MARQUETTE, Mich. (WZMQ) – Sled dog racing season is just around the corner and it’s a sport that doesn’t just take months of training, but years. A sled dog musher has a large responsibility not only to lead the fleet of dogs in front but also to raise them to be the athletes they are.
Juckette Racing, a team built in Minnesota and led by 13-year-old Aubrey Juckette, will be training for the Midnight Run, racing the team’s first 80-mile trail. For Aubrey and the team, this is far from her first race, she and the pack have been training since she was 5 years old. “Since I was a baby, whenever we had the UP200 I came up here and I wanted to do it, I thought it was so cool,” commented Juckette.
Since training her first Alaskan Huskie, Brewer, to her new lead dog Charlie (pictured below), she hasn’t seen the end of her racing “trail”. After building her team, she immediately started racing. “It was the Mcmillan race and I don’t think they have it right now but they did and I got to do that and I could see just over the handlebars,” continued Juckette.
The young sled dog team was mentored by other veterans of the sport, learning how to train endurance and utilizing the right diet for high-performance dogs. “You know you kind of see where you’re dog falls on your team you know so they might start as a wheel dog and move up as a leader,” commented Aubrey’s Mom, Kristin Juckette.
Aubrey and the team are still hard at work training for the upcoming midnight run. “That’s my next race and I have one after and that’s Copper Dog”
She says down the line wants to run in the junior and even the adult Iditarod race.
“It’s just great to see the bond that she has with her team and for us you know I always say to my husband that it kind of feels like we’re just along for the ride, it’s been a great thing for our family,” commented
