Colorado mushers power through a challenging snow season
SILVERTON, Colo. — The sound of dogs barking echoed across Molas Lake. Mushers struggled to hold their teams steady at the starting line. At the end of the countdown, a team of six dogs shot forward like a rocket.
In mid-January, the Rocky Mountain Sled Dog Club held a competition at Molas Lake. About 20 teams gathered to compete — not for prize money, but for the joy of racing.
The race featured five categories: six dogs, six miles; four dogs, four miles; two dogs, two miles; two-dog skijoring; one-dog skijoring; and bikejoring.
This winter’s dismal snowpack led to scheduling challenges. The club, which usually hosts around eight races per year, had to cancel or reschedule several races this season because of low snow. A planned race in Silverton was canceled but later relocated to Molas Lake after a timely snowfall.
Snow conditions have also disrupted other major sled dog races in recent years. In 2025, the famed Iditarod Trial Sled Dog Race in Alaska moved its starting point 200 miles north due to poor snow conditions.
“We use Alaskan huskies,” said Gregg Dubit, a board member of the Rocky Mountain Sled Dog Club and owner of Durango Dog Ranch. “Alaskan huskies are high performance mutts that over generations have been bred not to have shoulder injuries, hip injuries, or really any problems. They run fast and they pull hard, and they have really big appetites so they can process a lot of food to build muscle and stamina.”
Dubit’s dream of becoming a musher began in childhood after reading Jack London’s “The Call of the Wild.”
“You kind of go inside the head of the lead character, Buck, and look at the world through a dog's eyes,” said Dubit.
After leaving his job as a science teacher in Cortez, Dubit had 14 dogs and decided to turn his passion into a business. Sled dog racing is expensive, he said. He now owns 21 dogs.
A dog team can reach speeds of 25 mph and run more than 100 miles a day, day after day. But their drive to run can also put them at risk.
“The desire of sled dogs to run is so strong that some less mature dogs would run themselves to the point of being injured or even to death, so it's the musher's job to regulate their speed and give them breaks,” said Dubit.
Sled dogs thrive in winter. In summer, they may sleep 18 to 20 hours a day. As temperatures drop, they grow more energetic.
“Dogs are really empathetic. They pick up on our energy, whether we recognize it or not or don't want to admit it,” said Peter Behm, who competed in the six-dog race and skijoring event. “If we're radiating that sort of athletic, competitive energy, they're going to pick up on that and they'll know the difference.
In Colorado, most sled dog races are short-distance events that draw regional mushers and focus on community and recreation. T Iditarod, meanwhile, covers about 1,000 miles and attracts international competitors, making it one of the sport’s premiere events.
“The start is always super chaotic. It's super loud and crazy. That's kind of a sensory overload,” said Behm. “But once you get going and you start going to speed, things calm down a lot. You're just seeing the mountains, watching your dogs in full stride. You're just taking all of that in.”
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