Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race Training Updates

By Tyrell Seavey--Seavey's Iditarod Racing Team

The days have been flying by. Food drops have been completed and the Iditarod is upon us. Today, when I was out on a run, I realized that I would only be running my dog team a total of 3 more times before the Iditarod! After what has seemed like an eternity of work and training we are now ready for the big race. I have been creating a roster of my race dogs in my mind. I will most likely start the race with the dogs in the following order:

Yonkers Duncan

Zero                 Zebra
Sulu                  Brooklyn
Viking              Piper
Bronx               Mozart
Queens             Mesa
Flash                Sage
Amos               Konan

*Since a large number of my dogs are capable leaders, I will start to rotate other dogs into the front once we get away from the large crowds of people at the start.

This picture shows the bags of food for ONE dog team in the Iditarod. Each bag is labeled with a checkpoint name and the musher's name. A total of about 1,700 to 2,200 pounds are sent out by each musher.

Every year we undertake the momentous task of preparing approximately 1,800 pounds of meat, dog food and personal items to be sent out on the Iditarod Trail. These are the "Food Drops" that supply us at the checkpoints along the race trail. This year, with three teams in the Iditarod, the task was x 3. Thanks to some great help from the handlers, good logistical support from our “Life Manager” (my mom, Janine) and a minimal amount of cold sweat from us mushers, we got the food drops sent out on time, but the question is… where did we send them?

Since the weather has kept the actual trail route in limbo, it was impossible to know exactly how much of what to send where. Of course, we could of taken the ‘Paul Gebhardt’ approach and sent out a whopping 2,800 pounds for a single team, but we managed to keep it down to under 2,000 pounds per musher.

The reason that food drops are such a big deal is that they are a time consuming project that comes at a time when mushers are already stressed and pushed to their limits. We try to reduce this strain by cutting large quantities of meat ahead of time, so we don’t have to do it all at this crucial point in time.

An average food bag contains the supplies required to feed a 16 dog team: a variety of meats, vitamins and dry food. It also contains enough booties, plastic for the sled runners, wrist wraps, algyval (an herbal massage oil), and musher food to replenish our sled supplies at any rest stop. For more details visit our food drop preparation link.