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The History behind the bug...
So, this is what happened. While being homeschooled at age 8, my mother and I were really big on reading together. For kicks, mom picked up a book from the library that "looked interesting." It was about Libby Riddles and her adventures during the Iditarod. From there on out, life went all down hill [for my parents]. I was driven to be a musher! We had always been cat people. The idea of owning a dog had always been foreign to us... even though we do live out in the boonies. Suddenly, out of the blue sky, we were getting a dog... for me. Part hound and part... more hound, Caleb was not a typical sled dog. But, he was going to be and I trained him constently. Then it happened... AGAIN. We got another dog, Shilo, a siberian. Now, I had two dogs, a homemade kick sled (made by my Grandpa and Opa!) and a three wheeled rig (welded by my Opa!)... YAY!
Then an alaskan husky pup, Chance, came into my life. That's when I began racing. We had gotten a basket sled from ADANAC... which was so exciting!!
Soon we had Bashful, which we breed with another champian sled dog (not ours). We split the litter, and I got Luna, Kodi, and Frostie.
One very awful day, Caleb took off... and never returened. I was sooo heartbroken. He had played such a huge role in my life! But life did have to go on, and if I wanted to race in the six-dog class, I had to get another dog... even though there was no way I could every replace Caleb.
A musher friend had gone to Alaska to buy Euro-hounds from Egil Ellis and ended up with a free pup that didn't fit with Egil's team. I ended up with him, and his name Oakwood!
Racing:
I began racing at age 13. The plan was to build up distance and run mid-distance races. I did that... running 40 miles for two consecutive days. Even though I learned it the hard way, that my team was soooo *yawn* bored, I decided to change back to sprint. The dogs love the exhiliration... its in their blood... and if this is what they want to do, I'll join them!
Since then, racing has been experimental, running 6-dog sprint. Now I know what the dogs want to do, I feel that I can now go into it competetively... especialy now that I have a true sprint sled!
I'm still working on this... please stay in tuned!
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