Canadian Rangers pull out of Yukon Quest

The Canadian Rangers will no longer maintain the trails for the annual Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race, but organizers say they're lining up an alternative in time for the February event.

For the past 17 years, the Rangers have built and maintained the Yukon Quest trails as an official military exercise.

But Canadian Forces officials in the North say that won't be happening for the upcoming race, slated to begin Feb. 6, 2010, from Fairbanks, Alaska.

Instead, Quest organizers will hire an experiencedRanger as their trail coordinator on the Canadian side of the 1,600-kilometre race trail through Alaska and the Yukon.

"We'll be working with John Mitchell, who has been the exercise coordinator for the Canadian Rangers for the Yukon Quest trail for the last four or five years," executive director Wendy Morrison told CBC News on Monday.

Morrison said organizers are also counting on other Rangers to volunteer their time to help Mitchell during the race.

Expenses beingworked out

A trail plan for the 2010 Quest is already in place, she added.

Now what organizers are trying to figure out is how much it will cost for Mitchell to work on the trails work that was done in past years by the Rangers, free of charge.

"We're putting together, you know, various numbers on time and snowmobiles and fuel and all of that," Morrison said. "You know, it could be a pretty big range."

The absence of the Rangers from the Quest is not the only blip organizers have encountered in recent years. Last year, the race struggled to raise enough sponsorship and prize money.

As well, mushers reported problems a few years ago with the volunteer-built trail on the Alaska portion of the race.

Low musher turnout

"In the early days, before the Rangers got involved, the trail was really hit or miss," said Whitehorse-area musher Frank Turner, who has competed in the Yukon Quest for more than 20 years.

"Just the cost and logistics of putting the trail in, this is going to be a nightmare," he added. "This is a very, very serious impact for the Quest."

Turner said the race is already suffering asa low number of mushers have signed up.

"There's only 19 or 20 teams signed up for the race right now. That's extremely disappointing," Turner said.

But Morrison said she does not see the changes as a bad sign for the Quest.

"It's a little bit of a shift, but we're hoping that the mushers in particular with John being on board again this year and a lot of the same experienced volunteers doing the trail this year that they won't even notice the change," she said.

The 2010 Yukon Quest will begin in Fairbanks, with mushers racing through Alaska and the Yukon to the finish line in Whitehorse.