[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 47 (Tuesday, March 14, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S761-S762]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                       Tribute to Ryan Redington

  Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, colleagues who have been around for a 
while know that it is usually about this time of the year that I come 
to the floor to talk about my favorite sporting event. I am not talking 
about March Madness. I am talking about Alaska's version of March 
Madness, which is the Iditarod, when teams of dogs led by pretty able 
athletes embark on a thousand-mile mushing adventure across the wilds 
of Alaska, beginning down in Anchorage, all the way up to Nome.
  This year, it is not quite 1,000 miles. It is 998 miles, as they took 
the southern route, which they try to alternate during different years.
  But it has been an adventure for the 33 teams that ventured out just 
last Sunday, and I am here to announce that literally 10 minutes ago--
perhaps less than 10 minutes ago--the winner has just crossed the 
finish line under the burled arch in Nome.
  So Alaskans are excited. The Iditarod website has crashed because 
everybody was checking in to see if Ryan Redington had made it across, 
and I am here to announce that Ryan Redington is the winner of the 51st 
Iditarod race in Alaska. He and his team just, as I say, crossed. He 
has been in the lead for the past several days, but we are really, 
really quite excited about his win.
  I am looking forward to being able to give a call myself to 
congratulate him, but I know that right now his family, his friends, 
and everyone who is there in Nome to greet them after this 8-day 
journey are really quite excited. So he is probably not going to be 
answering his phone just yet.
  The Iditarod is really an extraordinary, extraordinary event. It is 
an experience like no other. And when they say it takes a village, it 
really takes a village. All of these little checkpoints along the way--
some of them are communities; some of them are literally nothing more 
than a cabin. So it is an opportunity for the musher and their teams to 
be checking in, be checked out by the volunteer veterinarians who are 
along the way; refuel in the sense of feeding their dogs, resting their 
dogs, getting a little food for themselves, but then traveling on.
  Think about what it means to drive a dog team for a thousand miles 
over this period of time and over terrain like this. Mr. President, you 
are from a northern State. You appreciate snow. We are not afraid of a 
little weather, but what these mushers and their teams have been 
through has been pretty amazing.
  I was there at the ceremonial start last week. It was zero in 
Anchorage. It was a pretty great day to be a dog because it was nice 
and cool. Temperatures increased along the way. They encountered 
everything from drizzle to rain to mud, then to deep snow, then to 
freezing cold, then to gale winds--bumps along the way. It is a 
grueling test for all of these teams.
  But as we look to what comes together to put on a race like this, it 
is something that Alaskans take great pride in. This is fueled by 
volunteers, whether it is the Iditarod Air Force, whether it is the 
veterinarians who come to volunteer. There is going to be a mushers' 
banquet up in Nome, where people come from all over the country to come 
and volunteer to serve dinner and clean up after dinner.
  I met a group a couple of years ago. They were from somewhere in 
Florida. I didn't know the name of the community. But they said that 
they took vacation every year to come to Alaska, to come to Nome, and 
their job was dinner rolls. They take a week vacation to go to Nome, 
AK, from Florida to be there, to be a part of this extraordinary, 
extraordinary event.
  So let me tell you a little bit about Ryan Redington and this race 
that he has just finished. So we are still looking at the exact number 
of minutes, but he has been on the trail now for 8 days, 21 hours, 
and--again, trying to figure out what the minutes are. This is his 
first-ever victory.
  Ryan is 40 years old, but Ryan has a stake in this race perhaps 
unlike any other young musher out there. He is a legacy musher, to put 
it in a sense. He was born and raised in Knik, AK. On his mom's side, 
his great-grandfather was an Inupiat who delivered the mail from 
Unalakleet to other villages by dogsled. That was how we utilized dog 
teams back then.
  Ryan comes from a family of mushers. His brother and his sister-in-
law have competed in sled dog races. His father and his uncle have both 
raced in the Iditarod. Not only did they compete, but they are in the 
Iditarod Hall of Fame. His daughter and son are taking up the tradition 
by taking on racing.
  On his dad's side, it is his grandfather, Joe Redington, Sr., who is 
the founder. We call him the ``Father of the Iditarod.''
  Joe Redington, Sr., has raced that race 20 times--almost 20 times. 
When he crossed the finish line for his last race in 1997, he was 80 
years old--80 years old. Can you imagine being 80 years old and running 
1,000 miles standing on the runners, running with your dogs? The 
Iditarod is not for the faint of heart, and so it is just an example 
here to say that mushing really runs in Ryan's blood.
  In addition to competing in the Iditarod, he has competed in numerous 
races across Alaska and the lower 48. He is a prior champion of the 
Junior Iditarod. He was named Iditarod's ``Most Improved Musher'' back 
in 2017. He is the 2019 and 2021 champion of the Kobuk 440 in Kotzebue.
  So, including this race, Ryan has finished the Iditarod now nine 
times--nine times. He came in seventh in 2021 and then last year had 
his third consecutive top-10 finish. He placed ninth. So this is a guy 
who has given his all--given his all--along with his incredible canine 
athletes, to be where he is today: No. 1.

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  We are just so excited and so thrilled for him, particularly given 
the family legacy surrounding the Iditarod. Ryan is the first Inupiaq 
Iditarod champion since 2011.
  It is interesting, Mr. President. I don't want to jinx things, but if 
you look--this is our reader board that we have outside my office over 
in the Hart Building.
  Every day this week, we have been kind of following the mushers up 
the trail so that people would know who is in the lead. And these are 
today's standings: Ryan, of course, in first. But he is followed by 
Pete Kaiser. Pete is from Bethel. Pete is Inupiaq. Richie Diehl. Richie 
is from Aniak, an Alaska Native. So if the places hold, it will be 
quite a strong and telling statement that our top three mushers would 
be Alaskan Natives.
  Dog mushing has been a part of life and culture for Alaskan Native 
people long, long before the Iditarod. But it is an ongoing reminder--I 
think a really beautiful reminder--of how men and women and, really, 
incredible dogs can work together in some pretty extraordinary winter 
conditions, connecting communities, connecting people.
  Ryan is an inspiration to so many of us, inspiring Alaskans and 
future generations of mushers, for how he cares for his team, for the 
character that he has shown as he has competed.
  And so to Ryan, I am going to have an opportunity to speak with you 
directly, but you need to know that you represent the true spirit of 
Alaska. You make us all so very proud. And we certainly congratulate 
you as the 2023 Iditarod champion.