Gerry Willomitzer's
Blackjack Racing Kennel
February 9, 2005
Vet check, last
training and off we go
Click on an image below for larger view
Hi all,
this newsletter will be quite short, even though or because a lot of things are
happening right now.
A couple of weeks ago Leslie and I brought 17
race dogs to town for the official Yukon Quest vet check. A few volunteer vets checked the
dogs, in particular heart, lungs, feet, body temperature and sleletal-muscular system to
ensure that they are fit to go on the long trip.
All 17 dogs passed the vet check without any problems.
After one of the last training runs Ophir had a bit of pain in one wrist but no swelling or resulting limp. So I have been thinking of dropping him from the line-up and taking Joseph in the Quest. While I think Ophir is the better dog he won't help me any in case his wrist turn out to be over-worked and prone to injury. I have a few more days to think about it.
Temperatures have been quite low around here. A few evenings back the thermometer dropped from minus 24 to minus 45 degrees (Celsius) in a matter of 3 hours while I was on a training run. I did make it home by minus 36 degrees, and after feeding it was 45. The next day it warmed right up again, and now it is zero (32 Fahrenheit).
We got quite a bit of snow and wind in January and I put close to 1.000 km onto the ski-doo just trying to keep my trail in shape. Needless to say I would have liked to save these long hours on the iron-dog and all the gas the thing burns. One go around on my training trails can take up to 4 hours and often I had to do that late at night, because of office work and training dogs.
This week started with the last two days at the office. Today I ran the dogs in the morning heat (just under 0 degrees). Since December we hardly did a run in weather warmer than 20 below, so some had quite a hard time with the heat. But it is supposed to cool down by Saturday so things are looking up. This afternoon I put in 15 miles of Quest trail from the start line to the Takhini River bridge, as noone had been there before. It should set up nice for the race. Tomorrow I have a long list of little things: fix sled bag and gangline, cut the dogs claws, borrow a walltent from a neighbor for the Dawson camp, oil change on the truck, split wood for the next few weeks, do a dump run (hauling away household garbage, a ton of dog poop, pallets from the meat business), do banking so that my credit card does not get cancelled during the race which would leave my handlers without $$$, prepare my trail book, build new cooker, and tons of other stuff. I'll have to stop in time for the "Meet the musher's event" and continue on Friday, where I will also do the last training run, have the mandatory mushers meeting and the start banquet. So that day is definetly shot and unusable for chores. But there is still all day Saturday which I will use to finish off everythingand pack the sled and the truck. On Sunday we'll start. I had all year to prepare and there is still last minute "stuff".
This is the last newsletter before the race, during the race will be silence on this channel but you can find frequent updates at yukonquest.com. Mush on!
G