Speaker 1: This episode is brought to you by square Space. Start
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Speaker 1: that's the smell of the Pacific Northwest. It's a smell
Speaker 1: of spring. Oh yeah, that that's where I was headed. Okay,
Speaker 1: So we are launching our Spring has Sprung tour and
Speaker 1: uh other dates tb D. But we know we are
Speaker 1: starting in the Pacific Northwest. Yeah, like I said, which
Speaker 1: is what smells like pachuli and liberalism and uh pine
Speaker 1: where we go in Seattle in Portland. Right on Friday,
Speaker 1: April eight, We're gonna be in Seattle at the Neptune,
Speaker 1: which we were at last time. It was a great venue,
Speaker 1: of great venue. The next day we're going to be
Speaker 1: in Portland at Revolution Hall, new venue for us, new
Speaker 1: venue for us, and we are going back there because
Speaker 1: two reasons you both treated us so well last time.
Speaker 1: And we have a very special podcast Taylor made for
Speaker 1: your necabou it. That's right, so come see us. You
Speaker 1: can get tickets on s y s K live dot com,
Speaker 1: our website powered by squarespace. That's right, and uh, we'll
Speaker 1: see you guys April eighth and ninth. Come on out,
Speaker 1: Pacific Northwest. Welcome to you Stuff you should know from
Speaker 1: house stuff Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and there's
Speaker 1: Jerry over there. And there's some delicious ritz crackers of
Speaker 1: peanut butter dipped in white chocolate, which means this is
Speaker 1: stuff you should know. Yummy cookies. Yes, but we're not
Speaker 1: gonna say who sent them just yet because that will
Speaker 1: fall under the administrative which, by the way, while we're
Speaker 1: mentioning it, thanks again to Mark Henry. We're pretty sure
Speaker 1: we thanked for the awesome steel work that we got
Speaker 1: at the Pittsburgh showy steel and barnwork right exactly. I
Speaker 1: thought we'd thanked him it. If we didn't, I want
Speaker 1: to make sure we did for sure, because it hangs
Speaker 1: right here above our heads proudly. It looms intimidating lee
Speaker 1: over our heads. Are you intimidated by it? Now? I'm
Speaker 1: a little under the weather, though, can you tell? I can? Yeah,
Speaker 1: mostly because you said so. But now that now that
Speaker 1: I'm listening for it, I can hear it sort of that.
Speaker 1: It's like you gotta stick a butter and each Nazia.
Speaker 1: Oh man, I wish do you you can do that?
Speaker 1: How are you? I'm doing okay, I'm not under the weather. Um.
Speaker 1: I am nice warm here in Atlanta. It's like seventy
Speaker 1: degrees outside here and like March one. Um. Kind of well,
Speaker 1: I want to say the opposite, but not necessarily these
Speaker 1: days things to climate change. Um in Alaska, Leo DiCaprio,
Speaker 1: where there, I thought that was a great speech, was fantastic,
Speaker 1: nailed it. Thin guy should be an actor. Uh in
Speaker 1: Alaska where they're about to do the Ida or they're
Speaker 1: about to run it. As a matter back, when this
Speaker 1: comes out, it will have started a couple of days before, right,
Speaker 1: so we'll be like right smack dab in the middle
Speaker 1: of what's called the last great race on Earth, the
Speaker 1: Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, also known as just the
Speaker 1: Iddarad or the Iddarade trail Sled dog Race. Did I
Speaker 1: say dog sled? No, you said it, but you just
Speaker 1: put the emphasist on the weird words or the I
Speaker 1: did rode trail sled dog race exactly. We could do
Speaker 1: this several more times we could. So let's get into this.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna we're probably both gonna say poopy things about
Speaker 1: dog racing, aren't we Probably. Yeah, I'm just waiting for
Speaker 1: people in Alaska to be mad at me. It's gonna
Speaker 1: be years before they get their hands on this episode. Yeah,
Speaker 1: probably so, because you have to fly it out, you
Speaker 1: drop it in from town to town, and everybody has
Speaker 1: to get their turn listening to it. Yeah. Thing I
Speaker 1: learned about people from Alaska is the reason they live
Speaker 1: in Alaska is because they don't like being told what
Speaker 1: to do by anybody. No, they don't. They like getting
Speaker 1: pushed around. No, so they moved to Alaska, where you
Speaker 1: can do as you please. So yeah, we'll see where
Speaker 1: this one goes. So the idea Rode, for those of
Speaker 1: you who don't know, is actually a a grueling endurance
Speaker 1: race across some of the coldest parts of the planet miles.
Speaker 1: That's a long way. And it's not like people are
Speaker 1: running or snowshoeing or hang gliding. They are on a
Speaker 1: little sled on skis. You could also call it a
Speaker 1: mini sligh if you wanted to. And this these mini
Speaker 1: slaves are pulled by teams of dogs. And that's the race.
Speaker 1: It's a dog sled race, that's right. Dog sled race
Speaker 1: held every year since nineteen seventy three. And uh, there's
Speaker 1: no like set a number of participants that kind of
Speaker 1: areas from year to year, depending on how many people
Speaker 1: want to take part. And uh, like you said, it's
Speaker 1: rough terrain, it's cold, brutal conditions could be anywhere from
Speaker 1: it could go down to fifty below zero. That's insane,
Speaker 1: with harsh winds and blinding snow. Snowblinds. Is that what
Speaker 1: it's called. That's what azz he called it. Yeah, do
Speaker 1: you remember the song snowblind? Yeah? I think so great black.
Speaker 1: I don't think he was talking about snow though, probably not,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? Oh, is he talking about cocaine?
Speaker 1: I think he may have been. I never thought about that, so, uh, Chuck,
Speaker 1: you said like up to fifty below I saw sixty
Speaker 1: below fahrenheight. Sixty below zero fahret heeight, that's cold. But
Speaker 1: I also kept running across people saying like negative forty
Speaker 1: degrees fahrenheight. And I remember we said that once when
Speaker 1: we were talking about seam o Hia, the Finnish sniper.
Speaker 1: It was like the baddest dude ever, the White Ghosters
Speaker 1: something something like that, the White Death, White Death. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that was it. Man, that guy, it's crazy anyway. Um,
Speaker 1: and we mentioned that he was out sniping people in
Speaker 1: in temperatures as cold as negative forty degrees fahrenheight, And
Speaker 1: ever since then people wrote in and said, dude, negative
Speaker 1: forty degrees is the same, and Celsius and fahrenheight it's
Speaker 1: where they converge. And ever since then, I've always noticed
Speaker 1: there's very few people who realize that, Yeah, well I
Speaker 1: forgot negative forty degrees. You don't have to say fahrenheher
Speaker 1: or celsius is amazing. The magic temperatures are so cold,
Speaker 1: none gives a crap, right exactly. Uh So the route
Speaker 1: for the iditarod Um, there are a couple of different
Speaker 1: routes depending on what year it is. Uh, this would
Speaker 1: be an even year, so that means they're going to
Speaker 1: follow the northern route last year, and every odd year
Speaker 1: they have a southern route. And uh they are basically
Speaker 1: the same route except for three hundred miles in the
Speaker 1: middle where it's different. Yeah, between a fear and Uncle elite,
Speaker 1: I believe I think so, um, and it either shoots
Speaker 1: up or dips down depending but other than that, it's
Speaker 1: the same exact route. Yeah, there are twenty six checkpoints
Speaker 1: along the way on the northern route and then twenty
Speaker 1: seven on the southern route because you need just that
Speaker 1: one extra by the southern route. I think, didn't it
Speaker 1: say the southern rount is a little harder? Uh? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think the general thought is in northern trail is
Speaker 1: a little easier, but like I think there's a difference
Speaker 1: in terrain. Typically that makes sense, and you would think, Okay,
Speaker 1: this is a thousand mile plus trek across snow in
Speaker 1: negative fifties sixty degree fahrenheight weather. Um, it's gonna take forever, right,
Speaker 1: And as a matter of fact, the first one in
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three did take I think the last place
Speaker 1: finisher more than thirty days to complete the race. Nowadays
Speaker 1: they're doing these things in like eight and change. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the record the first I did a ROD was like
Speaker 1: twenty days and change for the winner for the winner,
Speaker 1: and now the record is a guy named John Baker
Speaker 1: In finished it. So that would be a southern route
Speaker 1: even even more difficult, uh, In eight days eighteen hours,
Speaker 1: forty six minutes and thirty nine seconds. I saw more
Speaker 1: recently a guy named Dallas Cev who's part of like
Speaker 1: An I did a rod Family UM in two thousand
Speaker 1: and fourteen. He broke that record, but a few hours,
Speaker 1: eight days, thirteen hours, four minutes in nineteen seconds. I
Speaker 1: thought the baker was a guy No and baker, I
Speaker 1: guess top all another guy named Martin Bousser, who um
Speaker 1: he uh, he had the record for a little while.
