There Are Problems
The main post mentions that Melissa Owens and Zoya DeNure have scratched at Rainy Pass. These aren’t isolated problems.
Melissa’s injured leg makes standing on the runners for another week or so impossible, but Rick Swenson is going to attempt it with a broken collarbone. Rick has won 5 times, and is too old for this silliness, but he’s going to “tough it out”.
Lance Mackey made a passing comment about liking to lead so you don’t have to worry about “kennel cough”. Actually he was worrying about three of his dogs not seeming right, including Lippy, who has a 1000-mile race victory for each of her 9 years. He will be down to 12 puppies when he leaves Nikolai.
Zoya pulled out because her dogs weren’t “right”, Jessica Hendricks (36) is already down to 8 puppies and several teams are down to 13. It’s hard to say that these things are related, but it makes mushers nervous.
You will note in the listing that positions 55 and 56 are vacant. They will be assigned as people leave Rainy Pass. They represent Melissa and Zoya, and teams must go further than they did to move up.
More on the multiple problems in the ADN.
3 comments
What a shame we won’t get to follow Zoya’s rescues this year. But it sounds like she had a harrowing day of it based on her blog:
She left Rainy and was in the Dalzell when Miller went down; it was sudden as if he had a heart attack. Zoya gave him mouth to mouth, but he seemed not to recover. She put him in the basket and turned back toward Rainy—and found him with his head up, looking at her.
I can only imagine how she felt when she saw her dog looking back at her. You’re grieving for your dog, and all of a sudden, they’re back. Amazing.
There has to be some kind of bug spreading, and the warmer than normal temperatures help it spread. It could have started anywhere, as these team compete all over the world, but I can’t believe that the dogs haven’t been kept current on all of the standard inoculations, like the kennel cough shot.
It is definitely affecting the high and the low.
unfortunately, there are more bugs than there are shots for them, and iirc respiratory viruses in dogs and cats can mutate fairly readily, like flu viruses in people.