Hello all and welcome back to Notebook from the North! This week I thought it would be interesting to explore the topic of dog mushing, but seeing as I know quite little about it, world renowned dog musher Jeff King has kindly agreed to fill in the details. Jeff has over 40 years of experience racing dogs and has won some of the toughest races out there, multiple times! His passion for his dogs and sport is infectious so rather than trying to capture that in an article, I thought we could keep this as a podcast episode. To hear Jeff’s interview, just click the play button above!

For a brief overview of Jeff’s accolades, he was won the Iditarod four times, the Kuskokwim 300 a staggering nine times, the Copper Basin 300 twice, Tustumena 200 three times, and finally the Yukon Quest once. He has also twice received the Leonhard Seppala Humanitarian Award for the high level of care he gives to his dogs, as well as advocating for improving rules around dog care in the Iditarod race.

For more info:

You can go to Jeff’s Husky Homestead website where you can learn more about how he raises and trains his dogs, and if you’re ever in Alaska you can go out with Jeff and the dogs on an adventure!

The Iditarod website can be found here

Finally, an article on the Serum Run, an interesting historical event in Alaska which follows a similar route to the Iditarod race, can be found here

Music: kongano.com and Pope and Palmer’s “On the Road”

Cover Photo: JLS Photography Alaska/Flickr