| Monday,
March 11, 1991 - 10:40 amWe had an interesting time traveling to Labrador City. Labrador City
and Wabush have a population about 9,000, mostly associated with the iron mines. We
left the kennel Friday morning and traveled thru Cornwall, Montreal, and Quebec City to
St. Simeon on the St. Lawrence River. We arrived at St. Simeon about 4:00 pm.
We were stopped by the Highway Dept. who spoke French only. After a fashion we
learned that just north of St. Simeon there was an avalanche and we could not pass until
maybe 10:00 pm. We met several other mushers at a restaurant. They had been
waiting since 8:00 am. At 9:00 pm we were told we could not get through until
morning. There were no vacancies at the two motels so it was decided we could stay
at the school. This is where I received my first lesson from the pros. I slept
near Don McEwen who ran the Iditarod last year. He snored loudly, keeping me awake
and tiring me before the race begins.
We got up at 6:00 am on Saturday
morning and waited until noon for the road to be cleared. We then drove until 6:00
am Sunday morning to arrive at Labrador. The last 350 miles was on a rough, hard
packed icy road. The first 150 miles was paved with the remainder being gravel.
We are now in the process of getting all of the gear off the truck and into the sled
bag. The gear has to be loaded onto the sled so it will be handy when I need it at
the appropriate time on the trail. We estimate total weight of the sled with driver
at 450 to 500 pounds.
Since we arrived at the race site, we have dropped the dogs (taken them off the truck
so they can stretch and answer Mother Nature's call) a couple of times and they seem to be
excited. All of the other teams have arrived so they know it is race day. I
have a lot of confidence in the team; however, this is the first time that they will have
gone 400 miles. Everything else this year has been in the 60 to 130 mile category.
It has been an exciting season getting to this point. We certainly had our
trials and tribulations at the beginning of the season; however, the last 4 or 5 weeks
have been great.
We started the race season at the
Empire 130 race in Wisconsin. At that time the dogs didn't have adequate training on
snow. We had not run any 20 to 30 mile training runs due to lack of snow. We
went into the race season not totally prepared. No fault of ours, just Mother Nature
not cooperating. At Wisconsin the dogs ran great for the first 25 miles. We
were running in the top half of the pack; however, we were running on hard frozen ground
with very little snow. |
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What I didn't
realize was the dogs were pulling their ankles and shoulder muscles. As a result, 4
dogs in the main team became lame. Jim ran the second string team in a 30-mile race
and has not injured any of the dogs. He was doing real good until he stopped to help
Dad on the second day. I had a lot of problems due to lameness which resulted in me
dropping my normal leaders before the second heat. I also had two dogs in the basket
with 15 miles to go before I could drop them at a checkpoint. My leaders were
discouraged. This had an adverse impact. The next ace was at Leavenworth,
Washington in the Cascade Mountains. The first string team tried to perform well but
there were just too many lame dogs. My son Jim did real good with the second string
team with Batman and Blue, my two old dependable lead dogs who have given me much
enjoyment over the past 5 years. He got 3rd place overall and 1st place in
Siberians. We then came back to
the Beargrease 130 in Minnesota and started the race with 10 dogs. After 80 miles I
was down to 6 dogs again due to lameness. All stemming back to the Wisconsin race.
We then came home and ran unlimited sprint at Saranac Lake and 6-dog sprint at
Tupper Lake. From there we went back to the mid-distance racing.
At the Tug Hill Classic (60 miles)
in Turin, New York, we got a 6th place overall and 2nd place Siberian. We then went
to a 65-mile race at Bancroft, Ont. and finished 10th overall and 2nd in Siberians.
We then went on to St. Charles de Manville in Quebec (Mastigouche) which was a 100 mile
race and the dogs did super. We averaged 12 mph in this race. Normally, if we
can average 8 mph, it is good. However, this was an extremely fast trail and we were
racing against some real tough international competition which just made the whole race go
extremely fast. We finished 8th in this race and 3rd in Siberians. It was this
race that really gave me the confidence that the dogs had mended themselves and could
probably go 400 miles.
At the beginning of the season we had included the Labrador 400 in our race schedule;
however, as the dogs became injured I didn't think there was any way possible that we
could get the team back together for the Labrador 400, so I disappointingly discounted
attending the race. After the tremendous team effort at Mastigouche, I got excited
and made last minute arrangements so we could go to the Labrador 400.
SO HERE WE ARE, we have got Nome and Flicka in lead. I had wanted to run Missy in
lead; however, found out at race time hat she is in heat. In point we have Flash and
Missy. The next team dogs are Quochee and Ester. Next team dogs are Copper and
Kobuck. Next team dogs are Arooh and Spunky and the wheel dogs are Toby and Dakota.
As I said before, the dogs are excited and I am excited to get on the trail.
Just for good luck, we drew 13th position for the start which means that I will be going
out at 1:26 pm. I will sign off for now and report back in when we are on the
trail......
Stay tuned for further excepts of
this Great Adventure.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"The experience, memories, and
friendships developed will be precious to me forever" - Spencer Thew, November 27,
1991
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