Rogues Gallery Kennel Blog

Here are the images of Cole and the team at McCabe Creek dog drop. The frosty faced dog is Crumb who has just been a complete animal this whole race. her and Zoom are the first ones standing and chirping when it is time to leave a checkpoint. These photos are good, but for a really good amazing photo of Cole, check out the Fairbanks Daily News Miner’s “Yukon Quest Special Section – photo gallery.” The was a vertical drop about a team’s length long. The photographer from the Newsminer camped out in front of it an got an awesome action shot of Cole. There are a few other nice pics too. Check them out. The Yukon Quest site also has a couple good ones of Cole in their Gallery from McCabe, including one of her snoozing in the straw with a tired Goliath nearby. I won’t be able to post any of Cole for a few days. She is currently on her 200 mile leg and not due in until late tomorrow night (Wednesday night). I built her Dawson camp today all day long. it was a bit back braking, but nothing near as hard as what she was likely enduring at the same time. I’ll take some pics of her and the dogs in the camp, but probably won’t be able to post them until I make the long drive to Circle, back in Alaska, after the camp site gets cleaned. Until then.

Sorry for the absence. Finding a free computer isn’t always easy. Cole just pulled out on her long 200 mile run to Dawson, but both she and the team were in good spirits.To update, Cole made the run from Breaburn to Carmacks on schedule. While Eagle Summit is the crux of the race, and there are daunting legs like the one she just left on, the run to Carmacks is known as one of the most arduous of the race. It winds through narrow forest, has steep drops onto the Yukon River and then lots of jumble ice once down on the river. Sadly Kawlijah took a bad step along the way and hurt his shoulder, so Cole had to drop him in Carmacks. She was sad to see such a hard worker go, but since he was the youngest dog in the team, it meant she could worry less about her speed and rest schedule. From Carmacks she ran to McCabe Creek with no problems, rested briefly, then continued on to Pelly. With Kawlijah gone, Cole was able to run a less conservative race, and had reeled in several teams in front of her, moving from around 26th place up to 21st. Sadly, in Pelly that work was for nothing. We had new runners built just before the race, but they were not sanded quite as smooth as perhaps they could have been. Wanting to change runner plastic for the long haul ahead, Cole began to switch them out, but this task, which should have taken about 10 minutes, ended up taking an hour and a half. The teams Cole passed on the way to Pelly again got out in front of her while she fiddled with the runners. It was frustrating, but just one of many hurdles that can happen on a race this long. Cole isn’t giving up on reeling in these teams later in the race. She has run a very conservative schedule. As such, she has a lot of rest on the dogs, so they are still raring to go when leaving each checkpoint. Cole also has a huge team of 13 dogs still, while several teams not too far in front are starting to dwindle. So perhaps on the way to Dawson or maybe on the way to Fairbanks she will improve her standings. She said her primary goal is just to finish the race, but her secondary goal is to finish in the top 20. Hopefully, she will be able to do it. Time will tell. All for now. I’ll try to post more photos in Dawson.