Mali and Hemi leading the open team both days at the Montana Creek Championship. Photo Ddavid Pphalke

Kicked off 2012 racing season with a win at the Montana Creek Championship January 7-8. Ended up in second place after the first day of racing, 21 seconds behind the leader Arleigh Reynolds. Ran a team of 16 both days with a young leader Mali plus Hemi. Passed one team successfully day 1 and all dogs finished strong. Lots of snow and the trail was a bit soft and not super fast. Sunday and the race is a wrap and I had a pretty strong run. More snow fell during the night and the trail was still fairly heavy and tough but the base was firm all around.
“Despite the soft and snowy trail I hit 19 and 20 mph on several occasions. For those of you studying the times we had longer run times today because of the addition of the 2-mile Hood Loop, which made the trail 15 miles and yesterday 13 miles. The trail-block at the entrance to Hood Loop was not moved yesterday so all teams did a shorter trail. I ran the same team as yesterday and the leaders were again Hemi and Mali.”
Great weekend and whole team was more focused second day of racing and all business the whole way. The youngsters did great and Egil didn’t miss Casper and some of the other core dogs that got the weekend off. Now back to longer training runs at slower speeds and some more hardening for future battles...
We now have so much snow that it’s actually enough… but more to come and it looks like this will be a record snow year here. Forecast is for more of the white is on its way, storm after storm lining up hitting South Central Alaska with full force. Training dogs and shoveling, plowing snow takes up most of our days now and no need to try to do anything else.
To make our snowy Tuesday just a little bit brighter I made a pizza with Italian ham, shrimp and mushrooms. Bon appetite!
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We bring the puppies inside for an hour or two during the day and they get to play with toys and with us...	No need for a gym here... we get all the workout from Mother Nature...Egil shoveling off snow from our garage roof.	Young Mali did an awesome job in lead at the Montana Creek Championship together with Hemi who has been on the main team for two years now.	Snow is piling up around the clubhouse too at Montana Creek... soon only the roof will be over the snow.	Egil taking off on Sunday's heat...
Homemade pizza is always a treat.

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Mickey and Email in lead on Egil's team at Montana Creek Point Race #3.

First race of the season! Points Race #3 at Montana Creek. We split the Open dogs in two even teams, one 16 and one 14, and entered the 16 in the race and trained the 14 after the race. Both teams ran at about the same time and did well for being only the second time out with sled on a trail this season.
Up until now we have run on plowed roads with four wheeler and 13 miles on a punchy trail is very different from the solid footing of a road. All handled it well, though a few of the yearlings a bit tired towards the end which I expected. Still early in the season for us and back to training tomorrow. We have lots of snow and more on the way so plenty to play around in...
After a record cold November its just ok that we now in December have temperatures in the mid 20s (-10C). Just perfect for training dogs, skiing and spending time outside.
Days still getting shorter but soon it will turn and we will see more daylight again...
Tonight I prepared a halibut baked in the oven with white vine, Italian ham, garlic, creme and Dijon mustard. Bon appetite!
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The view at Montana Creek was beautiful - as always...	16 dogs...	First race for some of the yearlings, they are all excited...	On the line... Maya and Cookie in swing...	I have to bake Lussekatter with saffron, no Christmas without the Swedish treat...
.. and for the Christmas we also want to enjoy some spiced glögg...	Short days but some fantastic sunsets.

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Started training our racing dogs in teams on the trail at home.

