NEWPORT – Sled dog racing is a family affair for Marc and Sara Vanderwood and their four-year-old son Grey. The Vanderwoods have more than 25 dogs in training at their Oxford home, carrying on a family tradition. Grey began his racing career in 2004, before his second birthday, riding in a pulk attached to a dog and tethered to his mother behind.  Last year was his first season with his own sled.  He has competed in probably 20 races, and hasn’t finished worse than second in any races.  After two races, this year he is undefeated and scheduled to race at Newport this weekend.
     The Vanderwoods will be among 70 to 80 sled dog teams expected for the David D. Merrill Memorial Challenge Sled Dog Races at the Big A clubhouse of the Sebasticook Valley Snowmobile Club on the Durham Bridge Road Saturday and Sunday, Feb. 23 and 24. Organized by the Sebasticook Valley Chamber of Commerce, this year’s event is sponsored by the New England Dodge Dealers Association and Hartley’s of Newport.
     The public is invited to meet the mushers beginning at 8 a.m. with racing slated from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. each day. This year’s race is also a key qualifying race for the International Federation of Sleddog Sports, IFSS, upcoming World Championships slated for 2009 in Quebec. This week’s race is sanctioned by the Down East Sled Dog Club. In addition to traditional mushing, a feature of the annual race is the skijoring competitions, a combination of dog sledding and cross-country skiing.
     Participants are advised to dress in warm attire and bring cross country skis or snowshoes if they expect to follow any of the trails or go out on the ice. Racers will be competing for a $2,500 purse raised by the chamber. Exhibitions and concessions also are planned.
     Four-year-old Grey is a third generation musher following in the footsteps of his parents. Mom, Sara and Dad, Marc. The couple has lived in Oxford for the past 12 years, training dogs for traditional mushing and skijoring.
     Sara attended the University of Alaska Fairbanks on a ski scholarship and began skijoring while in college. She has competed in skijoring and pulka in two World Championships and trained for pulka in Norway. She and her husband Marc have hosted and coached several Down East Sled Dog Club Skijoring Clinics and taught numerous private lessons. She has won three ISDRA medals in the one and two dog skijoring and has bred several medal winning dogs.
     An Alaskan native, Marc Vanderwood started skijoring in Fairbanks, AK in 1993 with his Alaskan husky Marley. After racing in the Fairbanks circuit for a couple of years, Marc moved to Maine, with his wife Sara, and inherited a 34 dog kennel from his in-laws who were retiring from dog sled racing. Skijoring was a relatively new sport and no races were to be found, so the Vanderwoods worked with local clubs to get a skijoring class instituted at all races. Over the next couple of years they put on clinics and demonstrations throughout New England and helped to grow the sport tremendously. Marc has several Maine State Championships and Down East Sled Dog Club (DESDC) titles, a silver medal for the International Sled Dog Racing Association (ISDRA) two dog class and competed in the 2003 International Federation of Sleddog Sports (IFSS) World Championships in Bernau, Germany where he competed in the one-dog combined skijoring/pulka class.
     “The annual sled dog race is a community collaboration,” said Jane Briggs, Executive Director of the SVCC. “We simply couldn’t do this without the help of the snowmobile club. They provide the trails, grooming them and providing the manpower on the trails to direct the racers.”

Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved.