Revised - The location and start time for the Yukon Quest has been changed.

The race will now be starting at Suncatchers Inn Cattery, near the Dawson Overland Trail, at 906 Takhini River Rd.

With slippery winter driving conditions, those wanting to see Saturday afternoon’s start should give themselves 50 minutes to an hour to get to the area safely.

Ironically enough, Suncatchers bills itself as the premier cat kennel in Whitehorse. There is no word at this time how the cats feel about having the start of a dogsled race in their backyard.

The Quest announced the changes on its Facebook page Wednesday evening.

During the Meet the Mushers event at the Sternwheeler Hotel on Thursday evening, Quest executive director Ben Smith explained in more detail why the start was moved and the time changed from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

“We were monitoring the weather up until the start. We definitely had our eye on it the last few weeks,” Smith said.

“We can tell that the weather was going to be a big obstacle as we got closer to race time. That warm spell that came in definitely cast our start into disarray, he added.

“The rain that came down, the warm weather, the slush, basically turned Shipyards into an ice-skating rink.

“So we got the marshals, the judges together with the city and the staff here and we went out and took a look at it. Marshals and judges took one look and said, ‘This won’t be safe for anybody. Not only the mushers, but the supporters, the volunteers, the fans coming out. Nobody’s safe doing this.’

“We decided then that there’s no way we could run that race starting from Shipyards; that we would have to go to a secondary location,” Smith said.

“We had already looked around to see where a potential second spot could be so we already had it in our pockets where we would move to.

“We were able to pull the trigger pretty quick on getting over to the Suncatchers Cattery as the best location. We wanted to avoid steep transitions into the river there for teams, given the ice, the difficulty of controlling.”

There was also discussion about 14-dog teams being too powerful pulling on the ice.

“Some mushers have come to us bringing concerns about the power of the teams on such difficult conditions,” Smith said.

They came to the decision to start every race with eight dogs.

“They’ll go as far as Braeburn and then they will add dogs from there,” Smith said.

“To give the mushers that much more control over the the trail from here to Braeburn. It’s very slick, very icy, very, very difficult to navigate.”

Smith said it’s icy for much of the trail to Braeburn. Another concern is if there’s an emergency situation, mushers wouldn’t be able to get their snow hooks to dig in to the ice.

“They wouldn’t be able to regain control of a sled that’s out of control. The last thing we need is a bunch of dogs having an accident and getting hurt.” he noted.

“We took a look at it. As much as we want a competitive, exciting race, it has to be a safe race too. So in the name of safety, we had to move the race.”

The start time has been moved to 2 p.m. “to compensate for the dif-ference in distance and to maintain the schedule of volunteers and co-ordination we have further up the trail,” the Quest Facebook page stated.

Smith said the Suncatchers site will have two components to it: the dog lot and the start line, about a minute down the trail.

“We will not be able to open the dog yard for the public to interact with the teams.”

Despite the dog lot being off-limits to onlookers, people will be able to line up at a start chute.

“There will be a viewing area for people to see the teams pass through the start chute. The temperature will be cold and there will not be any buildings to warm up in.” (It’s expected to be in the low -30s tonight and into Saturday.)

The mushers and their teams will exit the chute and go on to the Overland Trail.

The Quest Facebook page added, “This is not a decision that we came by lightly, and we tried every avenue to make the Shipyards Park location work.

“This decision was made in the interest of safety. We greatly appreciate the support we have received and we thank everyone for following along with the Yukon Quest.”

Frank Turner, a Quest board member and race veteran, agrees with the decision.

“I feel good about it because they’re making decisions based on safety. Safety for the dogs and safety for the people,” Turner said.

“Ice, you have no control. It’s not meant to have dog teams travel on ice like that. It’ll never work out. You can’t stop, you can’t do anything.

“So if you have a problem, if you’re on snow, then you can hook down and you can do whatever it is you need to do to fix the problem,” Turner added. “But on ice, it’s not good. So it was a very good decision.”

The finish locations for the race remain unchanged. The YQ100 will end at Braeburn. The YQ250 will conclude at Pelly Crossing. The YQ450 finishes up at Dawson City.

Smith was asked how he’s feeling going into his first race.

“It’s nervous and excitement,” he replied.

“There’s the nerves of hoping everything goes well, hoping that we’ve prepared enough and we planned and everything works out.

“It’s palpable, the excitement in the air in this community right now for the Quest, seeing banners up and seeing people come out for this (Meet the Mushers) event. And just how the community rallies around it. You can’t help but buy into it.

“And being a new Yukoner, I’m loving the community feel of this event,” Smith said.

“And I couldn’t be more proud of how this organization has responded to every challenge that we’ve had. The board has been fantastic. Abi, our race operations manager, she’s been amazing. Everything has kind of fallen in it as it should.

“We’ve dealt with the obstacles, but I’m genuinely very excited for how this is gonna shake out,” Smith said.