Big Lake musher wins dog care award

BIG LAKE — They say it’s the most prestigious award in the Iditarod, the Alaska Airlines Leonhard Seppala Humanitarian Award.

And, in a sport based on the health and well-being of sled dogs, you can imagine why an award given for good animal care would be tops.

“People have ran for decades without getting this award, so I feel very honored to have it,” said this year’s winner, Jake Berkowitz, of Big Lake. “I feel incredibly honored.”

He spoke Monday afternoon from Big Lake. By that time, 54 mushers had crossed into Nome, including 17 Valley mushers from fourth-place Dallas Seavey to 53rd-place finisher Bob Chlupach, both of Willow.

Berkowitz said he believes that at age 26, he is the youngest musher to have received the award, which is an interesting side note in a year that saw a new record for oldest winner with Mitch Seavey, 54, of Seward, taking the win.

Berkowitz, who placed eighth in this, his third year finishing the Iditarod, said that he knew when he got to Nome he was probably in the running for the award, but wasn’t sure he’d get it.

One telltale sign he was likely being considered was the size of his team. To get the award, a musher has to finish in the top 20. And in that group of the top 20 at 15 dogs strong, Berkowitz’s team was the largest to cross the finish line. The next largest teams were a trio of 11-dog teams, mushed by Jeff King, Cim Smyth and Martin Buser, who finished third, 15th and 17th respectively.

Actually, 15 dogs were the most any musher brought to Nome. The only other team to arrive in Nome with 15 dogs in harness was that of Brazilian rookie and pet shop owner Luan Ramos Marques, who arrived in 49th place. Berkowitz held on to his original 16 until he finally dropped one dog 652 miles into the 1,000-mile race at the Kaltag checkpoint on the Yukon River.

Berkowitz said he doesn’t hesitate to drop a dog if he needs to for speed or some other reason. But it’s something he’s very reluctant to do.

“When I start dropping dogs for no reason just to speed up, that’s no fun for me anymore,” Berkowitz said.

All of this, of course, is all the more impressive when you realize that this year’s race was hampered by sickness running through many teams, including Berkowitz’s.

But even despite that and the melting snow and warm weather on stretches of the trail, Berkowitz said the dogs all arrived in Nome happy.

“It was just a beautiful dog team at the finish. They were barking under the burled arch and they had great weight on them,” he said.

How good was their weight? Berkowitz said on Monday he was participating in a study of his dogs and had just weighed his leader.

“He actually weighs two pounds heavier now than he did two months ago before he ran the Quest and the Iditarod,” he said.

Which, he said, means that he’s doing something right when it comes to the animals’ nutritional regimen.

So, obviously, tracking dog nutrition is a big part of mushing, right?

“That’s 100 percent of what it is, the dog care is at the forefront of all of us,” he said. “We wouldn’t be anywhere in this sport, especially competitively, if we weren’t committed to dog care.”

Contact reporter Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.

At the Iditarod’s banquets for finishers of this year’s race, local mushers — all but one of them, as it happens, Big Lake residents — took home a handful of some of the most prestigious awards in the race:

• The Millennium Alaskan Hotel First Musher to the Yukon Award went to Martin Buser.

• The Alaska Airlines Leonhard Seppala Humanitarian Award went to Jake Berkowitz.

• The Sportsmanship Award went to Cim Smyth.

• The Nome Kennel Club Fastest Time from Safety to Nome Award went to Cim’s brother Ramey Smyth of Willow, a musher known for his fast finishes. He had a time of 2 hours 19 minutes.