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On assignment: 72 hours covering the Can-Am sled dog race|

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FORT KENT, Maine — The 2015 250-mile Can-Am Crown International dog sled race started Feb. 28 in Fort Kent. Seventeen mushers from around the United States and Canada set off with 12 dog teams on a grueling trail over frozen rivers, among tight trees and over hilly landscapes.

When I was told I was heading to The County to cover the race, I immediately asked my co-worker Gabor Degre what to expect and the best way to cover an event this large.

He gave me a few tips. Dress warm, bring extra batteries, follow or drive with someone on the logger roads to each checkpoint, and prepare not to sleep.

I laughed at that last bit of advice at first. But he was dead serious. He explained I would have a blast, but I would not be sleeping.

I decided to follow one musher throughout the race and to make sure to get the first three mushers coming into each checkpoint. The musher I picked was 30-year-old Ashley Patterson of Shirley, Maine. Three other Maine mushers were competing, but Patterson had the best odds of finishing, as she had finished four other times.

On Thursday afternoon, I packed all the warm gear I owned, my camera gear and chargers, energy bars and my insulated water bottle and headed to Aroostook County.

On Friday were veterinarian checks, where I met with the oldest and youngest mushers competing in the shorter races that weekend. I was able to get a better feel of what I was dealing with and make plans to drive to each checkpoint with a race volunteer.

But before that, I was able to take a three-dog sled team around the property of Bangor Daily News reporter Julia Bayly. It was an experience I will never forget.

I woke up at 8 a.m. Saturday, dressed in all my warm layers, packed my ruck and headed to Main Street in Fort Kent to watch the 30-mile and 60-mile races take off.

I met up with Patterson while she was getting her dogs ready for the start of her race. I did a quick interview with her and then let her go back to putting booties on her 12 dogs. At 10:30 a.m., Patterson was off into the woods of Maine on her way to the first checkpoint in Portage Lake and I was headed back to the finish line to file photos and meet with Mike Daigle, who would be taking me around for the weekend.

Like everyone else helping with the races, Daigle volunteers his time as checkpoint coordinator for the weekend. When he’s not carting me through the backwoods of the Can-Am, he’s a Maine forest ranger. He is a super nice guy, and I knew from the start he was going to make this trip fun.

Around 2:30 p.m. we loaded our gear into the back of his pickup truck and started the 45-minute drive to Portage Lake.

It was amazing how dedicated and friendly the volunteers were at all the checkpoints. The minute we got there they set up a table for me to edit and asked if I needed anything else.

Around 4 p.m., I was introduced to a gentleman who would be snowmobiling me across Portage Lake to catch the first few mushers coming into the checkpoint. This was my first time riding on a snowmobile, let alone riding on one backward and hanging off the side to get the shots I needed (the second photo in my photo gallery is from this postion), but I had a blast.

As night fell, Patterson made her way across the lake and to the checkpoint. I followed her into the dog- and musher-only area and started taking photos of her caring for her dogs.

This is when I encountered the first of many obstacles: the lack of light. I had to rely on the headlamps from the mushers and the headlamp I wore to illuminate the photos. But to me, it worked even better than if flash was used. The headlights help give sharp contrasts to the photos and portrayed the mood of what these mushers were going through better.

After the mushers left Portage Lake, around 10 p.m., Daigle and I packed up and started the two-hour trip into the deep woods of Maine. On our way I saw my first two moose running next to the truck.

The next three checkpoints are kind of a blur. Shooting. Editing. Waiting. Driving. Shooting. Editing. Waiting. Driving.

I did manage to get an hour nap at the second checkpoint but other than that I was awake, just like the mushers. The lack of sleep was another challenge I had to overcome.

In this job you are put in situations where you might be awake for long periods of time, but I have never been up for more than 72 hours with only an hour of sleep. My mind started playing tricks on me, the way I was seeing colors was getting odd.

But like any athlete, you train your body to go into an almost autopilot mode when pushed to its limits. Your muscle memory takes over and you no longer have to think about what you are doing.

This is what happened to me. My instincts took over, regardless of my inability to make coherent sentences.

Around midnight Monday I was dropped back off at the ski lodge in Fort Kent to wait for the first finishers to cross. At 2 a.m., Martin Massicotte crossed the line first. Six hours later, Patterson enthusiastically finished, coming in fourth and the first woman to cross the line.

