By Slim Randles
This Saturday morning, an old man right here in New Mexico will act only a bit foolish once more as he has these previous 50-odd years on the primary Saturday in March.
I admit to being the foolish old man on this case. So what is going to I do on Saturday? I’ll open my closet and punctiliously take down my handmade gold parka that makes me seem like a walking bunch of pillows stuffed in a down sleeping bag. Then I’ll walk round and bear in mind seven sled dogs who shared a well-known path with me these many lengthy years in the past. They actually weren’t the very best sled dogs in that first Iditarod Dogsled Race from Anchorage to Nome, however they had been the very best I had. Well, six of them had been. I needed to borrow a canine to make a staff of seven, which was the minimum-sized staff that first 12 months.
I didn’t win any of that prize money. In truth, I didn’t make it to Nome. I went about 350 miles and crushed an ankle beneath the sled runner and a few children who didn’t look like old sufficient to shave flew me and the staff to a hospital in Anchorage in a helicopter. The great woman who made that parka for me and ran race headquarters and was my spouse at the moment was named Pam. She died on Christmas Eve.
For the subsequent 5 years, I served as a race official. And, after that first 12 months, the minimum-sized staff was expanded to 9 dogs. I used to be the one idiot, ever, to start out that race with solely seven dogs.
Here, let me bow and introduce myself … Seven-Dog Slim at your service.
I gained’t be out on that path this 12 months as a result of it’s hotter right here in my New Mexico home with the furnace working correctly. But a part of me might be there when these groups go away Anchorage Saturday morning. Part of me will all the time be there, Wishing courageous canine mushers nicely doesn’t get old, even when we do. Be cautious, guys and gals, and have a protected and great race. It’s a really lengthy solution to Nome.
Best needs from Seven-Dog Slim.
Brought to you by the Anchorage animal shelter, who stored me in good, workable, loving dogs again within the 70s. Thank you.
