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Musher's no dope: four straight
Source: Agencies |
March 18, 2010, Thursday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
LANCE Mackey won the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in the United States on Tuesday, becoming the first musher to notch four consecutive victories in the world's most famous dog-racing event.
Mackey reached the Nome finish line with an official race time of eight days, 23 hours, 59 minutes and 9 seconds, the second-fastest Iditarod time ever recorded in the 1,150-mile race from Anchorage, Alaska.
"This is for all my fans and the people who believed it could happen," he told a crowd of spectators lined up along Nome's Front Street, where he was greeted by family members, the mayor and other dignitaries.
"To be honest with you, I didn't know if it was possible or not. With the field of teams, the mushers that are so focused at the moment, on beating me," he said, after hugging his wife, handing her a bottle of champagne he had tucked into his sled and hugging his dogs. "Midway through the race, I didn't know if I was going to be able to pull it off."
No other musher - not even Susan Butcher or Rick Swenson, who dominated the Iditarod in the 1980s - has ever notched four consecutive wins.
For Mackey, this year's championship also provided some personal vindication. A throat-cancer survivor who has a prescription for medical marijuana, Mackey believes he was the target of a new Iditarod rule requiring mushers to submit to drug testing.
Mackey admits he regularly smoked marijuana on the Iditarod trail in past years, a practice he said helped with pain management and appetite. His cancer treatments left him without saliva glands or taste buds, but he said he would not use marijuana during this race.
The son and brother of past Iditarod champions, Mackey has a reputation for toughness. When his left index finger became compromised by nerve damage sustained during cancer treatment, he chopped it off himself.
Mackey reached the Nome finish line with an official race time of eight days, 23 hours, 59 minutes and 9 seconds, the second-fastest Iditarod time ever recorded in the 1,150-mile race from Anchorage, Alaska.
"This is for all my fans and the people who believed it could happen," he told a crowd of spectators lined up along Nome's Front Street, where he was greeted by family members, the mayor and other dignitaries.
"To be honest with you, I didn't know if it was possible or not. With the field of teams, the mushers that are so focused at the moment, on beating me," he said, after hugging his wife, handing her a bottle of champagne he had tucked into his sled and hugging his dogs. "Midway through the race, I didn't know if I was going to be able to pull it off."
No other musher - not even Susan Butcher or Rick Swenson, who dominated the Iditarod in the 1980s - has ever notched four consecutive wins.
For Mackey, this year's championship also provided some personal vindication. A throat-cancer survivor who has a prescription for medical marijuana, Mackey believes he was the target of a new Iditarod rule requiring mushers to submit to drug testing.
Mackey admits he regularly smoked marijuana on the Iditarod trail in past years, a practice he said helped with pain management and appetite. His cancer treatments left him without saliva glands or taste buds, but he said he would not use marijuana during this race.
The son and brother of past Iditarod champions, Mackey has a reputation for toughness. When his left index finger became compromised by nerve damage sustained during cancer treatment, he chopped it off himself.
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