Ahead of Yukon Quest start today, it’s anybody’s game

#sleddogracing Clipped from Newsminer.com

By Matias Saari
Published Saturday, February 14, 2009

WHITEHORSE, Yukon — With Lance Mackey out of the mix for now, the Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race will crown a new top dog.

And many mushers feel they have a shot to win the 26th annual race that starts at 11 a.m. today in downtown Whitehorse.

There’s a trio who most folks are labeling the favorites: Hans Gatt, Martin Buser and Jon Little.

Then there’s up-and-comers on the cusp, like Brent Sass, Jason Mackey, Dan Kaduce and Warren Palfrey.

And not to be overlooked are veterans with previous top results, such as William Kleedehn, Sebastian Schnuelle, Dave Dalton and Michelle Phillips.

“You can’t count anybody out, really,” said Gatt, who three-peated from 2002-04 before Lance Mackey began his four-year string in 2005.

Many people are counting Gatt as the man most likely to reach Fairbanks first in about 10 days.

“I would have to say Hans is the favorite, just from his past record,” Lance Mackey said Thursday from Fairbanks, as he prepared to follow the race from afar while continuing to train for March’s Iditarod.

Gatt likely will have plenty of competition in his quest to match Mackey with a fourth career Quest win.

“My prediction is Hans and Martin are going to be battling, and the race will be between Little and Kleedehn and some of the others for the other positions,” Lance said.

Gatt’s entry comes with a side note. He has spent the last two winters training Jamaican musher Newton Marshall at his kennel near Whitehorse and has set Marshall up with a few of his strongest huskies. Gatt’s aspirations for victory might therefore be diverted slightly.

“This year, obviously, the focus is to get Newton to the finish line,” Gatt said Wednesday.

The 50-year-old Austrian concedes he still has “a really good dog team” that placed sixth at the 2008 Iditarod and second in January’s Copper Basin 300.

The latter race is where Lance Mackey told Gatt he would be withdrawing from the Quest for a variety of reasons.

“I was bummed out,” Gatt said.

One musher who has been in great spirits in Whitehorse is Buser, the first Iditarod contender since Mackey to cross over to the Quest.

“It’s rejuvenating and stimulating and exciting to have a new challenge coming at you,” Buser said.

Though a Quest rookie, Buser said he thoroughly has researched the race.

“I think I’m ready for it. I’ve prepared well,” the Big Lake musher said. “I did a lot of homework, and I think I have enough supplies out there.”

Buser is racing mostly large males in the Quest and has a speedier team lined up for the Iditarod, though he may enter a few dogs in both races.

Buser joked that he finally entered the Quest because of a mid-life crisis. He added that the timing was right as he has become an empty-nester because sons Nikolai and Rohn are attending college.

His goal is “to finish well,” but it seems he’s also eyeing the $30,000 first-place prize.

“I do need to make some money,” Buser said a week ago during the vet check in Fairbanks.

Then there’s Jason Mackey of Kasilof, who said he’s racing to win and to uphold the family name.

Palfrey, of Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, also didn’t hesitate to reveal his hopes of landing in the winner’s circle.

“Ultimately, first place, that’s the goal,” said Palfrey, who wasn’t satisfied with 26th at last year’s Iditarod. “I don’t go into any race saying I’ll be happy with the top 10 or top 20. Basically, anything (below) a first-place finish is a disappointment.”

Of course, many others would be thrilled with 10th place, while some aspire just to travel the entire 1,000 miles.

Mike Ellis of Rumney, N.H., has been in Two Rivers since Halloween preparing for his second Quest with his team of purebred Siberian huskies. He placed 11th and set a Siberian record of 12 days, 10 hours last year.

“I’m hoping to crush it,” Ellis said of his record.

Frenchman Didier Moggia and Becca Moore of Willow are back after dropping out on day two last year at the Mile 101 dog drop. “I need to finish what I started,” Moggia said.

Also among the 29 mushers who will start — more than a dozen others entered but later withdrew — are 21-year-old Josh Cadzow of Fort Yukon, the first Alaska Native musher in years; Wayne Hall of Eagle, who is familiar with the challenges waiting on the Yukon River; and Yuka Honda, who is drawing plenty of attention from a Japanese film crew following part of the race.

Reports so far predict a hard, fast trail on the Canadian side, while Quest veteran John Schandelmeier, filling the newly created Alaska trail coordinator position, got a head start breaking out and marking the second half of the route. Complaints were rampant about trail conditions in Alaska last year, particularly on a neglected section of jumble ice on the Yukon.

One negative in this year’s race is that only $151,000 of a planned $200,000 purse is guaranteed so far. The shortfall is due partly to a decrease in sponsorships because of the lagging economy.

“There’s a lot of little things that should have been done,” Dalton, who is starting his 19th Quest, said about the organization’s fundraising efforts. “Mushers feel they’re getting hurt in the long run.”

Correction

There are three mushers who have won the Yukon Quest and the Iditarod and the Yukon Quest sled dog races in different years — Rick Mackey, Joe Runyan and Jeff King. Lance Mackey is the only musher to have won both races in the same year. He did it in 2007 and 2008, but he is not entered in the Quest this year. Rick Mackey is the only one of the four who won the Iditarod before wining the Yukon Quest. Rick Mackey won the Iditarod 1983 and the Yukon Quest in 1997. A story in Friday’s News-Miner incorrectly stated that King and Runyan were the only other mushers other than Lance Mackey to win both long-distance races.

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