Austin Butcher Interview

three times and so you're pretty well a professional mushroom well yeah I guess and you work in St. Michael for Standard Oil as well is that correct yeah I became Chevron USA a number of years ago they're my sponsor along with Barry Nair from no so from your race experience from different races how does this race look to you this year kind of up and down it's been look good when I got here and then it's snowed for four days and then it looked bad but then it looked good this morning when everybody was putting a trail in but now it looks bad because they say the middle part of the river's got two feet of snow on it the middle part of the trail so I guess we'll just go out and see what happens so how do you adjust to all that just keep going okay now this year you don't have the mandatory 24 hour layover what are your what is your strategy there are you going to rest your dogs or or is that a secret yet no it's no secret I'm going to rest where it's warm the rest didn't

it looks like I'm going to rest in CalSCAG and I'm going to rest at Steve Bush's house at Danny Act and then that's as far as I've been figuring after that I'll just see where everybody is and see what's happening from there on you've got some good competition this year there's a lot of proven competition and there's really a lot of competition that's could really surprise a lot of people I think Walter Williams really has a doctor in this years but everybody around here says and just from some of the times and distances he's been doing that you may he may do it he says he's going to do he certainly believes in his chances Gary you're one of the untested competition here Susan you came in second hey noisy Susan you came in the second last year and this year you're ready to try for

first to understand yeah that's right you've been training your dogs whole year since last year as best as you can you you ran and yeah I did rot again last year and you well this is that was your third I did rot I understand how do you feel about this race you totally ready for it oh I don't know about that I don't think I've ever been totally ready for a race there's always it seems like there could have been a lot of things that you could have done but the dogs have had pretty good training considering the weather that's been all over the state and I've been up near manly hot springs so we had pretty good training but never a lot of snow but enough snow to get around on so I probably have as good of training as most people have on their dogs you've got a lot of snow now how do you feel about that oh that's good yeah I'm just happy to see snow and the dogs will be happy to see snow and won't be so hard on their shoulders and stuff if you had the hard pack trail that was around here last week

Susan you said you were disappointed to see the 24-hour mandatory layover dropped would you explain why you feel that way well yeah I run the I did a rod and that's kind of the you know it's the biggest race most important one the most prize money on it and stuff and to run two races two long distances like this it's hard on the dogs period if you have that 12 or 24 hour layover you're not going to burn your dogs out quite as much and with some of the racers that are going to be in this race it could be an awful fast race and pretty straight through and getting to go awful slow and awful hard on the dogs and I want to have something left to run the I did a rod with that's only a month away so I was real disappointed in that and because of that wasn't going to come but finally I was kind of back and forth all winter long and finally when it started raining up in Eureka and I heard it was snowing here

I hopped out of plane and got down here so better to run them down here anyways give your dogs a good time if nothing else yeah that's right okay what is your strategy going to be then if if you can are you going to try to rest for say 12 hours eight hours some place and and build up their strength again are you going to come straight through I don't think that it's possible to rest them anywhere for 12 hours unless we all get into a huge storm and everybody kind of rest them for a while but if conditions stay like they are now I'll probably be resting more than some people but if I care to do it all well I'm going to have to give them a lot less rest than I would want to for a 300 mile run some of the local people here feeling have a good chance that the race this year I know Walter Williams sounded very confident last night how do you feel about the competition well I'm sure that there's going to be a lot there going to be a lot tougher

the teams from around here because last year a lot of us that came in had run the Ididarad before in various other long distance races and so we knew what longest in tracing was about and they didn't and but they learned last year so they know how to train and more about the race so there it wasn't easy last year so it'll be a lot tougher this year well you'll see some of these same people again and the Ididarad no matter what happens here so good luck to you and we'll keep track you on the trail okay thank you everybody is in such a big hurry to leave as soon as we get through talking everybody starts taking your mics off walking away oh Alexi wants to get a little video here they go along with it so you get you with that nice poster in the background knows the I came in fifth and the Ididarad last year but for that race that's

funny good you know I mean you can't you can't feel that about that no I don't so I you know I feel I have a really good I did a team this year and that's what I don't want to mess up well D. John Rowe is I believe running the Ididarad this year my run eggs but and I assume Jerry Austin um a lot of people that were supposed to come Roger Nordlund I'm supposed to come and he was going to be going but there's still a few really competitive teams that didn't come to this race well and George Atlas team was supposed to be going in the Ididarad but as of this it's this he's not going to be putting it in there but Rick Mackey and Herbie Knack but have really competitive teams and they're not here so uh so not everybody will be in the same boat you're in no no