Speaker 1: But yeah, it went from like what did you say,
Speaker 1: twenty days for the winner in nineteen seventy three and
Speaker 1: now it's like just over a week, and within that
Speaker 1: week is a forced twenty four hour furlough, So technically
Speaker 1: they might be able to do it in a week
Speaker 1: if they really tried. Yeah, twenty four hours plus two
Speaker 1: eight hour breaks. So yeah, I bet if it was
Speaker 1: up to the mushers, they would press on yes, because
Speaker 1: aside from those enforced breaks, they do typically press on UM.
Speaker 1: They'll stop every once in a while, like feed the
Speaker 1: dogs or something like that, but for the most part
Speaker 1: they're not sleeping. They're staying awake and they're just pushing forward,
Speaker 1: so they get sleep deprivation. They start to hallucinate. Um.
Speaker 1: I read this really great New Yorker article called the
Speaker 1: White Wall, where, um, the light from your head lamp
Speaker 1: because you're traveling at night. Sure most of the time, Um,
Speaker 1: the light from your head lamp is reflecting off of
Speaker 1: the fur around your parka, and it creates this kind
Speaker 1: of white screen in your field of vision, and it's
Speaker 1: like right for hallucinations. She just started to go a
Speaker 1: little batty. Yeah, for sure, I saw where this one
Speaker 1: lady who uh was a musher said that she slept
Speaker 1: while she was Oh yeah, that's what she said. She
Speaker 1: just taught herself to kind of hang on and off,
Speaker 1: or maybe she just thought she was sleeping. Yeah, that's possible.
Speaker 1: And you know, it's freaking out on the snowblind, so
Speaker 1: we should mention mush. Apparently no one says mush anymore.
Speaker 1: Oh as far as like the lingo. Yeah, now they
Speaker 1: say like hiker, all right, or let's go, But mush
Speaker 1: originally meant like start going. Yeah, it's a fridge from
Speaker 1: Marcia or marsh, yes, marsh and uh yeah, they still
Speaker 1: call them mushers. It's funny name. But apparently the mushers
Speaker 1: don't use the word mush when they're as far as
Speaker 1: like their command exactly. Yeah, that makes sense. So you
Speaker 1: want to talk about the history of this sport, this
Speaker 1: endurance sport, because the there's really no way around it.
Speaker 1: The dogs are like peak before, they're like Lebron James,
Speaker 1: of of of dogs, all of them. But let's talk
Speaker 1: about the history of sled dogs, about the kind of
Speaker 1: dogs that are used for sled dogs. Like most people,
Speaker 1: including me, assume that if you were um riding around
Speaker 1: the snow on a sled being pulled by dogs, you're
Speaker 1: probably being pulled by Siberian huskies or Alaska mala mutes
Speaker 1: or maybe a samoyad. Yes, perhaps, Thank you for being
Speaker 1: the one to say it out loud. It's not the
Speaker 1: easiest one just looking at it to pronounce. Would you say?
Speaker 1: Some woyd Samoyd. I watched the dog Show the other day.
Speaker 1: That's why I love that they had who won? Uh
Speaker 1: you know? I'd actually well, that's how old I am.
Speaker 1: I fell asleep before the best in show. Okay, that's
Speaker 1: all right. Yeah, this very fun as long as you
Speaker 1: enjoyed yourself watching it. I want to go one year. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that'd be cool. All that it is crazy, crazy partying.
Speaker 1: No I think it'd probably be a lot of fun
Speaker 1: to go see and cheer for dogs, although I'm against
Speaker 1: dog breeding in general, so I probably shouldn't even go. Um,
Speaker 1: but the the some what is you say, the samoiede
Speaker 1: and the Alaskan malamute and the Siberian husky. They are
Speaker 1: all a k C registered breeds. They're recognized by the
Speaker 1: American Kennel Club, and they used to pull sleds, especially
Speaker 1: Siberian Huskies. There's a guy named um Leonard uh oh man.
Speaker 1: I can't remember his name, Cippola, I believe it's what
Speaker 1: his name was, and he was the guy who first
Speaker 1: started racing Siberian Huskies in Alaska on sleds. But if
Speaker 1: you go to Alaska today, you're going to find something
Speaker 1: called an Alaskan husky is typically the kind of dog
Speaker 1: that you're gonna encounter as a sled dog. And this
Speaker 1: is like a mixed breed. It's a mutt breed UM
Speaker 1: and they have been bred to just basically be mentally tough,
Speaker 1: physically sturdy, UM not too big but also not too small.
Speaker 1: The thick coat and um yes, and uh, not just quickness,
Speaker 1: but a strong inbred desire to run and pull stuff
Speaker 1: while they're running. Yeah, I saw this. One guy called it. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's like they have a wanderlust, like there there's always
Speaker 1: some place else they'd rather be, Like they want to
Speaker 1: go go go over there, which is why. Um, if
Speaker 1: it's when you're taking a break or something with your
Speaker 1: dogs on the iditar rod, you have to chain them
Speaker 1: down whereas they're like see you. And they also microchip
Speaker 1: them as well. I had a friend who had a
Speaker 1: husky and um, they are not easy. And this husky
Speaker 1: would get out and see you later. Yeah, for like
Speaker 1: two days. Yeah, and he always came back, but he
Speaker 1: came back wearing like a Hawaiian shure. Yeah. That would
Speaker 1: freak if my dog got out, because my dogs are
Speaker 1: big dummies. They wouldn't like that, wouldn't know how to
Speaker 1: come back. Was this a pretty smart dog? Yeah? I
Speaker 1: think that's the Alaska husky is pretty smart generally, So
Speaker 1: it was an Alaska husky, I think so. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: Alaska huskies are descended, um more from the dogs called
Speaker 1: Inuit dogs and Eskimo dogs, and they are basically in
Speaker 1: didigenous dogs to Alaska. They came over with the first
Speaker 1: humans who crossed the Bearing Land bridge, right, the dogs
Speaker 1: pulled them across that bridge, probably, oh they did. So.