Its been quite some time since I updated the “news” but not much has happened over the summer, except it went by way too fast.
We had a fantastic racing season with Egil winning top three major races Rondy, ONAC and Tok Race of Champions. Our dogs are fantastic and we cannot thank them enough.
We gave them all a long well deserved summer vacation where they played with eachother, free ran and enjoyed sunny days resting in the kennel.
We also needed a break after a long winter and enjoyed a week in Victoria on Vancouver Island in B.C. Canada in early May. For me this was a new experience and a very pleasant one, Victoria is a beautiful city and we had so much fun, enjoyed fantastic museums, restaurants and of course the Buchart gardens – my favorite…
Summer here in Willow was just a normal one for Alaska, with high temperatures in the 70F (20C) so no need for applying any sun protection lotions. Instead we decided to get out and bike every other day, it payed off and by the end of summer we did some 16 to 20 mile runs. Feels good and we are now ready to start training dogs.
And so we did, started all our racing dogs on the dog walker in July and now by the end of October we are back to team training. We have four 12-dog teams to train and its so interesting to see how quick they adjust to running in a team again. For the young guys it’s a lot of new to learn but they are fast learners and after a couple of runs they know all the rules.
Still waiting for the first real snow fall here in Willow, we have seen flurries but the ground is still too warm for the snow to stick. I guess we will have to wait until November before we can take the dogs out on a snow covered trail…
Tonight I prepared a garlic/sage spiced pork loin in a creamy sauce with mustard seeds. Served with “Domino” oven roasted potatoes. Since the weather is still so warm I harvested red cabbage from my garden and made a side dish. Slowly braised red cabbage with a fresh taste of tart apple, the perfect match to the pork and potatoes.
Bon appetite!
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Here I am outside the famous Empress hotel in Victoria, can you see me?	Butchart gardens... how lovely, could have spent several days there.	My garden did well this year and I made a lotion out of my Calendula flowers...	Crisp morning and drove to Palmer to load up the winter supply of bedding for the dogs. High quality straw is hard to find but this year we luckily found some and here the straw bales are ready to be loaded on the trailer.	Ready for fall training, I have my safety glasses on, earplugs, clean harnesses, lines, hat, windproof jacket...
Dragrat sent us new harnesses, collars and belly blankets - we are ready to start training.	Tony and Egil having a after dinner talk... Tony is such a sweatheart...	Mid October and snow is falling but does not stick to the ground, too warm... there is an old swedish saying that the snow has to come and go three times before it stays...	Baking bread is my favorite hobby... here is a sourdough bread flavored with sesameseed, flaxseed and sunflower seeds.	Garlic and sage flavored pork loin served with "domino" potatoes and red cabbage...

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Egil and team ready for take off.. .

We have a dog race indeed! 1st day of ONAC and only 23 seconds separating the top three teams. Ken in lead, I’m second and Arleigh in third. Arleigh set a blistering pace right from start and I didn’t dare follow him but instead tried to not get too far off his checkpoint times without loosing too much. I managed to get some time back at the end on Arleigh but Ken was too though today, good job Ken!
The trail was fantastic and the dogs could run fast the whole way. I had a couple of dogs that looked a little overwhelmed by the speed and they will stay home tomorrow. Casper and Hemi did great in lead even though young Hemi’s head turned in all directions at road crossings and other gatherings along the trail, he never let his tug line slack though. This is Hemi’s first ONAC. My GPS read 19 mph average over the 20+ miles. Let’s go see if we can repeat that tomorrow! Stay tuned...
Picture is from the start area on 2nd avenue in Fairbanks.
Tonight dinner at Bistro with lots of friends, good food and wine... Bon appetite!
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Grand daddy of them all...

This was our team today...

Egil and Mark Hartum 15 minutes before starting out the first heat...

Before today's heat Egil rubs some Hundesalva into the paws of each dog. This salve comes from Skillingaryd in Sweden.

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5th Rondy Championship victory - what a wonderful feeling... photo by Britt Coon www.akbritt.com.

Have you been missing us here? We have been busy training and racing… Montana Creek Championship, Su Vally Championship, Exxon Mobil and “Rondy” Open World Championship in Anchorage and looking at the results we are very, very pleased with the performance of our dogs. Egil winning his fifth Rondy World Championship was of course a fantastic victory with an awesome group of dogs!
Now we are back in Fairbanks and today, day before the kick off for Open North American Championship 2011. We had the drivers meeting this morning and after that went on the trail tour where all the drivers get to go around the trail, pulled by snowmobiles, and check it out. The trail looks fantastic, smooth and solid. The extension trail is the best I have seen it in years! I will start with 15, two new in and two out from the Rondy group. Unfortunately the one of two going out is my main man Ruby. He managed to hurt himself somehow while we had the team free running as we were about to load up for the trip up here and he is still limping from that incident. This is a routine the dogs do almost every day of the year and of course it has to happen now and to Ruby... well, well not much I can do but to rest him and hopefully get him back for the race in Tok next weekend. This opens up for some new thinking and team positions, could get interesting... 
The stage is set for some speedy racing, best of luck to all! Live streaming of the ONAC race go to: www.sleddogcentral.com
Also you can now follow us on Facebook Ellis Racing Sleddogs.
In Fairbanks we always enjoy the excellent Thai restaurants in town... tonight Thai House on 5th Avenue.... Bon appetite!
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Egil mixing dinner for the team... Momentum for main course...

... and enjoying the food...

Egil 5 time Rondy champion talking to George Attla 10 time Rondy champion after the Rondy race in February downtown Anchorage. Photo by Britt Coon www.akbritt.com

Ruby and Email leading Egil's Rondy team. Ruby will not be running this weekend for the ONAC. Photo by Britt Coon www.akbritt.com

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