it while others thought the complete opposite. We had a meeting with the Trail Boss and the Race Marshal, who also disagreed on what to do. Finally, we agreed to wait until the sun had been on the trail for a while, groom it and then start the races. This seemed to meet the approval of many although by the time we got started at 1230hrs there was some more grumbling going on.


Rick (one of Jenn's handlers), James (Lou's handler) and me, waiting for the races to start


It was considerably milder this day and after running her four dogs, Jenn asked me if I thought she should run in the 6-dog race. She said that the four dogs were hot after they had finished their race. I said that it was up to her, since I didn't see the dogs when they had finished, but if she did run them and it seemed like they were getting hot to stop and give them a break. Since I was out on the trail still, we communicated through a friend who had picked up grooming duties between races. I'm glad that Jenn decided to run the dogs because she had a much better race on the second day and even though she stopped for the dogs three or four times, she still managed to beat her time from the day before.

After the 8-dog race, I came in and finished cleaning up and packing our truck. Jenn had already gone to the arena where the awards ceremony was to take place and I met her there with her parents, Lauren, Owen and Hunter, asleep on a pile of clothes on the table. The awards went until around eight-thirty, Hunter, Owen and Lauren having left earlier on with Jenn's parents to go to our house where they'd wait for us. Once the awards were over and people started leaving Jenn and I exchanged email address with a few friends we had met that weekend. It was hard to not feel like it was the end of summer camp and everybody was scrambling to get the addresses of their new-found friends before the bus left.

On the ride home, Jenn said that she was proud of our dogs. She thought they did really well in spite of us. She's right: Jenn fell twice; the dogs passed and were passed successfully even though we haven't trained for that yet; they handled the crowds well even though it is usually me, them and a Crown Land trail where we run; and they managed to stay competative with sprint dogs, even though ours are more suited to colder weather running and longer distances at a slower pace. Jenn finished 3rd in the 4-dog out of a field of seven and second in the 6-dog out of a field of two. Not bad for her first race, I'd say.

Jenn helped me put the dogs back at their houses and then went inside so that her parents could go home. I fed the dogs while Jenn got the three kids ready for bed and then the four of them hit the 'off' switch and that was it for them. It was a long day and they were tired. I was starting to slow down, too, but there was no way I was missing the celebratory, congratulatory, we-did-it-but-thank-God-it's-over party that was going on at the Champ's house, just up the road.

Lou, the champ, with a groupie and his greyhound




I'll have more photos of the weekend as soon as I can get them from Jenn's mother.