SOUTH BRIDGTON – On Saturday morning, Lindy Howe stood on a snowy hill, scanning the apple orchard below at the Five Fields Farm in South Bridgton.
Then her son, Colby Briggs, zipped by, mounted on a sled pulled by a pack of Alaskan Huskies.
“There’s my son,” Howe exclaimed. “He passed the other ones. Very good. I’m so proud I’m going to cry. Look at him. Oh man. Right around that corner. Oh boy! That was great. Oh my goodness. He is flying. And there’s Kevin. There’s my partner Kevin.”
Ten years ago to the day, Howe said, Briggs took first place in the eight-dog class at the Musher’s Bowl on the Fryeburg Fair Grounds. Howe, who wore a parka adorned with dog sledding badges, maintains a 35-dog kennel at her home in Augusta, and brought 17 of them to this year’s Musher’s Bowl. She said she hadn’t raced them in two years, thanks to poor snow conditions.
“I am so excited,” Howe said. “This is a really, really, really special day.”
According to Tom Gyger, the owner of Five Fields Farm, about 400 people bought tickets to watch 25 sled dog teams race at this year’s Musher’s Bowl. In an ideal year, Gyger said, some 600 people will watch 35 teams. Gyger said that a combination of cold temperatures and overcast conditions contributed to the lower turnout. Also, he said, in a sport that’s particularly sensitive to subtle weather gradations, many racers were not convinced that the event could take place.
“The phone calls all started with, ‘Are you still holding this race?’” Gyger said. “There was doubt. You go much out of South Bridgton, do you see much snow anywhere else? No. This is a very special microclimate here.”
Musher’s Bowl 2014 was not particularly competitive, since Down East Sled Dog Association officials withheld the customary prizes after determining that the trails were too icy and dangerous for top-speed racing.
Paul Field, the coordinator of the Musher’s Bowl, said that there was not enough fresh snow this year to create snow berms to buffer the trail.
“We don’t have the depth of snow off the trail to give a berm to hold you on the trail,” Field said. “Normally the snow on the trail is lower than the shoulders. Well, this year because of the rain it’s about equal. We took the competition out of it, and this wasn’t a sanctioned race. It was just a fun race day. They’re competing against their own times and not competing for money or points. Because, we felt if they did that they’d push too hard and somebody would get hurt. So that kind of slowed things down.”
But according to Beth Olsen, the president of the Down East Sled Dog Club, the mushing was great.
“For all the weather we’ve had, the trails here are fantastic,” Olsen said. “I don’t think anybody expected him to pull off a trail like he pulled off. I skied today. That being said, early this morning, to be on the skijor trail and be able to actually ski was phenomenal, for all the rain that we’ve gotten. We expected an icier trail.”
Thomas Carroll, of Raymond, who is Field’s grandson, raced one dog and a four-dog pack.
“It was icy,” said Carroll, 15, who has been racing for two years. “It was fast. It wasn’t sticking to my skis at all. It was good.”
According to Vince Buoniello, president of the New England Sled Dog Club, the Musher’s Bowl was the first sled dog race in New England this winter.
“It’s been not a good year,” Buoniello said. “Nothing’s happening in New England. You’ve got the snow and then you’ve got all that rain after that and then the freezing weather. You can’t race on those trails. It’s not safe. The dogs have no footing.”
The Hill Village sled dog race in Bristol and Franklin, N.H., and the Westbrook Winter West Fest Race were both canceled due to poor trail conditions. Westbrook will try again Feb. 15. Last year, the Musher’s Bowl was canceled due to icy trails.
In other words, Field said, it’s lucky that the race was held.
“It’s a fun day for all,” Field said. “Does it really matter whether they’re racing for points, or racing for fun? Everybody’s having a great time – the spectators, the dogs [even though] they haven’t been able to train much because so many areas of the state don’t have snow right now.”
A racer in the six-dog speed category begins the nearly 5-mile course last Saturday during the annual Musher’s Bowl in South Bridgton. 
Beth Olsen, president of the Down East Sled Dog Club, oversees the start line during Saturday’s action at the Musher’s Bowl in South Bridgton. The club made the call not to award prizes due to safety concerns relating to icy trails.
A spectator uses his cell phone to capture images of a musher approaching the finish of the nearly 5-mile race course at Five Fields Farm.
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