Travel costs leave mushers on ice: Iditarod Features

Travel costs leave mushers on ice: Iditarod Features | adn.com

[excerpt]

Team Norway, a tight-knit group of Scandinavian dog mushers whose talent helped fuel the international appeal of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, is staying home this year.

Two-time champion Robert Sorlie teamed with Norwegian friends and mushing partners Kjetil Backen and Bjornar Andersen to form a potent packet of performers that finished outside the top 10 just once in its last 10 races here.

Sorlie, of Hurdal, became the first foreign musher to win the world's most popular long-distance sled-dog race, expanding its international popularity.

Both Sorlie, in 2002, and Andersen, in 2005, were rookies of the year. Andersen's fourth-place rookie finish was, by far, the best rookie showing since the Iditarod's early days when many of the mushers were first timers. He remains the only first-timer to reach Nome in fewer than 10 days.

Expense is keeping the Norwegians home.