Husky News

Following a significant snowfall overnight Monday and barring monsoons and unseasonable heat waves, the organizers of the 79th Laconia World Championship Sled Dog Derby are “99 percent” certain that the “Greatest Show on Snow” is a go for this weekend.

Racing is scheduled to begin at 8:30 a.m. Friday and to continue into Sunday afternoon, and as of late Tuesday afternoon —- despite the occasional rain shower and temperatures in the mid- to upper-30s — Jim Lyman said the derby would proceed as scheduled.

The president and trail boss of the Lakes Region Sled Dog Club, which is the manager of the derby, Lyman and his crew were expected to be out today and Thursday nights grooming the 15 miles of race trails.

The club’s board is scheduled to meet this evening. Should weather conditions deteriorate significantly between now and then and be forecast to remain that way into the weekend, the plug would be pulled at the meeting.

But Lyman doesn’t expect that to happen.

“From the way I see it now, yesterday I was 95 percent thinking we’re not going to have a race. Now I’m 99 percent sure that we can have a race,” he said, adding that the challenge is preparing the course properly.

“We don’t want to get on it too quickly and want to let some moisture out of the snow. The next batch of precipitation could change to snow which would be great.”

After Monday night’s storm dumped more than 6 inches of white stuff on the Lakes Region, race officials were on the phones at 6 a.m. Tuesday morning calling prospective mushers and according to Lyman, “they’re all packing and they’re all headed this way.”

He expects that some 15- to 20-dog teams will compete in the open class and that overall there may be as many as 50 teams, which is up from last year.

More information about the 79th Laconia World Championship Sled Dog Derby can be found at www.lrsdc.org.

Source: The Citizen of Laconia