Team Aasheim

Etter en fantastisk fin start på november så har værgudene bestemt seg for at all den fin myke snøen som kom i oktober, skulle bli til ikke så fin, hard is.. Hundestellet ble plutselig en ekstremsport og trening ut fra hundegården har vært helt utelukket. De siste to ukene har yr.no sagt at det skal snø, men snøen blir dyttet frem en, to, tre dager. Derfor har vi nå sluttet å se på værmeldinger, og kjører heller på “stå opp og titte ut av vinduet” taktikken. Plutselig en dag så er det hvitt igjen.

After a wonderful start on November, the weather gods decided that we had had enough fun for a while, and turned all the wonderful snow into a not so wonderful sheet of ice. Feeding the dogs turned into an extreme sport, and going out training here has been out of the question. The weather gods has, for the last week, said that it will snow in Heidal. But every day when i check the forecast, the delightful snow has been moved forward 24 hours.. This seems to be a repeating pattern. So, i now ignore everything about the weather, and just peek out the window in the morning. One morning i will get up and look out the window and have the best day ever.

We are now in the middle of November and the training is going good. I am now realizing that being a student and a musher is quite time consuming. Our first exam is coming up, and we are in one of the most important months of dog training. Training in the day and reading at night.

The first snow arrived in October, but a few mild days has turned most of it into ice. Hopefully we will have some more snow soon.. We have not been out on the sleds yet. We have had the opportunity, but i prefer to run with the ATV to have full control on big teams. When we start with the sleds, we’ll split them up in smaller teams of 6-10 dogs. At least until the snow has settled and it is possible to stop and get off the sled safely.

The dogs are doing very well. No sore paws and no injuries. Some of the girls has just been in heat and Jesus has been going crazy. He’s had his own little howling concerts, preferably in the middle of the night. A couple of weeks back i came into the dog yard to find a big tree that had blown down onto Jussis  place. Jussi had started chopping it up on his own, and he still lives up to his nickname, Jussi The Destroyer. He is the only dog here who has managed to break the fiberglass door on the dog box on the car. Jubie is being her usual schizophrenic self.. Without the harness on she is in her house with the tail between her legs, but when i start up the ATV, she goes crazy and forgets that she is shy. It also good to see that some of the younger dogs are fighting for a place in the A-team.

We changed the dry food for the dogs this fall. We are now feeding with Canimat from Hundekjørerbutikken, and we are very satisfied. In full training, the dogs gained weight and we had to reduce the amount of food the were getting.

We will add some photos over the next few weeks, so stay tuned for more updates.

Yes yes, i know.. I haven’t been good at updating. Short and painless, so far it is looking great. We are training good, the dogs are awesome. I have been training some of these dogs for 5 years now, and i have never seen them so fired up in the fall before.  After the first longer trip, after taking the harnesses off i had 17 dogs screaming for more. Very promissing.  So far i have been training them in front of the car just for the safety of it. And seeing how much power this team has, i am dreading the first ATV training.  I do believe that the Honda will be a bit to easy to run off with.

The drawing of the startnumbers for Femund is done, and i am starting as number 37. Not super great, but i have already made the plan for the first few legs of the race. The plan is simple… Get up front of the pack. It’s gonna be interesting to see what the other mushers do, they can make or break my wonderful plan..

Magnar is now signed up for Hallingen. Hopefully 160 km will be a good distance for the old man and his bad back.

I have been to Eina and seen the dogs there a few times, and they are having a ball.  Jøran and Sigvart are training well, and it is looking good for the winter. Jøran asked me what i would say if he beats me on Gausdal Maraton… What can i say, it’s not the worst thing that can happen to be beaten by your own dogs..

We are all looking forward to the best winter ever, and we hope that as many as possible will follow us this winter.

First of all, i would like to appologize for not updating this page very often.  I promise that i will get better this season.  Short about the last season..: It was okay.  Short about the coming season..: It’s gonna be great!

The plan for the winter is simple.. Get as much training done as possible, and then we will see how it goes.  The main goal for the winter is to improve the result from Femundløpet 2012.  The 2012 race was quite cold, so i took out a lot more rest than i had planned on before the race.  I had to leave Lupus (frostbite), Sala (sore shoulders) and Rambo (frostbite) behind in Søvollen, and Randy went out in Tynset 1 with sore shoulders.  These 4 dogs are very important in the team, but Jesus stepped up and took charge.  We had a great race, trotting along at our own speed. It was a great experience and we learned from the mistakes we did.

This winter will be quite busy.  I have just started studying to be a nurse, i am planning on working in the lift in Kvitfjell, and we are planning on doing both Femund 600 and Finnmark 1000.  It’s gonna be an interesting season with a lot of hard work. I will only have 16 dogs in training myself, while 8 will be in Eina with Sigvart Strandvik and Jøran Stokke and one will be in Ottestad with Stein Håvard Fjestad.

So far we haven’t really started training.  the dogs are running loose in the dogyard a lot, and we have been out on the first few runs with the ATV.  1st of September is the magic date, and we will be in full training from then. I have for the past few years said that i will start training on the 1st of August, but it is hard to find the time with the rafting season still on.

Welcome to Dogsledding Norway and Team Aasheim.