Speaker 1: I saw that they didn't hook dogs up the sleds
Speaker 1: until like the them this past millennia or the one
Speaker 1: we're in now that was like a D eight hundred
Speaker 1: or maybe twelve hundred when they were using sleds. That's
Speaker 1: what I saw, um, but I also saw that it
Speaker 1: goes back to time immemorial. Who knows. What I did
Speaker 1: see though, is that these dogs, these Inuit dogs and
Speaker 1: the Eskimo dogs were um definitely hauling stuff like whale
Speaker 1: carcasses are huge parts of whale carcasses to be butchered
Speaker 1: back in town. Um, they were hunting dogs, their companions,
Speaker 1: they were protector dogs. They were just total um butt
Speaker 1: kicking animals that could stand temperatures well into the negative
Speaker 1: twenties or aties or forties degree parentheights. Because that double coat, yes,
Speaker 1: so the outer coade I think deflects the snow and
Speaker 1: then they have the inner coat that has waterproof and
Speaker 1: insulates them. So when you see those dogs laying out
Speaker 1: in the snow, uh, they're not cold, right, you know,
Speaker 1: don't think, oh poor dog laying in the snow. I
Speaker 1: mean there can be problems, as we talked about with
Speaker 1: the Iddarod when that one dog was buried. Um, they
Speaker 1: can also get frost bit. They can get frostbite though
Speaker 1: depending But yeah, for the most part, which I don't understand. Man,
Speaker 1: that's crazy. I was like, man, these checkpoints, they have
Speaker 1: like tents at the checkpoints. How how big are the tents?
Speaker 1: I mean, what if more than one team has to
Speaker 1: put their dogs in the tents? And I was like,
Speaker 1: they're not in the tent. No, they sleep, they put down,
Speaker 1: they put down. Hey, they might have a bale of
Speaker 1: hay that the musher has, um and the dogs sleep
Speaker 1: on the hay in the snow and they cover their
Speaker 1: nose with their tails they do, which is adorable. And
Speaker 1: at kennels for these dogs, some of them they'll have
Speaker 1: like plastic barrels cut in half with a little hole
Speaker 1: for the dog to get in and out of when
Speaker 1: weather is really bad. But for the most part, yeah,
Speaker 1: especially if it's not snowing or windy. Uh, a Inuit
Speaker 1: dog or Alaska husky can just sleep outside on the
Speaker 1: snow exactly. They used to deliver the mail in Alaska
Speaker 1: in the late eighteen hundreds to early nineteen hundreds. That
Speaker 1: was exclusively how the mail was delivered until the airplane
Speaker 1: became the primary mode of mail delivery. Uh. And the
Speaker 1: last mail dog in Alaska retired in nineteen sixty three,
Speaker 1: so not too long ago. Pretty impressive, Yeah, right before hippies. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the dog didn't didn't live to see hippies. The police
Speaker 1: used them uh in the in the gold rush of
Speaker 1: the late eighteen hundreds, and of course Alaska aside. They
Speaker 1: have long been used in Arctic and Antarctic expeditions. Yeah.
Speaker 1: There was actually a very famous antarctic expedition in Japan
Speaker 1: where I think in the fifties. Yeah. Uh, an antarctic
Speaker 1: expedition had to be abandoned and the Japanese researchers had
Speaker 1: to be evact by helicopter and they were like sorry, dogs,
Speaker 1: well somebody will be back in a few days. We're
Speaker 1: gonna change you up here. Here's some food, good luck,
Speaker 1: fight over it. A year later, a research team made
Speaker 1: it back to that outpost and they found two of
Speaker 1: the dogs were still alive, uh, Taro and Jero, and
Speaker 1: they were brothers, which makes it even more awesome, and
Speaker 1: they became national heroes back in Japan. Um, And I
Speaker 1: was like, well, yeah, of course they ate the other dogs.
Speaker 1: I've read an article that said that there were no
Speaker 1: signs of cannibalism, that they just like like hunted penguins
Speaker 1: and seals and stuff like that and managed to survive.
Speaker 1: Was it that the basis of the Paul Walker Walker
Speaker 1: movie Paul Walker, The Fast and the Furious, same guy, Uh, no,
Speaker 1: longer with us too? No? That car wreck? Yeah? Was
Speaker 1: he a passenger? He was the passenger in that car wreck,
Speaker 1: wasn't he? I think he drove. He did have a passenger.
Speaker 1: What was it called eight below right? Yeah, which is
Speaker 1: he's not Japanese. No, but he's he It was supposedly him.
Speaker 1: I think it must have been based on that or something.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen the movie. I think they thought an
Speaker 1: updated version would fair better. They're like, who does everyone
Speaker 1: like Paul Walker? Exactly? They were used as war dogs
Speaker 1: in World War One and World War Two, hauling equipment,
Speaker 1: search and rescue. Helps set up the Alaska telegraph line
Speaker 1: around World War One. Um, and they also almost invaded
Speaker 1: Norway from uh the eastern coast of Canada. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: They were attached to like the fifteenth Mountaineering regiment of
Speaker 1: the United States Army. I think it would have been
Speaker 1: army for sure. And um, we didn't invade Norway, but
Speaker 1: have we These dogs would have been there with us yea.
Speaker 1: And by us, I mean specifically you and me, Chuck,
Speaker 1: because we were. Uh so you said that they are
Speaker 1: bred for there not only endurance, but for their for
Speaker 1: their speed. And they actually have their feet have adapted
Speaker 1: to take on this train because a good sletter is
Speaker 1: uh is that a sletter? Sure? Alright? Good letters has
Speaker 1: wide flat feet. But they also have toes that are
Speaker 1: dense and together. You don't alto explayed toes because stuff
Speaker 1: can get in between them. So basically they have like
Speaker 1: they they have feet like hammers. It sounds like hammer
Speaker 1: toes basically, but hammer feet. Yeah. And the gender doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: Uh Lady, little lady dogs and little boy dogs are
Speaker 1: just as good. Uh So gender isn't a big deal. Um.
Speaker 1: They're also big at trail breaking, right, So like, if
Speaker 1: you want to go out and see if the ice
Speaker 1: is thicken up to cross, take a team of sled dogs.
Speaker 1: And they actually do this in Denali National Park. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and they do it ahead of the Iditarod. They send
Speaker 1: out teams to break the trails and make sure it's
Speaker 1: as safe as it can be. And those trails, chuck
Speaker 1: were used for a very long time and still were,
Speaker 1: but then they started in like the six sixties, say
Speaker 1: maybe early seventies, to be blazed more by by snowmobiles.
Speaker 1: And this guy named Joe Ruddington Sr. Was really sad
Speaker 1: to see the dog sled, the traditional um sled, being
Speaker 1: replaced by the snowmobile man made machines. And he said,
Speaker 1: you know what, we need to preserve this heritage. I'm
Speaker 1: going to start a race in the in the fashion
Speaker 1: of some of these old ones. There was this all
Speaker 1: Alaska Sweepsteaks that was much shorter. But like in the
Speaker 1: ninet hundreds, people were using sled dogs a lot and
Speaker 1: actually using them, but then they fell out of fashion.
Speaker 1: So this guy, Joe Ruddington Sr. Tried to preserve it
Speaker 1: by starting this race. Yeah the Dorothy Page or they
Speaker 1: together or were they just uh they were they were
Speaker 1: kindred spirits. Okay, gotcha. So the first one they organized
Speaker 1: was a fifty mile race, right yeah, and like the
Speaker 1: sixties and not like the mile journey that has grown
Speaker 1: into today. They really stepped it up yeah, and the sprints,
Speaker 1: they actually have sprint races. They have all different races.
Speaker 1: A sprint is a thirty mile sprint, like just go
Speaker 1: flat out for thirty miles. Thirty miles. That's insane, It
Speaker 1: is so um there's this very there's this widely um
Speaker 1: held misconception that I did a rod was created to
Speaker 1: commemorate this, um this very famous run that happened in right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: the dip theory outbreak. They ran out of well, they
Speaker 1: needed to get medicine and they used dogs to get
Speaker 1: medicine to the farthest reaches of Alaska. And like Gnome,
Speaker 1: I think there's about to be a dip theory outbreak.
Speaker 1: So that has nothing to do with it, because that
Speaker 1: is all over the internet, including on the IDDA out side. No,
Speaker 1: if you look at the Idea out side, it says
Speaker 1: specifically what Joe Reddington's aim was. Yeah, um no, I
Speaker 1: know I saw that everywhere, including on our own How
Speaker 1: Stuff Works articles that people believe that they meant to
Speaker 1: con rememorate it. And yes, this this incredibly courageous emergency
Speaker 1: rescue operation of bringing vaccine um well at least antiets,
Speaker 1: and I think it is what it was to the
Speaker 1: children of Nome before this outbreak killed them all. Um,
Speaker 1: it captured the world's imagination. UM, and it did follow
Speaker 1: the same route half of it, but the first half
Speaker 1: was delivered by train and UM, the Idda trail was
Speaker 1: starting to fall out of use by the time Joe
Speaker 1: Reddington and Dorothea Page came along and wanted to preserve it.
Speaker 1: So it's more coincidence than anything that they didn't They
Speaker 1: didn't intentionally create the idea road to commemorate the dip
Speaker 1: theory run from Well, if you go to New York
Speaker 1: Central Park around sixty s it um on the east side,
Speaker 1: you can see a statue of Balto, the dog who
Speaker 1: was the lead dog on that serum run. So they said,
Speaker 1: we're gonna commemorate this in New York, which I don't
Speaker 1: get it londs like it would be in Alaska. Well,
Speaker 1: the reason why they did it there was because, um,
Speaker 1: like the whole country was paying attention, much of the
Speaker 1: world was paying attention to this this little tiny this
Speaker 1: little tiny town up in Alaska was in real trouble.
Speaker 1: And this doctor put all these telegraphs out like asking
Speaker 1: for somebody to bring them something. And the closest stuff
Speaker 1: was in Anchorage, and since this trek took like five days,
Speaker 1: people were covering it for the for the newspapers, and
Speaker 1: people were reading about it all over the country. They
Speaker 1: got so jazzed up that New York was like, we're
Speaker 1: gonna wreck the Statue of Balto. But that didn't explain
Speaker 1: why New York they just got that excited. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: the reason. That's exactly why. Uh So in the early
Speaker 1: nineteen nineties. Well, let's let's take a break, actually, and
Speaker 1: then we'll talk about the nineties. Yea, So in the
Speaker 1: early nineties, as I was saying, before they started there,
Speaker 1: there's a ceremonial kickoff they do. Now, uh that's not
Speaker 1: a part of the actual race, so people can come
Speaker 1: out and cheer them on. Yeah, so they have a
Speaker 1: big party and people line the streets and they get
Speaker 1: all the Apparently it's a crazy scene because you know,
Speaker 1: hundreds and hundreds of dogs, and these dogs, I will say,
Speaker 1: I mean, we'll get to the the downside, which is
Speaker 1: pretty grotesque if you ask me. But these dogs want
Speaker 1: to work, and they want to they want to pull
Speaker 1: the sled. Um, I don't know if they want to
Speaker 1: pull a eleven hundred miles. But they are sled dogs.
Speaker 1: And so when you get these highly energetic uh, well,
Speaker 1: they're all kinds of breeds, but mostly the Alaska husky
Speaker 1: is what they prefer. Uh, mushers prefer. Um. It's a
Speaker 1: crazy scene because they're not like they're they're not your
Speaker 1: average lapdog. They're excited and they howl. They have very
Speaker 1: shrill howls. A lot of them do, yeah, unless they
Speaker 1: had their voice box removed by their musher, which is
Speaker 1: the thing it can be. Um. So they kick off
Speaker 1: an Anchorage and the reason why it's just a ceremonial
Speaker 1: kickoffs because there's usually not enough snow these days in
Speaker 1: Anchorage again climate change. So they used to go up
Speaker 1: to Vascilla or was Silla? I don't know how they
Speaker 1: pronounce it up there? Is it was Silla. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: Sarah Palins, I know, I don't remember back then. Um
Speaker 1: and uh, then they stopped getting enough reliable snow there,
Speaker 1: so they had to move it up even further to
Speaker 1: Willow Willow Willow Vilva, phil of Um is two and
Speaker 1: a half hours north of Anchorage. They always have snow there,
Speaker 1: that's their motto, right, So they have the ceremonial parade
Speaker 1: of the dogs the day before, and then the next
Speaker 1: day is when they start, and like the race officially starts. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it costs a lot of money to uh to
Speaker 1: put on the race and and it's not cheap to
Speaker 1: be a musher with a sled team. I mean you
Speaker 1: can put as much as like twenty grand into your
Speaker 1: sled team. Uh and the training and you know, it
Speaker 1: takes a long time. So some of these mushers have
Speaker 1: corporate sponsors. Uh you can make money to like, um,
Speaker 1: owning a kennel and leasing dogs out to other I
Speaker 1: did aod contestants. Yeah, um, yeah, but yeah, I think
Speaker 1: corporate sponsorships definitely helped quite a bit. Well. A lot
Speaker 1: of corporations have stepped away from it though in recent
Speaker 1: years as far as sponsoring the race, um, because of
Speaker 1: all the controversy surrounding it, which we will still get to. Uh,
Speaker 1: you gotta be eighteen. You can't just be some uh
Speaker 1: dumb fourteen year old or even a seventeen year old,
Speaker 1: not even seventeen and a half. You gotta be eight
Speaker 1: team and you have to have completed uh some other
Speaker 1: qualifying races and place. I mean, we can get specific
Speaker 1: if you want uh a Yukon Quest International Sled Dog
Speaker 1: Race or two approved races, and you have to have
Speaker 1: at least five miles under your belt on those races
Speaker 1: and have finished in the top or it says here
Speaker 1: mind bending lee. Another way to qualify for an idd
Speaker 1: A rod race is to have been in a previous
Speaker 1: I did a rod race, which I guess. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't think that. What's you. I guess once you're in
Speaker 1: your first one, then you're qualified. But are you sure?
Speaker 1: It wasn't like if you've won, then you get like
Speaker 1: a lifetime No. I don't think exemption. That's what golfers do,
Speaker 1: is right, well, some of them, some of the p
Speaker 1: g A events. If you win that event, then you're
Speaker 1: automatically and for the rest of your life. Maybe not
Speaker 1: the rest of your life, but I think for like
Speaker 1: the next five years or it depends on the Then
Speaker 1: you get automatically qualified. That makes sense, all right, So
Speaker 1: what's uh? What's what does a sled team look like?
Speaker 1: They look pretty good. You got your musher, that's the
Speaker 1: guy standing on back telling the dogs what to do. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's right, um, I mean the gender neutral guy. Um.
Speaker 1: And then you have a team of dogs and depending
Speaker 1: on what you're doing UM with the idea in particular,
Speaker 1: you have to start I think with sixteen dogs, right,
Speaker 1: and you have to finish with twelve. No, twelve to sixteen,
Speaker 1: and they have to finish with ten. So you can
Speaker 1: have up to six dogs die along the way and
Speaker 1: not get disqualified from the idea. Rod Technically, um and
Speaker 1: in the lead are the very appropriate named lead dogs.
Speaker 1: These are your smartest, fastest dogs. I was reading about
Speaker 1: these dogs. These dogs are amazing dogs, so smart that
Speaker 1: they will even disobey their owner if they're like, dude,
Speaker 1: that's a cliff. Don't tell me too much. I know
Speaker 1: you can't see because you're snow blind in the Aussie fashion,
Speaker 1: So just leave it to me to ignore your a
Speaker 1: man and steer us to the left. And so when
Speaker 1: that lead dog starts to go, the dogs immediately behind them,
Speaker 1: the point dogs or the what are they called the
Speaker 1: swing dogs? They also are called point too. I think
Speaker 1: they're the ones who actually get the rest of the
Speaker 1: team to turn with them. Yeah, and uh, they call
Speaker 1: them swings because you know you have to. You can't
Speaker 1: cut it short. You gotta swing wide around obstacles and
Speaker 1: These dogs are smart enough to know to do that.
