The decision to call off the Can-Am Crown International Sled Dog Race for the first time since its inception three decades ago was a matter of safety, organizers said.
Jonathan Hayes woke up at 5 a.m. in rural Maine to feed his 20-some dogs Monday morning, and his heart sank when he learned that the sled race they had been training for since the fall was canceled.
The Can-Am Crown International Sled Dog Race, the longest sled-dog race in the Eastern United States, will be canceled because of a lack of snow for the first time since the race’s inception more than three decades ago, event organizers said.
The news came as a blow to the mushers who spent long hours training to prepare for the event, which was to be held from March 1 to March 5 in Fort Kent, Maine, which borders Canada.
Mr. Hayes, a high school biology teacher, had spent hours training with his dogs after his family went to bed. “I’ve been pushing myself training and conditioning for the last six months for something that just got canceled,” Mr. Hayes said. “It’s hard.”
The decision to cancel was a matter of safety, said Dennis Cyr, president of Can-Am. Since there isn’t as much snow this year, there will be an abundance of vegetation, brush, rocks and gravel exposed on the trails.
“It wouldn’t be safe to run the dogs, or the volunteers to be out at the remote checkpoints,” Mr. Cyr said. “We don’t want to expose our mushers to that or ruin our reputation by having a sloppy race this year.”
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Source: Elections - nytimes.com
