How far would you travel to follow a dream?
Former Morristown resident Bruce Linton has traveled 4,500 miles, to Kasilof, Alaska, to realize his dream of running the Iditarod dog-sled race.
Now, it looks as if his dream of becoming the first Vermonter to complete the race might come true. But first, he’ll have to complete a 300-mile qualifying race and raise nearly $10,000 to cover his entry fee and other expenses.
The Iditarod is the Tour de France of dog-sled races, a 1,150-mile trail stretching across the Alaskan wilderness from Anchorage to Nome.
Seventy teams with 16 dogs each compete in the race held early every March. The average finishing time is 12 to 14 days, although one team has gone the distance in nine days.
Linton, 43, started mushing — racing teams of sled dogs — in 1998.
He was born in New York City and raised in Philadelphia, and moved to Vermont in1994 to work for the state government as an environmental scientist. He had dreamed
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| Bruce Linton and his dog team pass a checkpoint during a race in Alaska. |
about running the Iditarod since childhood, but didn’t buy his first Alaskan husky until the early 1990s. Within a few years, he had four — enough for a small dog-sled team.He started a business called Green Mountain Dog Sled Adventures, offering tours in Morristown, Eden and at Smuggler’s Notch. The tours quickly became popular, and in 2005 Linton resigned from his environmental job to run his company full time.
Last winter’s unusually warm and icy weather hurt his business and made it difficult for him to train and race his dogs.
“My business exploded, but I couldn’t control the weather,” Linton said. “One
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| Map shows the 1,150-mile trail. COURTESY PHOTO |
day the sun came out and I lost $5,200 of pre-booked tours.”His wife, Melissa, suggested the couple move to Alaska where there would be more opportunities for him to train his dogs and prepare for the Iditarod.
They moved to Kasilof — a small town 117 miles west of Anchorage — in June. They bought some land and a recreational vehicle to live in and built kennels for the dogs. Linton estimates the move cost $80,000.
Living in Alaska has provided him resources he didn’t have in Vermont, Linton said. His neighbors, for example, are experienced mushers who have eagerly mentored him.
“I’m a rookie and they have helped me prepare for the race,” Linton said.
The couple lives mostly off of Melissa Linton’s wages as principal of a local public school during the fall and winter, while Bruce Linton trains full-time. During the spring and summer, he will run his own business as a seafood broker, buying salmon and halibut from local fishermen and distributing it to restaurants.
He has built a race team, which he calls his “A team,” of 28 dogs. The dogs have been training four to six hours a day since September and have competed in a two-day, 200-mile race. Linton will spend most of this month competing in local races, including a 300-mile race, to qualify for the Iditarod.
His lead dogs — chosen for their ability to listen to and follow commands — are in peak condition and have about 1,400 miles of racing experience, Linton said.
Linton has already experienced the adversity facing mushers who pursue their sport across Alaska’s often treacherous terrain. His dream nearly went kaput in November when his dog truck — outfitted with special kennel boxes, and carrying 20 dogs — slid off a dangerous section of road in Ninilchik known to locals as Dead Man’s Corner. The dog truck rolled five times as it slid several hundred feet down a hill before finally stopping at the bottom of a ravine.
The truck was demolished, but miraculously Linton was unharmed and the worst injury suffered by any of his dogs was a swollen toe. Some of the dogs ran away after the accident, but were recovered by the next day.
Linton’s sled, affixed to the roof of the dog truck, fell off early in the accident and received only a few minor cracks.
Linton’s passenger, fellow musher Jason Mackey, wasn’t as fortunate. He suffered broken ribs and internal bruising during the accident and his sled, also affixed to the truck’s roof, was reduced to a pile of splinters.
The accident hasn’t diminished Linton’s desire to compete in the Iditarod, but with no dog truck, many expenses from his recent move and accident, getting to the starting line of the Iditarod within the next three months may be difficult.
Competing, even if he runs in back of the pack, will be an amazing learning experience, Linton said.
It will also provide a platform from which Linton, a Type 1 diabetic, can promote diabetes awareness in his community.
When Linton was diagnosed with the disease 14 years ago, he worried that he might be confined to his home. Since then, he’s finished three Ironman triathlons and participated in several marathons. He has also run sled-dog races while hooked to an insulin pump.
Now, he wants to encourage other diabetics to pursue their dreams.
“Dog-sled racing is pretty selfish,” Linton said. “I’m not providing any good to the world. Speaking to other diabetics and encouraging them to live their dreams would provide some meaning to my life.
This is my dream. I get to do what I love 10 to 12 hours a day.”
