Inspirational (And Adorable) Photos Of Dogs Running The Alaskan Iditarod

Bruce Linton's team races out of the chute during the official restart of the Iditarod Race in Willow, Alaska, on March 8, 2009.

Left: Christine Williams, 2, of Akiak, Alaska, hugs Polar Bear, one of the dogs in the dog team of her father in 2000. Right: Two sled dogs wait for their turn to be looked over by a veterinarian at the Iditarod headquarters in 2002.

Raymee Redington of Knik, Alaska, looks over his gear to try to decide what to leave behind in Rainey Pass, Alaska, March 9, 1987. Many mushers feel that in order to speed up their progress they must unload any unnecessary weight.

Kazuo Kojima of Tokyo and his dog team cruise along the thrilling Alaska range and weather the hard-packed, wind-blown snow, March 9, 1987.

Left: Musher Libby Riddles in Nome, Alaska, celebrates her victory as the first female champion of the Iditarod shortly after crossing the finish line. Right: A man and his dog on the Iditarod.

A sleeping dog lies in straw and a blanket during the Iditarod race in Talkotina, Alaska, in 1999.

Left: Three-time Iditarod champion Martin Buser of Big Lake, Alaska, and his dogs take a break from the 1,100-mile sled dog race after reaching the Nikolai, Alaska, checkpoint about 350 miles from Anchorage. Right: A member of Dee Dee Jonrowe's Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race team in 2000.

Kotzebue, Alaska, musher Ed Iten takes a nap in the Rainy Pass, Alaska, checkpoint in the Alaska Range during a break in the second day of the 1,100-mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race on March 8, 2004.

Norwegian musher Bjornar Andersen pets one of his sled dogs as he puts them to bed in the Takotna, Alaska, checkpoint on March 9, 2005, as he takes his mandatory 24-hour rest break in the 1,100-mile Iditarod race.

A musher drives his Iditarod race team through the trees on the Farewell burn area in 2005.

Left: Stan Zuray of Tanana, Alaska, drives his team along the Iditarod Trail as it parallels Knik-Goose Bay Road in Wasilla, Alaska, in 1996. Right: Martin Buser drives his dog team into the Rainy Pass, Alaska, in 1997.

Steve Vollertsen of Takotna rests his dogs and his feet during a stop at Rainy Pass, Alaska, on March 1, 1979, after traveling 203 miles from Anchorage in his first run in the Iditarod race to Nome.

An overhead shot of a musher and his sled on the icepack near Nome.

Musher Joe Garnie's team, from Teller, Alaska, heads through the streets of Anchorage at the start of the 1999 Iditarod race.

Harold Tunheim mushes his dogs through the finish line during the Iditarod race in Nome, Alaska, in 1999.