Speaker 1: So you've got those are the first four dogs you have.
Speaker 1: Are the lead dogs and the swing or point dogs
Speaker 1: behind them. You're gonna have a couple of pairs of
Speaker 1: what are called team dogs. These dogs are just really
Speaker 1: good at pulling, working well with others. Yeah, they're like
Speaker 1: the role player on the NBA bench. Yeah, they're the
Speaker 1: solid basketball players, the Draymond Greens. But sure, but they're
Speaker 1: not going to be starting an All Star game. No,
Speaker 1: but they they they may have enough spunking spirit. You
Speaker 1: get the rest of the team going, um, yeah, the
Speaker 1: Draymond Greens. And then at the back, right in front
Speaker 1: of the sled are the wheels, the wheelers. Yes, and
Speaker 1: they are the strongest of the bunch, supposedly, And uh,
Speaker 1: those are the dogs. But the dogs are attached to
Speaker 1: the sled or else you're in big trouble. You have
Speaker 1: a bunch of really fast dogs running together and a
Speaker 1: mushard who's left behind. How funny would that be? It
Speaker 1: would be funny to everybody else, but the mush rights
Speaker 1: and um, the sled connects to the dogs through the
Speaker 1: main line or the toe line right or the gang line.
Speaker 1: I think it's the other name for it. And this
Speaker 1: is basically just a line that goes from the sled
Speaker 1: all the way up to the lead dogs, and all
Speaker 1: the dogs are connected to this thing. That's right. Then
Speaker 1: the dogs are connect to the lead line and they
Speaker 1: pull on that toe line via tug lines that are
Speaker 1: connected to their harnesses. That's right. Uh. And the dog
Speaker 1: is wearing a color and a harness. Um, they don't. Actually,
Speaker 1: it's not like they don't have reins. Like a horse,
Speaker 1: They go on command. Um. I have seen like a whip.
Speaker 1: They stopped us whips, but they used to fairly recently,
Speaker 1: got you. Yeah, they go mushus no mush no more
Speaker 1: mush no more whips. Things are changing big time as
Speaker 1: a matter of fact. Um. And then you have the
Speaker 1: So the dog's collars can is connected by a collar line,
Speaker 1: I think right. So, Uh, you have to condition these dogs.
Speaker 1: You know, they don't come out of the uh the
Speaker 1: womb ready to run a thousand miles. They want to. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they've got some genetics going on for sure, but absolutely
Speaker 1: takes some shaping as well. But you have to condition
Speaker 1: them over time, uh, from the time they're little pups
Speaker 1: to start them out wearing the collar and the harness
Speaker 1: to get used to it. To pulling little light things
Speaker 1: around the house that's adorable, yeah, um. To building up
Speaker 1: their endurance in their in their strength over time, just
Speaker 1: like you know any endurance race, if you're a marathon
Speaker 1: or the same deal. You don't go out and run
Speaker 1: twenty six miles. And you also have to be um.
Speaker 1: You have to understand um verbal commands obscure ones too,
Speaker 1: like hike not much, though no one says much to
Speaker 1: a dog. Let's go all right? All those mean let's
Speaker 1: let's go right. Yeah, I think that's how they say
Speaker 1: it easy if you want to slow down and we
Speaker 1: couldn't decide as a G I think it's g I
Speaker 1: think I think it's gum. Or come haw to go
Speaker 1: left or right? Haw is definitely haw uh straight on
Speaker 1: and then whoa if you're gonna stop. It makes sense
Speaker 1: like with a horse, and imagine straight on means keep
Speaker 1: on going. They also definitely need to learn to work together,
Speaker 1: which is not necessarily in every breed of dogs makeup.
Speaker 1: You know, dogs have alpha dogs and their pack dogs,
Speaker 1: and you have a lead dog that that lead dog
Speaker 1: and fulfill that role. But you also want dogs that
Speaker 1: can that aren't like constantly jockeying for position, that they
Speaker 1: know their place and they're willing to work together with
Speaker 1: the other dogs. Temperaments a big deal for sure. And
Speaker 1: then um, you also when you're running the Iditara and
Speaker 1: you're putting a sled team together, you out you want
Speaker 1: to pick dogs of similar build, similar gait and speed.
Speaker 1: You want them to basically move as one. And so
Speaker 1: a lot of the selection and your dogs that you
Speaker 1: put together for a team is going to have a
Speaker 1: huge impact on the like how they pay well together
Speaker 1: but not and not just temperamentally but physically and in
Speaker 1: the way that they move as well. Yeah, and the dogs, uh,
Speaker 1: they can be big um, But generally I think for
Speaker 1: the endurance races, you want a dog this between like
Speaker 1: forty and sixty pounds and how old are they Well, um,
Speaker 1: if you want to be a sled dog, you're probably
Speaker 1: at least two. But you would think you know, like
Speaker 1: if you look at thoroughbred horse racing, those horses are
Speaker 1: retired by like age three, I think maybe four. These
Speaker 1: dogs will pull sleds and compete in like races up
Speaker 1: until age ten. Yeah, not bad. And again at the
Speaker 1: Nali National Park. They get retired at age nine. Uh.
Speaker 1: They're eating a lot. Uh. They need to eat around
Speaker 1: ten thousand calories a day while they're doing these races. Uh.
Speaker 1: That's about two thousand pounds of food per team and
Speaker 1: it's mostly just meat. But they have this stuff. It's
Speaker 1: sort of like how can the Appalachian Trail? They have
Speaker 1: it flown ahead and dropped off at all these checkpoints,
Speaker 1: so the food in your bourbon is waiting there when
Speaker 1: you get there. There was a guy um Man what
Speaker 1: was his name, Macki Lance Mackie. He was like the
Speaker 1: number one I did a rod racer for several years
Speaker 1: and um, he was not well liked among all I
Speaker 1: did a rod racers because he used to just do
Speaker 1: things like smoke pot like while he was just riding
Speaker 1: along on the I did or trail. I saw the
Speaker 1: drugs and alcohol was the thing with Musher's. I don't
Speaker 1: know if that's how widespread it is, but well, it's
Speaker 1: like a marijuana is a banned substance now even apparently
Speaker 1: they're talking about legalizing it in Alaska and the I
Speaker 1: did a rude committee is like not still can't smoke pot?
Speaker 1: Lance Mackie, we're looking at you. Um. But apparently according
Speaker 1: to this New Yorker article, great New Yorker article, the
Speaker 1: White Wall check it out. ESPN has a really good
Speaker 1: one too. Um. They said that he quit and did
Speaker 1: the did the race straight and still one once I think,
Speaker 1: and then smoke tons of pot right afterwards to celebrate. Yeah. Um.
Speaker 1: But the along this trail, um, you were saying that
Speaker 1: that the dogs eat mostly meat. They eat different types
Speaker 1: of meat. They also eat like, um, nutritional supplements. And
Speaker 1: in the White Wall the article they describe what Dallas
Speaker 1: stevis feeding his dogs at One Stop, and he's it's
Speaker 1: like a four course meal. He starts with a broth
Speaker 1: um with kibble and some nutritional supplements, and then they
Speaker 1: eat some fish steaks, you know, they have some beef
Speaker 1: and when they finish it all off with chicken skin
Speaker 1: like all fat. That sounds delicious. Yeah, And the dogs
Speaker 1: are eating like ten to fourteen thousand calories a day,
Speaker 1: which is like ten times the cloric intake of an
Speaker 1: active dog of about the same size, ten times just
Speaker 1: in a day. Yeah, because well they're they're running like
Speaker 1: over a hundred miles a day. It's crazy. Uh, they're
Speaker 1: wearing little doggy booties now, um, because it's very rough
Speaker 1: on their feet obviously running over this ice and snow
Speaker 1: and rough terrain. Uh. And a team will go through
Speaker 1: as many as two thousand pairs or this has two
Speaker 1: thousand booties. Maybe a thousand pairs. Yeah, well no, yeah,
Speaker 1: a thousand pairs. Would it be a pair before? Yeah,
Speaker 1: a dog pair of before? So five hundred dog pair.
Speaker 1: We just created a new thing. It's like a Baker's dozen.
Speaker 1: So two thousand booties we'll go through. Um, but they're
Speaker 1: still going to get their feet beat up, their paws
Speaker 1: beat up pretty bad. Well yeah, because dogs perspire by
Speaker 1: panting and on the bottoms of their feet, So you
Speaker 1: can't just wear um booties all the time. So that
Speaker 1: one of the mushers things that they really have to
Speaker 1: be paying attention to is a good time to give
Speaker 1: the dogs feet to rest without the booties, to let
Speaker 1: them basically perspire so they don't overheat. Yeah, And I
Speaker 1: get the feeling that if they're really hauling and they
Speaker 1: see that they've lost a few booties, they're not like, oh,
Speaker 1: let me stop and put a fresh booty. You know,
Speaker 1: They're they're mushing forward so Chuck, let's take a break, um,
Speaker 1: and uh, we'll come back and talk about some other stuff.
Speaker 1: All right, we've talked about dogs, We've talked a little
Speaker 1: bit about mushers. But one thing that makes a good
Speaker 1: musher is granted, they are standing. They're not running. Well,
Speaker 1: sometimes they're running along, but they're basically they're definitely standing.
Speaker 1: But it's tough. It's not like I get the feeling.
Speaker 1: It's like if you've ever been snow skiing or water skiing,
Speaker 1: it's hard on your legs. It's not like, oh, I'm
Speaker 1: just standing here or taking a joy ride. Ye have
Speaker 1: over over bumpy terrain um for hours and hours and
Speaker 1: hours basically for eight days. It's gonna be strong and
Speaker 1: have a lot of stamin in your own self. You
Speaker 1: also have to put up with again you have to
Speaker 1: be yeah, mentally tough. You have to put up with
Speaker 1: the hallucinations and um not make really bad decisions while
Speaker 1: you're on the trail and it's night and you haven't slept. Um.
Speaker 1: And uh, you also need to pack. Well, yeah, you
Speaker 1: want to bring everything. It's sort of like backpacking everything
Speaker 1: you need but as light as you can make it.
Speaker 1: And you there's actually stuff you have to bring just
Speaker 1: to survive. You gotta have a sleeping bag, sleeping bag
Speaker 1: and axe, snowshoes, a little cooking pot and fuel so
Speaker 1: you can boil water. Sure, um, and then you also, um,
Speaker 1: most of them carry a gun. The Dallas CV guy
Speaker 1: said that he carries a three fifty seven with him
Speaker 1: and he actually shot a moose with it that was
Speaker 1: charging him and his dogs. And no, because this is
Speaker 1: his long time rival, the the young upstart, the clean Liver,
Speaker 1: whose father Straight Edge U was also I Did a
Speaker 1: Rod winner from two thirteen. I think it very much
Speaker 1: seems like a family thing. I saw a lot of
Speaker 1: people with the same last names. Um. And then the
Speaker 1: other big essential gear is the sled itself, which there's
Speaker 1: not like. You don't go to the official I Did
Speaker 1: a Rod sled store and buy your sled and go, okay,
Speaker 1: I'm ready. You you constructed yourself? Oh really, yeah, you
Speaker 1: definitely can'. I'm sure there's sleds out there that you
Speaker 1: can buy, but you can also build him yourself. The
Speaker 1: I Did a Rod only requires that quote some type
Speaker 1: of sled or toboggan must be drawn, right, so you
Speaker 1: want that to be light as well. Um, probably about
Speaker 1: a hundred pounds empty, more than twice that full. Yeah,
Speaker 1: plus your own human body. Yeah, which you know, maybe
Speaker 1: drop a few pounds before the race. And again, I'm
Speaker 1: sorry to keep going to the same well, but the
Speaker 1: Dallas TV cat, the reason we I keep mentioning him
Speaker 1: is like he is really your hero. He's he's fine,
Speaker 1: he's I don't know enough about him to know whether
Speaker 1: he's my hero or not, but he is definitely reshaped
Speaker 1: the um. I did a rod race um with some
Speaker 1: of the stuff he's doing. One of the things he's
Speaker 1: doing is it's making I did a rod racers like
Speaker 1: more athletic um. Like if they're going up a hill,
Speaker 1: he'll jump off of the runners and run behind the
Speaker 1: sled rather than just get a ride with the dogs,
Speaker 1: which of course increases your time, but it's also easier
Speaker 1: on the dogs. It's just you have to be not
Speaker 1: a tub and you have to be able to run
Speaker 1: up in clins for eight days when you need to.
Speaker 1: You know, Yeah, that's it can't be fun. Running in
Speaker 1: the snow is not fun, No, but it helps you
Speaker 1: win and it's easier on your dogs, and if you win,
Speaker 1: you're gonna get some dough. They split the money up. Um,
Speaker 1: you can actually finish in last place and still get
Speaker 1: some money. Um, but you're gonna get obviously, the grand
Speaker 1: prize winner will win a nice fat purse in the
Speaker 1: six figure range, a really nice purse, very nice. Uh.
Speaker 1: Then there are other little prizes along the way, like
Speaker 1: a field day elementary school. If you reach the halfway
Speaker 1: the first much are muchure to go to to the
Speaker 1: halfway point. Um, in odd number of years it would
Speaker 1: be I did a right itself and then in cripple Uh,
Speaker 1: in the even number of years, you're gonna get yourself
Speaker 1: the g C. I. Dorothy pay Age Halfway Award and
Speaker 1: three thousand dollars in gold nuggets gold nuggets. That's pretty neat. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine every once a while they're like, we
Speaker 1: didn't have the gold nuggets, but here's three thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: I'd be like, I want my gold nuggets three thousand
Speaker 1: dollars worth. Um, you bite into it, just check its authenticity,
Speaker 1: and you call the guy who gives your dinner cookie. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the Alaska way. Uh. What else? The top lead
Speaker 1: dog is gonna take home the Lolly Medley Memorial Golden
Speaker 1: Harness Award. Of course everybody knows that. And then um
Speaker 1: there's other towns where if you're the first one to
Speaker 1: make it to say on Veek or Ruby, um, you'll
Speaker 1: get a seven course meal and thirty five hundred one
Speaker 1: dollar bills because it just seems like more not like
Speaker 1: gold nuggets, but thirty five hundred one dollar bills is
Speaker 1: pretty great. These are almost like joke gifts. Yeah. Well
Speaker 1: Wells Fargo, which is five dollars in pennies you know,
Speaker 1: slows you down. Um. Wells Fargo, which is uh one
Speaker 1: of the bigger along with x On Mobile, the two
Speaker 1: biggest corporate sponsors of the Idea Rode, offers them like
Speaker 1: a the Red Lantern awards the last place finisher. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's from the Widows Lamp. At the finish line,
Speaker 1: they have the Widows Lamp, which is a a lamp
Speaker 1: that they leave burning until the last musher and team
Speaker 1: has crossed. And that's from the old days, from they
Speaker 1: would keep a kerosene lamp burning for people that were
Speaker 1: still out there on the trails. Well Wells Fargo is
Speaker 1: the old timey multinational bank. Look at their look at
Speaker 1: their homespun logo with the stage coach, and it's pretty neat.
