Huskies become 'drivers' in publicity sled race

This reversal of mushing roles was dreamed up by the marketing department at Snausage brand dog treats as a way to celebrate "the connection between dogs and humans." The winner of the first-ever Snausages Man Sled Race received a donation to their selected pet charity.

Originally scheduled for Girdwood, the race moved to the lake in Kincaid Park -- officially known as Little Campbell Lake -- due to weather concerns. The course was between 75 and 100 yards long and took less than a minute to run Tuesday morning.

The pre-race favorite was Buddy. He's familiar to tourists as the affable star of the Wildride Sled Dog Show. The show features canines from the kennels of 2004 Iditarod champion Mitch Seavey, which is where all the dog "drivers" came from.

Buddy is famous for standing on the sled runners with his paws on the handle while Mitch or some other human hauler puts on a harness and pulls the sled. (The man harness is basically a big dog harness with minor adaptations.)

But this race had different rules. Dogs rode in the basket while a fourth human team member did the steering and braking. When one of the pullers in Buddy's Blue team stumbled in the first heat and fell behind the sled, Buddy leaped out to check on the fallen runner -- as every responsible musher is required to do.

That halted the Blue Team and gave the Red Team, driven by Chinook (rumored to be Buddy's girlfriend) the opportunity to cross the finish line first. Chinook's team then prevailed in a second heat.

The second-place Green team was driven by Hugo, a purebred Siberian who starred in Disney's movie "Snow Buddies" a couple of years ago. The Yellow team was driven by Cosmo, another Siberian. According to his official biography, he was "born in Ohio and came to Alaska to be a real sled dog."

Snocrates, the Snausages mascot, presented the winner with a check for $5,000 to the Second Chance League, a musher-to-musher organization that tries to find homes for sled dogs that may not be working out with their current teams, according to Danny Seavey of the victorious Red Team.

The crowd on hand was small, mostly local media. Although the event was billed as the "first ever" -- implying that it will recur -- the Snausages people were not certain at this time that it would be repeated.

One suspects that Buddy is up for a rematch.

Find Mike Dunham online at adn.com/contact/mdunham or call 257-4332.