Alta

The Undervegs raceing team has now arrived in Alta. Espen came yesterday and has been to the mandatory drivers meeting and done his registration. The rest of the team; Aslak, Knut and the dogs arrived this evening. Team member, and last years Finnmarksløp contestant, Lotta is in Tromsø doing her very last bit on her Phd. She is following the race on the web, between her writing. We wish her the very best.
So the we (Aslak and Knut) are here following the race and giving Espen the best service we are able to. Stay tuned, we will update when possible.

Online at Finnmarksløpet

During the next two weeks we hope to use this site for the last updates on Finnmarksløpet and how things develop with Espen and the dogs.... For further information check www.finnmarkslopet.no

New Blog Site

I have now upgraded the www.undervegs.no website and moved the blog to this site.

For future updates please visit http://www.undervegs.no/UNDERVEGS/News/News.html

New Year

Normally we feed the dogs on their chains or harnessed in the team, but when they stay in the dog room in the barn I have fed them loose all 17. It is interesting to see how they behave in this situation. No one is allowed to touch the meet in the bucket and Vosko is making sure it does not happen...

Tuva got her first sled for christmas and is now taking her share in the training.

After long distances on relatively hard surface before christmas we are now having some days of workout with steep hills and soft snow. It does not go fast, but the dogs have to work hard and it gives good lead dog training. On the cold days it is also much warmer up in the mountains than here down in the valley. We started home at 80 meter above sea level and climbed a peak of 1200m. On the way we went trough several mountains passes and some interesting places, specially when my brake broke...

Training in the mountains

Finally we have started the trips into the mountain areas of Indre Troms. This last week we have had good trips to Dærta and Altevatn. It was not plenty of snow, but acceptable, to Derta. At Altevatn the snow and trail conditions were really good. All the dogs seems happy after this hard training week, and no major injuries so far is also a good sign. In the barn we have re established the dog-room in the old stable, so that they can get maximum recovery after training on cold days.

Hard November soon over

Ideally a hard November should mean hard training for the dogs, but not this year. November has been hard of solid ice on roads and everywhere else making the training difficult. We have almost managed to do the planned training, but it has involved a lot of traveling to Kiruna, Skibotn, Dividalen and Øvre Sopero. Finally the snow has arrived again making doglife a little lighter... But we have also had some really good trips the last weeks. Cart training in the mountains of Skibotn and sledding in Soppero with expert mushers imported all the way from Australia. In Soppero we did long runs during the day and warmed up in the sauna afterwards.