There will be time for other thoughts and critiques, but for now I'm focusing on two - love and pride for Q, Pepe, Leap, Opal, Yotam, Waller, Whip, Bob, Kiwi, and the rest of the team (sorry, I can't find the roster right now). Rest well and travel safe. New adventures await. #mushersky 6/6 - ThreadSky

esp1371.bsky.social • 6 days ago

There will be time for other thoughts and critiques, but for now I'm focusing on two - love and pride for Q, Pepe, Leap, Opal, Yotam, Waller, Whip, Bob, Kiwi, and the rest of the team (sorry, I can't find the roster right now). Rest well and travel safe. New adventures await. #mushersky 6/6

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lmhamilton.bsky.social•6 days ago

Thanks for all this Espy. You are wonderful with words and I appreciate all you do for the #uglydogs

cheerybrit8.bsky.social•6 days ago

So very well said ❤️. So proud of Q and the team for running their race.

karenmcg1.bsky.social•6 days ago

So proud and heartbroken for these teams (mushers and dogs) I will probably never meet, but love with all my heart.

Good run, Pepé. You run the world.

k8c.bsky.social•6 days ago

This is so great. Thank you!

kcbrownie.bsky.social•6 days ago

Thank you for all the posts and updates. ❤️ love and pride is a wonderful focus that I can hold onto❣️

que3m.bsky.social•6 days ago

Awoo!

mollyknight.bsky.social•6 days ago

The press release made it worse. I’m so frustrated and upset.

esp1371.bsky.social•6 days ago

Yep. I'm glad Q made them withdraw him though, and Sydnie too. If you're going to make them stop, then you own the decision and don't get saved by a "scratch." It frustrating and dumb because they added 150 miles and started a day later but apparently did not factor that into anything.

mckaypaints.bsky.social•6 days ago

And the biggest things that I keep coming back to is a) maybe they *couldn’t* rally enough volunteers! It sounds like the changes were made for good reason, and sometimes that means other factors have to change. Fine! Own that and say it rather than framing it this way.

mckaypaints.bsky.social•6 days ago

And b) they had to have - or should have known - how this would affect the back of the pack by the time the race started. Telling the mushers that might not have changed anything, but maybe they’d have planned differently.

mckaypaints.bsky.social•6 days ago

I run long distance, and I’m a slower runner. I run for the joy of it, but I also like to push myself. So if I can run a half marathon going 10:30/mile the entire way, I might start slower, say 12:00-ish so I can push myself at the end.

mckaypaints.bsky.social•6 days ago

Because it affects your start time in later races, plus it’s fun to see if you can cut 30 seconds off your best pace. But if I know they’re going to start pulling everyone not running over 11 min/mile at mile 9, I WOULDN’T DO THAT.

esp1371.bsky.social•6 days ago

Yep. A lot of the problems the Iditarod has (not all, but a lot) could be solved - or at least mitigated - by simply being more open and transparent.

mckaypaints.bsky.social•6 days ago

YES. People tend to be really forgiving of “hey here’s what’s going on, we messed up/couldn’t make x happen, this is probably going to affect y thing in z ways.” One of the best ways to alienate people is to be inconsistent, unpredictable, and refuse to explain.

oleanders.bsky.social•6 days ago

I get that there need to be some limits on how long teams use. But these should be defined before teams sign up, and could be extended due to circumstances.

mwuest.bsky.social•6 days ago

I'm glad about that too. Because if he had needed to scratch, he would have. They ran an amazing race!

akchick.bsky.social•6 days ago

So much this!!! I completely forgot about the day later part.

anitamargarita.bsky.social•6 days ago

I just don’t understand what the big hurry-up is about. It doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the health of the teams. If they want it to be a fast ten day race, they should just lay it out there. Otherwise it’s subjective and weird and leads to bad feelings.

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