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Photo by M. Scott Moon
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You can't compare it to any other competitive event in the world.
A race more than 1,150 miles of the roughest, most beautiful terrain Mother Nature has to offer. She throws jagged mountain ranges, frozen river, dense forest, desolate tundra and miles of windswept coast at the mushers and their dog teams.
Add temperatures far below zero, winds that can cause a complete loss of visibility, the hazards of overflow, long hours of darkness and treacherous climbs and side hills, and you have the Iditarod — a race extraordinaire, a race only possible in Alaska.
From Anchorage, in South-central Alaska, to Nome on the western Bering Sea coast, each team of 12 to 16 dogs and their musher cover the miles in 10 to 17 days.
It has been called the "Last Great Race on Earth," and it has won worldwide acclaim and interest.
German, Spanish, British, Japanese and American film crews have covered the event. Journalists from outdoor magazines, adventure magazines, newspapers and wire services flock to Anchorage and Nome to record the excitement.
It's not just a dog sled race, it's a race in which unique men and woman compete.
Mushers enter from all walks of life — fishers, lawyers, doctors, miners, artists, natives, Canadians, Swiss, French; men and women each with their own story, each with their own reasons for going the distance.
In 1925, part of the Iditarod Trail became a life-saving highway for epidemic-stricken Nome.
Diphtheria threatened and serum had to be brought in; again by intrepid dog mushers and their faithful, hard-driving dogs.
The Iditarod is a commemoration of those yesterdays, a not-so-distant past that Alaskans honor and are proud of.
Information provided by the Iditarod Trail Committee (www. iditarod.com).
