La Center grad Josh McNeal made hard decision to withdraw early from Iditarod sled dog race

McNeal said just prior to scratching everything, it was going very well for his team on his second running of the Iditarod.

“Up until that point, we were having so much fun,” he said. “I was having a blast racing with the dogs, camping with dogs. We were right where I wanted to be. My plan was to take it easy into the Yukon (River Valley), and then starting racing from that point. The dogs were definitely excited and good and ready to go.”

The problems started during his 24-hour layover in McGrath, during which more than foot of snow fell.

“It was really wet and heavy snow,” McNeal said. “The dogs didn’t rest the greatest there. And then it was a tough run to Ophir. I think last year I made that run in four hours, but this time it took me 6.5 hours because the trail was so slow.”

At Ophir, McNeal opted to return one of his dogs — his primary leader dog — because it had become thin over the grueling trail.

Two checkpoints later at Galena, McNeal returned three more of his female dogs because they were coming into heat.

“And after I returned those (three) dogs, the rest of my team, especially my male dogs, were not interested in leading,” McNeal said. “So essentially I was left without any dogs that wanted to lead. Their minds were in other places.”

McNeal pushed out of Galena with a team of 10 remaining dogs. But a few miles down the trail, he decided to return to Galena and scratch.

“Most people wouldn’t think about that, but that is definitely an issue,” McNeal said. “I learned some lessons. The biggest is that every dog that I take on a 1,000-mile race from now on will be a male dog or a spaded female.”

McNeal said he had originally planned on skipping the 2023 Iditarod and return for the 2024 race. But those plans have changed.

“We already have plans for next year,” he said. “I wasn’t going to run it next year, but scratching and not making it to the end made me lean to running again. We were so close and things were going so well, you just want to give it another try.”

Despite not completing the race, McNeal said the positives of his 2022 Iditarod experience outweighed the negatives.

“Mentally, it was a lot easier on me because I knew what to expect,” he said. “I knew what I was going to go through. So I was having a blast. Getting to see new parts of Alaska, getting to go into the villages and meeting people, … getting to do the ceremonial start in Anchorage and getting to see all the fans, it kind of felt like things were normal again.”

McNeal said he has plans to combine kennels with another fellow musher, which will make his team stronger for 2023.

“I have to keep reminding myself that we are a very young kennel and I have a lot still to learn,” he said. “And it takes time to get there, but we’ll get there.”