by 1stimestar on Sat Feb 13, 2010 1:19 am
Yea they get a layover in Dawson. Handlers are at the checkpoints just as volunteers are at the Iditarod checkpoints. But as a handler you can not help the musher at all, can't touch the dogs except at Dawson, mushers can't go to their trucks ect. They have to rely on their drop bags. In this respect the Quest is obviously harder then then Iditarod. If you think of how tempting it is to scratch when you are cold and exhausted and your truck is right there at the checkpoint and warm, ready to load up your dogs, versus arranging to fly them out of a remote checkpoint, I know it makes a difference. Perhaps that is one of the reasons that the Quest has a much greater scratch rate percentage wise then the Iditarod.
Nome has an average winter temprature of 7F degrees. Even -20 is uncommon there. We have weeks of -20 here in the Interior. Norton Sound moderates the tempratures for that part of Alaska. Anchorage is in our southern zone and has many winter days of 30F or above. There winter lows average about 5F degrees.
We are gaining 6 and 7 minutes of daylight a day now. So the difference in daylight hours alone between the start of the Quest and the start of the Iditarod is significant. That's over an hour difference in 10 days.
I'm not saying that the Iditarod is easy, only that the Quest is tagged as the Toughest Race on Earth for a reason.
