"Iron Fleck"!
Peter's Quest
Good Luck to Peter Fleck and team
as they compete in the 2010 Yukon Quest !
as they compete in the 2010 Yukon Quest !
Rookie Peter Fleck, 19, of Salisbury, England, looks down the trail as
he prepares to start the Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race on
Saturday, Feb. 6, 2010, in Fairbanks, Alaska. Fleck has been living in
Wasilla, Alaska, as he prepared for the race. Fleck was the last of
twenty four mushers to start down the 1,000 mile trail from Fairbanks
to Whitehorse, Yukon. Sam Harrel/News-Miner
Yukon Quest rookie Peter Fleck might pull a few surprises
FAIRBANKS — In the final minute before he started the Yukon Quest, Peter Fleck rarely took his gaze off the trail ahead.
He spoke only once. “All right, guys.” And his team went scampering toward Two Rivers.
His reserved demeanor could have been from nerves or fear. The 19-year-old Englishman arrived in Alaska with no mushing experience on Jan. 2, 2009, and Saturday he began a grueling 1,000-mile journey.
But Fleck’s quiet start might not have been from sheepishness. It could have been a measure of the focus that mentor G.B. Jones calls his greatest asset.
Case in point: Fleck’s 27th place finish in January’s Copper Basin 300 was about 20 minutes off his predicted schedule.
Many teens can’t show up to class on time. This 19-year-old almost nailed a 66-hour schedule of caring for 12 dogs in a 300 mile race.
But no matter how meticulous the musher, one year is an extremely short time to learn everything you need in order to tackle the Quest, which is billed as the toughest sled dog race in the world.
“Most people think it’s pretty fast to be having a crack at the Quest, but I figured, ‘Why not?’” Fleck said at the vet check one week before the start. “Seemed like a stupid idea to start with, but it’s becoming more and more like I figure I can at least give it a good go. I’m sure there’s a lot of doubters. We’ll see.”
Fleck said he was inspired when he was a child by a 1994 Disney flick about a longshot sled dog racer trying to save his family farm.
“I watched ‘Iron Will’ when I was tiny, and it seemed like a good time to see what it was about, see if you could still be a dog musher,” he said. “Coming from England, it seemed like a bizarre idea.”
While taking a year between high school and college, he sent e-mails to mushers in search of someone who would show him the ropes.
Before coming to Alaska, Fleck spent several months training as a safari guide in Africa. He returned with a few months remaining and went to Jones’ kennel in Wasilla to see what mushing was all about.
He fell in love with sled dog racing almost immediately. The plan was for Fleck to be Jones’ handler in the Iditarod and let Fleck run Jones’ second team in 2010. But Jones withdrew, and Fleck instead spent the rest of the winter running the dogs on short outings.
A long camping trip following the Iditarod trail to McGrath convinced Fleck that he had to keep mushing for at least one more year.
He put aside the safari gig and convinced his university to defer his first semester for a year and returned to Alaska in June.
In July, fellow Quest racer Kelley Griffin was helping him along. She described him as “pretty raw” when they met, but he is now a competent musher and, in her eyes, capable of taking on the Quest’s ever-perilous trail.
“He’s such a good student, and he’s genuinely doing the work it takes,” she said.
Fleck’s aptitude combined with his physical skill make him fit to lead a team in the Quest, Jones said, but his love of the dogs is what makes him deserving of the honor.
“He has an absolute, non-phony appreciation for them,” Jones said Saturday morning as Fleck prepared his sled. “There’s not a musher here who does more for his dogs.”
So if this bright young musher has a heart of gold, his story might be good enough for a Disney film of its own. “Iron Fleck”? It could be. Some of the family movie plot lines are already there.
There’s the rag-tag group that looks to defy the odds: not just Fleck, but his 14 huskies. Instead of running a preselected team from a veteran musher, Fleck combined what dogs he could from the kennels of Jones and Ray Redington and added two from the Mat-Su pound: Whisky and Mac.
And with any feel-good tale, there is adversity. The Yukon Quest sees about one-third of its starters scratch, many of whom have years more experience with both dogs and subarctic weather. Even by completing 300-mile and 200-mile races — the Copper Basin 300 and Gin Gin 200 — Fleck took some by surprise.
“I won’t say who, but two well-respected mushers said he wouldn’t qualify,” Jones said.
Now all this script needs is a happy ending. To Fleck — and most every Quest rookie — that means finishing in Whitehorse, no matter how long it takes.
Contact Peter Fleck at:
ptrflck@gmail.com
Alaskan@GoodMorningAlaska.com
Sierra and Aurora Brown recently enjoyed a sled ride
down the historic Iditarod Trail!
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Iditarod Trail Kennel
Schedule of Events
Schedule of Events
February 6th , 2010 ~~~ The Yukon Quest begins in Fairbanks!
February 20th, 2010 ~~~ Yukon Quest Finisher’s Banquet in Whitehorse, Canada!
February 27th, 2010, Saturday ~~~ Iditarod Trail Kennel potluck/party at the kennel, starting at 10Am! Everyone invited. Come and see the Jr. Iditarod mushers go past the campfire! The ultra-marathon racers will also be running on the trail going to McGrath or Nome by foot or bicycle!
March 4, 2010, Thursday ~~~ Iditarod Race banquet in Anchorage.
March 5, 2010, Friday ~~~ Iditarod Trail Kennel banquet at the Sourdough Mining Company Restaurant in Anchorage. 6PM to 9PM. Live entertainment! Everyone welcome! $25 at door!
March 6, 2010, Saturday ~~~ Ceremonial start of the Iditarod race.
March 7, 2010, Sunday ~~~ Re-start of the Iditarod race in Willow.
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