Two Rookies, Dakota Schlosser and Will Troshynski, in Iditarod XLIX are Jr. Iditarod veterans. Will ran the Jr. Iditarod for three successive years beginning in 2001. In 2003, he had a unique Jr. Iditarod experience as the race was moved out to Glennallen due to insufficient snow cover along the traditional trail. Dakota ran the Jr. Iditarod in 2015 and 2016. He had the experience of going to Cantwell and running the Denali Highway for the 2015 Jr. Iditarod – same reason, lack of snow. In both 2003 and 2015, the start of Iditarod was moved north to Fairbanks.
#39 Dakota Schlosser – Willow
Dakota Schlosser, age 22, moved to Alaska from Wisconsin with his family in 2012. He’s been mushing for seventeen years. In the lower 48 he concentrated mainly on sprint racing. In Alaska he began focusing on mid to long distance racing. He has a competitive race kennel that he has raised mostly from puppies. For a 2018 litter he used the theme of candy bars to pick names. Those pups were at Dream a Dream Dog Farm during Summer Teacher’s Camp. The teachers loved taking the pups for their daily walks on the trails through the woods. Seven of the candy bars will be on his Iditarod team – Butterfingers, Snickers, York, Hershey, Reese’s, 100 Grand and Joy. In Jr. Iditarod, Dakota claimed two 4th place finishes including rookie of the year. Last year, Dakota raced the Alpine Creek 300, Kusko 300, Willow 300 and Tug Bar 150. He received the Humanitarian award for the Alpine Creek race. Running Iditarod has been his dream since he was 10 years old. Dakota works as a diesel/heavy equipment mechanic for Knik Construction.
#27 Will Troshynski – Fairbanks
Will Troshynski, age 35, feels fortunate to have learned to mush and be mentored by Martin Buser when he ran his first Jr. Iditarod in 2001. Will is a veteran of three Jr. Iditarod races. Now, 20 years after his first race, Will is about to realize his dream of running Iditarod. Will has handled for may mushers across Alaska and has had the opportunity to develop his own sense and philosophy of running dogs. He’s been active in mid-distance racing. In 2017 he and his spouse, Shawn, established ATAO Kennel in Two Rivers, Alaska. ATAO stands for Adventure, Truth, Accountability, Onward. Troshynski is open about his struggle with depression and mushes to show that you can do big things when coping with mental health issues. Will is a trans man and races for LGBTQ + youth. Will is training 18 dogs for Iditarod. He prefers to keep his kennel small so that each dog gets maximum love and attention as well as individualized quality training.
By the way, there will be eleven Jr. Iditarod veterans doing the Gold Trail Loop in 2021. Dakota and Will are the only Iditarod rookies of the group. The Jr. Iditarod veterans have completed 33 Jr. Iditarod races. The same group has compiled 92 Iditarod finishes with 39 being top 10 finishes. Lance Mackey and Dallas Seavey own 8 championships out of those 39 top ten finishes. To this date, there has never been a Jr. Iditarod Champion who has gone on to win the Iditarod. If it’s going to happen this year, it will be up to Ryan Redington and Ramey Smyth. In 2020 Ryan finished Iditarod in 8th place and Ramey, who has accumulated 11 top 10 finishes, claimed 11th place. I’d call them both strong contenders.