I’m not sure if it was the lack of sleep, or if it was because I had just watched animals and humans with incredible endurance complete a huge accomplishment, but I teared up while Patterson hugged her dogs and family.

These are the assignments I live for, where I not only learn something new but can discover something about myself in the process.

 

Covering the 2015 Eastern Maine basketball tournament

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To say I shot a lot of basketball last week would be an understatement. In a week and a half span, I shot around 17 games and averaged about 600 images a game.

That’s a lot of basketball. That’s a lot of repetition.

In situations like this it becomes very important to keep pushing yourself to find interesting moments and to keep trying to cover the event in a different way.

Like I said in the The Frame post on the Hermon basketball coach, sometimes the best images don’t come from game action but rather what’s happening off the court.

While game action is important, I don’t necessarily think it is the most important thing at a game. Crowds, coaches, players on the benches usually tell the story better than the person going up for the layup.

High school sports, especially tournament play, are full of emotions. This could be someone’s last game that they ever play. Dejection is just as important as jubilation.

Watching for and knowing where those especially emotional people are is helpful when something big happens.

When I cover basketball I shoot with three bodies, one with a 24-70mm, one with a 70-200mm and the third with a 300mm.  This allows me to see the game in a multitude of ways and allows me to almost be in two places at once.

Though I do move around a good deal while shooting too. From court side, to to top of the arena and everywhere in between. I’m always searching for an interesting angle. It not only keeps me interested but it keeps the photos interesting too.

For the finals on Saturday I mounted a remote camera over one of the nets, similar to the one I did for state cheerleading,  to give a different perspective to viewers after a week of seeing similar images. They turned out better than expected and gave a totally different view on the typical shooting shot that I had seen thousands of times that week.

Large tournaments like this are not only physically but mentally daunting, as is doing anything over and over again in a short period of time. I’m glad the bulk of the tournament is over. I walked away with some interesting photos that I’m pretty proud of.

Hermon Pond Ice Shacks

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After seeing a New York Times post on different ice shacks in Canada, I was inspired to document some found in Maine.

I headed out to Hermon Pond, a pretty quick drive from the office, to see if I could find any.

I was pleasantly surprised to find a good amount of all different shapes and sizes spread throughout the pond. I threw on my micro-spikes and started the long walk down the plowed runway.  No, I wasn’t a real Mainer and didn’t drive my Jetta on the ice.

I’ve never been on that large of a frozen body of water. To be honest, it kind of freaked me out. Every time the ice released pressure, I jumped a little, even though I knew the ice was over a foot deep.

By the time I started shooting, the sun was starting to set. Some of the shacks were illuminated by a golden light, while others were cast in a blue shadow. I played with both lighting situations and seemed to like the deep blue better. To me, it almost lets you feel the cold in the photos.

After about 30 minutes of shooting, I started my haul back to my car and was pleased with what I came away with.

Any day where I can spend most of it outside making photos is a good day.

Cuba, through the eyes of BDN’s Bob DeLong

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In April 2000, the Bangor Daily News sent photographer Bob DeLong to Havana along with reporter Gordon Bonin to accompany a group of Maine educators organized by Let Cuba Live on a one-week tour of Cuba. The trip happened about the time of the famed Elian Gonzalez international custody battle. Gonzalez was the 6-year-old Cuban boy whose family in Miami tried to take custody of him while the U.S. government and his father battled to keep him in Cuba.

Nearly 15 years later, Cuba and the U.S. have vowed to re-establish diplomatic relations, which were originally tainted by the Cold War cuban missile crisis. 

During his visit, DeLong took photos of children playing baseball in the streets, where roosters also roamed. He showed a country full of color and decaying Spanish architecture.

BDN cartoonist George Danby, who worked with DeLong, said he was usually relaxed and quietly observant while shooting. Danby said he was in the background, but always with a keen eye, looking for a photo that wasn’t obvious and unusual.

“His photography was always a part of him.” Danby said.

DeLong retired from the paper in February 2002 after 22 years as a photographer for the BDN and a total of 34 years with the company. Just a few years later, he died of an illness at the age of 68.

Former Bangor Daily News Executive Editor Mark Woodward was quoted in DeLong’s obituary as saying “Bob DeLong was the epitome of the professional newspaper photographer.”

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Bob DeLong, courtesy of Monty Rand