Alaska News

Photos: 2012 Iditarod Trail Invitational

One thing about the Far North hasn't changed since Archdeacon Hudson Stuck roamed the country by dogsled 100 years ago: The best gift one winter traveler can give another is a trail.

Thus it was with enthusiasm that Iditarod Trail Invitational racers greeted a snowmachine, early-on in the 2012 competition, at the confluence of the Susitna and Yentna Rivers, where the landscape was buried beneath more than two feet of fresh snow.

Back in the day, the ultramarathon, human powered, 350-mile race from Knik to McGrath was called the "The Iditasport Extreme." Those crazy enough to head on the next 550 miles, to Nome, took part in a race known colloquially as "The Iditasport Impossible." These days, they are both lumped together under the banner of the Invitational, but they remain extreme and if-not-impossible, damn near so.

Over the past decade, only 35 Invitational competitors have made it to Nome. Nearly twice that many make it up the trail each year with the aid of canine teammates in the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race. Some think the latter event extreme. They're clueless.

Here's a running slideshow by Dispatch staff writer Craig Medred from the 2012 Iditarod Trail Invitational.

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