Speaker 1: They're just Western cowboy bankers, right. And it's funny you
Speaker 1: mentioned stage coach too, because you're like, wow, this is
Speaker 1: crazy using dogs and pull sleds and you think what
Speaker 1: you do with other stuff horses. This is using dogs
Speaker 1: as draft animals. Absolutely, that's all totally fine. Uh. So
Speaker 1: they have veterinarians on hand. Um, this article said around
Speaker 1: thirty seven, So weird, and there's a little bit of
Speaker 1: weirdness in this article, choke. But they do have veterinarians
Speaker 1: on hand to to examin them during the race, uh,
Speaker 1: before the race, to make sure they're all healthy. Um.
Speaker 1: But dogs die. Dogs can die of over exertion. Um.
Speaker 1: They can have trouble catching their breath. They can asphyxiate
Speaker 1: on vomit um. They can fall through the ice is
Speaker 1: a big one. As a matter of fact, falling through
Speaker 1: the ice is not necessarily a death sentence, even when
Speaker 1: it's negative forty degrees below. Sometimes I'll run right out
Speaker 1: of that thing. Yeah, because they're Alaskan huskies right. Um.
Speaker 1: But there's this very famous story from four there's an
Speaker 1: I did a odd winner named Susan Butcher. And she
Speaker 1: won multiple times. But her team in four UM was
Speaker 1: let out of after falling through ice, but her two
Speaker 1: lead dogs pulled the rest of the team out just
Speaker 1: like one dog at a time until the whole team
Speaker 1: had made it out of the ice water and continued
Speaker 1: on kept going. Yeah. Um. And then the next year,
Speaker 1: that same poor lead dog got kicked by a moose
Speaker 1: and they didn't finish that year. I believe it had
Speaker 1: to recuperate. He did had to recuperate for a year. UM.
Speaker 1: I believe a hundred and forty four dogs have died
Speaker 1: since the first race. UH. In the past few years
Speaker 1: they haven't had any deaths, but generally one or two
Speaker 1: dogs are going to die. Two thousand nine was a
Speaker 1: bad year. UM. One of the worst and most recent years. UH.
Speaker 1: There was like, I think six dogs that died that
Speaker 1: year two thousand, I think eleven or twelve. There was
Speaker 1: one dog that died, but it died terribly. UM. He
Speaker 1: died from being asphyxiated by the snow after he was
Speaker 1: left at a checkpoint by his musher in the hands
Speaker 1: of like the local vets at the checkpoint, and they
Speaker 1: tied him up and the weather got bad and no
Speaker 1: one brought him in and he was a snow drift
Speaker 1: just built over the dog. He couldn't go anywhere and
Speaker 1: he suffocated in the snow. Um that that was a
Speaker 1: big deal. Um. Yeah, Pete actually had to apologize. They
Speaker 1: condemned the musher. They said that they just left this dog. No, no,
Speaker 1: like they left him officially. No, no, But Peter didn't
Speaker 1: say that. Petter said they just left this dog behind
Speaker 1: it h and had they were had a lawsuit brought
Speaker 1: against them, and they came out and apologized. Said, oh,
Speaker 1: actually we know it wasn't on you. You left them
Speaker 1: in the care of somebody else. And they said the
Speaker 1: person said that the apology was weak. If you're gonna agitate,
Speaker 1: even if it's four animal rights, you should agitate correctly. No, agreed.
Speaker 1: Can I get your facts straight before you agitate, You know,
Speaker 1: like there's enough, there's enough there that you can you
Speaker 1: can get your facts straight and still agitate just as effectively. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're talking about dehydration, ulcers, hypothermia, heart problems, and let's
Speaker 1: talk about those ulcers. Chuck. There was a study from
Speaker 1: Oklahoma State University UM of a decent number of sled
Speaker 1: dogs on the Iditarod trail that UM found a lot
Speaker 1: of them had anemia because they had stomach ulcers and
Speaker 1: they were bleeding slowly and developing anemia as a result.
Speaker 1: And they got stomach ulcers from being fed aspirin and
Speaker 1: anti inflammatory drugs like advil to keep them going to
Speaker 1: keep their joints from hurting, and the the veterinary study
Speaker 1: suggested that UM, the dogs be fed and acids to
Speaker 1: combat the ulcers. So they're getting they're being driven a
Speaker 1: thousand miles miles over eight days, they're given drugs to
Speaker 1: keep their joints from hurting, they're getting ulcers from the drugs,
Speaker 1: they're getting anemia from the ulcers, and this VET study
Speaker 1: said that they should be given and acids. Yeah. One
Speaker 1: of the vets, Uh Scott More, he was a volunteer
Speaker 1: for the race a few years ago, said he saw
Speaker 1: dogs with torn achilles tendons, dehydration, diarrhea, hypothermia, hyperthermia, inflammation
Speaker 1: in the wrist, and soreness in the shoulders from the harnesses.
Speaker 1: I didn't know much about this. I just saw it
Speaker 1: on the news every now and then. I thought, oh,
Speaker 1: neat these working dogs out racing. But um, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: go ahead and say no more I did, or odd
Speaker 1: shut it down. Oh yeah, yeah, you're killing dogs for
Speaker 1: the entertainment of people. I know it's rare, and I
Speaker 1: know these mushers really care for these dogs and care
Speaker 1: for their well being and do all they can to
Speaker 1: ensure their safety. But to me, if dogs are dying
Speaker 1: at all in training, in the race, after the race,
Speaker 1: then you just shouldn't do anymore, or at the very least, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, shorten the race, or do something to ensure
Speaker 1: that these dogs don't die. Ever, So there's there's a
Speaker 1: there's a couple of schools that thought. Peter is very
Speaker 1: much opposed to the Iditarod and dog sled racing in general.
Speaker 1: They're like, just don't hook a dog up to a sled.
Speaker 1: That's our stance. Now are they against recreational sledding? There
Speaker 1: against all kinds of sledding, every every sleds What I
Speaker 1: couldn't find if you had like six dogs and you
Speaker 1: sled it over to your friends and they were your
Speaker 1: family dogs, Peter says, don't do that. I thought it
Speaker 1: was just competition. There there's a group called the Sled
Speaker 1: Dog Action Coalition. Yes, they are opposed to the iditarod,
Speaker 1: But they don't have a problem with humane and well
Speaker 1: done recreational mushing. Um. The Humane Society of the United
Speaker 1: States opposed to the ididar rod. But um is uh,
Speaker 1: they don't have a stance on mushing whatsoever. But Peter
Speaker 1: it says, don't don't use a dog as a draft animal,
Speaker 1: even for your own recreation. Um. But if you'll notice,
Speaker 1: the one common thread is that all these groups are
Speaker 1: opposed to the idea it a rod itself. They are
Speaker 1: saying like, even if you have vets on at every checkpoint,
Speaker 1: apparently the mushers can um overrule the vets ruling. If
Speaker 1: a vets like this dog needs to come out, the
Speaker 1: musher can be like, get lost and the vet doesn't
Speaker 1: have any recourse. Um, And that's totally well within the rules.
Speaker 1: But even if you do have vets looking after them,
Speaker 1: and even if Peter has successfully promoted change and the
Speaker 1: idea ROD is credited for really facing up to a
Speaker 1: lot of the problems that the dogs face and dealing
Speaker 1: with them and having like a very low tolerance for
Speaker 1: animal cruelty, especially um, the very fact that you're hooking
Speaker 1: up animals too sled and driving them miles over eight
Speaker 1: days is in and of itself, to a lot of critics,
Speaker 1: inhumane for the entertainment of people. Even take that away
Speaker 1: for whatever reason. It's it's inhumane, like, well take it away.
