Dog Days in Winter

Skiers, skaters and snowmobile jockeys have inflated the audience for winter weather. A smaller, more select group of frosted sportsmen also follows snow bulletins with fascination: the men who hitch Huskies to light wood rigs and mush across wilderness trails in sled-dog races. From the White Mountains of New Hampshire through the Upper Midwest snow belt to Alaska, a cadre of dog sledders has been reviving the arcane sport for thrills and profit. TIME Correspondent Richard Woodbury visited Ely, Minn., to cover the Sixth All-American Sled-Dog Championships. His report:

The thermometer hovered just above 0DEG as the caravan of campers and mobile kennels--bearing such names as "Ozzie's Huskies" and "Polar Bear Kennels"--trekked into Ely (pop. 5,000) for the biggest weekend of the year. The 7,500 participants and spectators jammed the town's five motels and four restaurants. At Zup's Market the run on dog food was so fierce that supplies quickly gave out. Mayor Jack Grahek, himself a Husky fancier, opened up his own stockpile to ensure that none of the 2,500 canine guests would go hungry.

In the basement of Bridgeman's Restaurant, the drivers and their backers were trading tales and plotting strategy while downing tumblers of bourbon and Grain Belt beer. They also mulled over the tout sheet of Local Handicapper Duane Krause, who goes by the pen name "Timber Savage." Savage and most of the smart money favored George Attla, a lame, one-eyed Athapascan Indian from Fairbanks, Alaska. Others leaned toward Harris Dunlap, a former art teacher from Bakers Mills in New York's Adirondacks.

Attla, a veteran on the sled-dog circuit that has grown to 400 races a season, made close to $20,000 last year in purses. (The money is raised by such diverse off-season activities as bingo and potluck suppers.) He finds the kicks at least as compelling as the cash. "There's no other sport," he says, "where you have to control 16 animals at one time." There is probably no other winter sport so expensive either. A beginner itching to compete in the "unlimited class" (seven or more dogs) can expect to spend up to $10,000 for his team, and a good lead animal can cost $3,000. Preparation for serious competition is also time consuming; in the summer a team must be trained for the rigors of the trail by hauling their driver over hill and meadow on wheeled rigs or automobile frames.

Come Saturday morning the staging area behind the old railroad depot was full of yapping dogs and eager drivers, who made last-minute adjustments to their birchwood sleds, dosed their teams with cod-liver oil, and administered suppositories so that the dogs would excrete before and not during the race. As the town's lone vet scurried about treating sore legs and nervous stomachs, sheriffs deputies shooed away an occasional stray Dalmation or schnauzer.

Cottage Cheese. The course was 16 1/2 miles long but only 8 ft. wide, meandering through stands of aspen and balsam, crossing four frozen lakes and looping back into town. It had been packed down by snowmobiles towing iron bars, but a sudden thaw softened the surface. Drivers, whose control of their dogs is limited to four simple commands --Gee for turn right. Haw for left. Hike for go, and Whoa for stop--found the going tricky, and there were five spills on Suicide Hill. The teams are paced by their drivers, who must take care not to burn them out in heavy slush. When a burst of speed is needed, drivers sometimes "pump" (give a series of short one-legged kicks in the snow) to aid their animals. Some drivers hold a "snub line" to prevent the animals from running off without them in the event of an overturn.

The temperature dropped to a numbing 13DEG below zero that night, and on Sunday the course was frozen solid. Attla, who had turned in the best time during Saturday's first heat, prepared his team for the final day with a feast of cottage cheese, honey and rice. As spectators clutching flasks of brandy scrambled on foot or into pickups to find vantage points out on the course, Starter Frank Salerno began dispatching the 141 teams at 1-and 2-min. intervals. When Attla's turn came, he catapulted from the starting line and assaulted Suicide Hill.

Fifty-four minutes and three seconds later, man and dogs crossed the finish line, their faces masked in a film of frost. Attla's run--at an average of close to 20 m.p.h.--clipped six minutes off the course record. His reward: two trophies and a purse of $1,650. The next day, with Ely recovering from apres-sled festivities, Attla and his Huskies were in his 3/4ton truck, rolling down State Route 169 toward Colorado and another race.

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