00:00 [Music]
00:06 [Sound of a car driving by]
00:15 Such karma!
00:19 [Dog barks]
00:20 [Dogs barking]
00:24 [Dogs barking]
00:26 [Dogs barking]
00:29 [Sound of a car driving by]
00:32 My name's Lisa Murray and we've travelled up to Aviemore for the Siberian Husky Club of Great Britain Aviemore Rally for the 23rd year.
00:41 We've been coming for 23 years.
00:43 My husband Stuart is the one that competes and I'm the one that gets the dogs ready and makes sure that he's on the start line on time.
00:49 So Aviemore, where does it sit in the calendar?
00:52 So it's always normally the last weekend in January, so it's sort of halfway through our calendar.
00:56 We normally start racing at the end of October through to March time, weather depending.
01:01 We also go abroad, so we've raced in Germany, Belgium, France, at the European and World Championship level as well.
01:08 Not a lot of people realise just how popular the sport is.
01:11 So that on most weekends there can be anything from 100 teams running in a forest somewhere in the country on most weekends through the winter months.
01:20 There's mostly Siberian Huskies, there's also some Alaskan Malamutes and Canadian Eskimo dogs and Greenland dogs.
01:26 You might see the odd one, odd dog that somebody has as a normal dog shall I say, so maybe a German Shorthaired Pointer or some people have some Eurohounds as well.
01:37 But this weekend is just about pure bread racing.
01:39 What's up for grabs is normally if we're lucky maybe a bag of dog food and a plastic trophy.
01:44 There isn't any money in it, we don't earn anything out of it.
01:47 It's for fun really and for what the dogs enjoy, the dogs love to have their harness on and to run.
01:53 There's quite a few people here that have competed in the World Championships.
01:56 We've got junior mushers that are coming through the ranks as well.
01:59 So they started at maybe 10 or 11, 12, 13 and are now into the adult classes.
02:05 So progressing through which is good because it really keeps the sport going along.
02:08 My name's Alan, so we've travelled up to Inverness, we're staying in Inverness until Monday.
02:13 We came for this event, the last time we came was in 2019.
02:18 It's good, it's a very sort of social event, you know, everybody's really friendly.
02:24 But I mean the place, you know, I mean what better place to come to than this.
02:29 Pete Jones, I'm the organiser of the Siberian Husky Club of Great Britain Sled Dog Rally.
02:35 And tell me, who competes and who visits the competition?
02:38 The people who compete are all, it's any type of sled dog, which is Siberian Husky, Eskimo dogs, Greenland dogs and Alaskan Malamutes.
02:48 And people travel from all over the UK and further to enjoy the racing.
02:54 And do they make a weekend of it?
02:56 More than that, it becomes a holiday. Most people over here for a week or a fortnight.
03:01 It's a lot of money to come up here just for a weekend.
03:04 That's a kind of boost for Aviemore and surrounding area.
03:06 Absolutely, I mean we all use the restaurants, we all use the pubs definitely.
03:11 And we all have accommodations, so we're all booking houses or the lodges or whatever, you know, whatever you're using.
03:18 It's all bringing money to the economy.
03:20 Some people have just got pet dogs to train and they're only doing it for fun.
03:24 Other people, like myself, I mean I've raced for Great Britain twice and we enjoy doing it up to a very competitive level.
03:32 I think most people who say I'm not competitive, generally they are inside.
03:36 It's absolutely free to visit. I mean today has been phenomenal, the amount of visitors that have come today.
03:42 I think it's just something that's... people even travel here, just book a hotel just to come and watch the event.
03:49 And to think they've been doing that year after year is phenomenal.
03:53 When it started, before my time in 1984, it was a very small event, very few people.
04:00 At its peak it went up to 250 teams and at the minute we're down to about 70 teams.
04:07 Probably due to economy, you know, costs, it's a lot for people to get up here.
04:13 I'm Alison Hall and I'm from Berwick-upon-Tweed. We've come for this event.
04:17 I mean I've heard people saying, you know, they've come from Milton Keynes and down the south, Nottingham, different places.
04:23 What are you having for your tea?
04:24 Haggis.
04:25 [Laughter]
04:27 [Music]
04:33 [MUSIC]
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