Speaker 1: But it's not like the old days where you needed
Speaker 1: to deliver the mail's serums. I mean, it's purely for
Speaker 1: entertainment at this point. And I know it's tradition, and
Speaker 1: people that are into this are gonna say, like, you
Speaker 1: know that you could do anything these days. Definitely, this
Speaker 1: is a proud old tradition, like just stay We've moved
Speaker 1: to Alaska for a reason. Stay out of my business. Um.
Speaker 1: And they definitely do take that stance for sure. But
Speaker 1: that's not to say that mushers are cruel awful people.
Speaker 1: By all accounts, most of them are very good to
Speaker 1: their animals because they want them to perform well. Uh
Speaker 1: they are like family to them in most cases. But
Speaker 1: you still hear about these uh terrible things that happen
Speaker 1: uh in the in the training. And it's not just
Speaker 1: the race itself, it's the training, it's the pens. They'll
Speaker 1: they'll they still call animals. There's one guy named Frank Winkler.
Speaker 1: Two times I did a ride racer. He was charged
Speaker 1: with fourteen counts of cruelty two animals. When UH animal
Speaker 1: control officer are found a craze of dead and dying
Speaker 1: puppies in his truck. He said he couldn't afford to
Speaker 1: take him to the vet. So they'll call the dogs
Speaker 1: like if you have a deformity, if you're just not
Speaker 1: good enough, they will still kill that's what calling means.
Speaker 1: Kill the puppies. And they don't call them by injecting
Speaker 1: them with um, you know, sodium pentethal or some gassing them.
Speaker 1: A lot of them, A lot of kennels, even like
Speaker 1: professional kennels UM will shoot them. And the I did
Speaker 1: a rod committee. That's that's within their rules. Like you
Speaker 1: can shoot a dog to cull it. Colling is fine,
Speaker 1: and how you call it um is okay. Apparently beating
Speaker 1: a dog to death is not really acceptable. But that's
Speaker 1: what Frank Winkler did. But for he did he shot
Speaker 1: some and then I guess he ran out of bullets
Speaker 1: and started using an axe handle and he was an
Speaker 1: I did rod racer um. And that's a problem with
Speaker 1: the kennels that there are a lot of kennels out
Speaker 1: there that don't treat their dogs very well. They don't
Speaker 1: feed them enough, they treat them fairly and humanely, and
Speaker 1: just the very fact that they cold dogs that aren't
Speaker 1: good enough is is um reprehensible to a lot of people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: me included at the u S UH. And I want
Speaker 1: to say, and me too, like I think this is
Speaker 1: there's a there's a there's a part of me that
Speaker 1: I'm like, this is not my thing that's up in Alaska.
Speaker 1: But dogs belong to humanity. Well, yeah, it's like when
Speaker 1: we did the bullfighting thing, like you can take your
Speaker 1: tradition and stick it where the sun doesn't shine. And again,
Speaker 1: culling isn't something that all breeders do, all kennels do. Uh.
Speaker 1: Many of the dogs now that aren't capable or adopted
Speaker 1: out to loving families, which is great, but culling is
Speaker 1: still a part of the culture and some kennels, uh
Speaker 1: the u S crab Lunic Kennel and aspin Colorado UH
Speaker 1: say that as many as thirty five dogs have been
Speaker 1: killed annually by gunshot to the head. And the manager said,
Speaker 1: you know, culling dates back hundreds of years. It's nothing new.
Speaker 1: It's part of the circle of life for this dog
Speaker 1: sled dog. The circle of life, the nine millimeter of
Speaker 1: the brain is these so um, yeah, wow, it's part
Speaker 1: of the circle of life. Huh, that's what are you said?
Speaker 1: And so Chuck. A lot of this stuff is reserved
Speaker 1: for the I did a rod specifically, and the kennels
Speaker 1: that supply dogs for the idea rod. But just having
Speaker 1: a sled dog in and of itself is not necessarily
Speaker 1: a bad thing, or even using a dog for a
Speaker 1: sled dog is not necessarily a bad thing. I don't
Speaker 1: think I take a heart line as PA. Maybe like
Speaker 1: if you want to recreationally much Uh, there is a long,
Speaker 1: great history of it. I have no problem with it
Speaker 1: because these dogs do love to run. Uh, they love
Speaker 1: to pull, and that's their job. But I just can't
Speaker 1: get behind endurance racing if these dogs are being injured
Speaker 1: or if they die from it. It's just my opinion.
Speaker 1: I know a lot of people disagree. We don't put
Speaker 1: opinions in here much, but one argument I don't want
Speaker 1: to hear is that we should shut down all endurance
Speaker 1: racing for humans in because humans can get injured and die.
Speaker 1: The key difference here is humans have free will and
Speaker 1: they elect to do so. Uh big difference between animals
Speaker 1: and humans that it's just not a comparison I think
Speaker 1: you should make. Okay, Well, if you want to know
Speaker 1: more in the meantime about the I Did Rod, you
Speaker 1: can go watch it. You can go to I Did
Speaker 1: a Rod dot com. I believe in track the Racers
Speaker 1: um and you can also read how the I did
Speaker 1: Rod works on how stuff works by typing those words
Speaker 1: in the search part how stuff works dot com and
Speaker 1: uh say said search part, it's time for listener now,
Speaker 1: Hey guys, I'm a registered dietitian. I realized I spent
Speaker 1: a lot of my day tech talking about the three
Speaker 1: things in my email title, which was poop. Listen to
Speaker 1: the Poop podcast on the way to work today and
Speaker 1: really enjoyed it. As someone who regularly discusses poop and digestion,
Speaker 1: it's great to hear it on a podcast. Also, I
Speaker 1: think you guys should do a breastfeeding episode. Breastfeeding is
Speaker 1: super fascinating. Uh so, thanks for being great in car entertainment.
Speaker 1: I came across this gem of a conversation a few
Speaker 1: years back because, uh, you guys were asking for different
Speaker 1: names for taking a poop, and she said someone had
Speaker 1: written name your poop after a movie on a bathroom wall,
Speaker 1: And of course a plenty list ensued. And here are
Speaker 1: some of my favorites. The Great Escape and by the way,
Speaker 1: we heard from a lot of people with great names.
Speaker 1: Children of the Corn, The Exorcist, Operation Dumbo, Drop e
Speaker 1: t the Extraterrestrian, I don't get held, I don't. I
Speaker 1: didn't get the Exors, Rosemary's Baby not bad, the hurt Locker,
Speaker 1: mud Gross, Apocalypse now not bad, easy writer, and there
Speaker 1: will be blood gross so gross. So the first part
Speaker 1: there's actually two emails. The first part was from Sarah uh,
Speaker 1: and then the boop movies was from read Sarah. I
Speaker 1: don't want you to be associated with that. What was Sara?
Speaker 1: He was the one that said that that gress feeding
Speaker 1: would be good. And she's a dietitian and she talks
Speaker 1: a lot about poop. So we should do a breast
Speaker 1: feeding one again if it canna be a hornet's nest.
Speaker 1: But we could do it. Sure, we just have to
Speaker 1: research it because there's no article on how stuff works.
Speaker 1: They think about it. It's worthwhile. Okay, sounds good, uh,
Speaker 1: But if you want to get in touch with us
Speaker 1: in the meantime. You can tweet to us at s
Speaker 1: y s K podcast. You can join us on Facebook,
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Speaker 1: us an email to Stuff Podcast that how Stuff Works
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Speaker 1: more on this and thousands of other topics, is it
Speaker 1: how stuff Works dot com.