For many, the goal is running the world-famous Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, whose annual restart in Wasilla in March - weather permitting - boosts local cash register receipts by more than $1 million. For others, it's the attraction of shorter races or simply recreational mushing, all of which keep cash registers ringing in the Valley year-round.

"Dog mushing has a very positive economic impact on Wasilla," said Cheryl Metiva, executive director of the Greater Wasilla Chamber of Commerce. "When the (Iditarod) restart is retained in Wasilla, it has an impact of about $1 million to our economy. When the restart moves from Wasilla, the community certainly feels it."

A competitor takes to the trail in the Don Bowers Memorial Sled Dog race Friday, Jan. 28, in Willow. Whether it is through tourism, dog food sales or mushing supplies, dog sledding packs a healthy impact on the Matanuska Valley's economy. PHOTO/Margaret Bauman/AJOC

"The fabulous job the Iditarod Trail Committee people are doing, Stan (Hooley) and Joann (Potts), has helped everyone involved in the mushing business side of it," said Tallman. "We get calls from all over ... people calling us for information because they heard if they are running the Iditarod, this is the place to get information.

"The Iditarod has a romantic aura to it," he said.

The romance dates back to a dream of the late Joe Redington Sr., who brought his family to the Valley in the late 1940s. Redington promoted into reality the idea of a sled dog race to Nome to commemorate the famous 1925 serum run to save victims of a diphtheria outbreak. While Redington never got rich mushing dogs or promoting the Iditarod Trail race, he became the inspiration for hundreds of other mushers, some of whom have found significant financial success on the heels of their Iditarod experiences.

Popular four-time Iditarod champion Martin Buser runs year-round tours of his Happy Trails Kennel in Big Lake, where a visitor can see a mock Iditarod checkpoint and learn how an Iditarod champion races and cares for his dogs on and off the trail. Visitors also get to cuddle husky puppies, see a multimedia trip along the Iditarod (complete with Buser's tales of the trail), and on most days meet Buser himself. The kennel tours, new last year, attracted busloads of convention-goers from Anchorage during the fall, Buser said. The visitors were particularly intrigued by the puppies and the musher lifestyle, Buser said. "It is a unique lifestyle, and that's what they really like to see."

Iditarod veteran Lynda Plettner, also of Big Lake, entertains busloads of visitors every summer with kennel tours that include sled dog rides, cuddling puppies and Plettner's tales of the trail. Winter tours are available too, but by reservation only.

"I show them the kennel, explain the type of dog needed for this event," she said. "I show them the puppies, offer them a ride through the woods, and they take lots of pictures." She also offers mushing lessons to would-be mushers and those training for the Iditarod. "I've done 11 Iditarods and trained nine other Iditarod finishers," she said.

Plettner also offers a weeklong mushing experience thatincludes bunking at a cabin at the kennel and working with her to care for the dogs. Clients also go out on the trail with them. "I get a lot of teachers who want to do that," she said.

Plettner said she's given about 60,000 sled dog rides since she started her business in 1994. She gave some of those rides at Iditarod headquarters from 1994 to 1996.

Another Iditarod veteran, Linwood Fiedler, spends winters racing and training for an upscale visitor experience in Juneau. His business, Alaska Heli-Mush, offers a helicopter ride up to sled dog tours on a glacier overlooking the state capital. This summer, Fiedler also will open a sled dog tour operation near Denali National Park, he said.

Redington's younger son, Raymie Redington, himself an Iditarod veteran of many years, now provides rides for tourists who flock to Iditarod Trail Committee headquarters each summer. Redington and his wife, Barbara, bring puppies from their kennel to the headquarters and talk with visitors about the race.

Dozens of competitive mushers, like Kent and Susie Kaltenbacher, also maintain fairly large kennels and participate the local races. It's a sport that can quickly add up to big expenditures, on everything from food and supplements to straw, housing, miscellaneous mushing supplies and veterinary bills.

Most mushers make their purchases locally. "They have the items we want and we like to support the local economy," said Susie Kaltenbacher, who estimates her huskies eat about 4 tons of dog food annually. The Kaltenbachers, like many mushers, keep expenses down by building their own dog houses. Susie Kaltenbacher, who grew up on an Oregon farm working with power tools, also built her own sled.

"You can't touch a good racing sled for under $1,500," she said. "I built it because I knew I could, and it's a lot less expensive than buying."

Kent Kaltenbacher used that sled in the recent Don Bowers Memorial Sled Dog Race in Willow, which attracted more than a dozen mushers, including Bryan Mills, a tavern owner from Ashland, Wis. Mills, there to complete a qualifying race for the Iditarod, said he comes to Alaska several months a year with his dog team, spending about $10,000 to $12,000 locally each time. This year his expenses also include $3,000 paid to a local auto dealership to rebuild the transmission on his truck, he said.