Speedy sleds at spring festival
Just some of the features at Toonik Tyme 2016
Stewart Burnett
Northern News Services
Monday, April 11, 2016
IQALUIT
If snowmobile racing and sticking your head in a tub of seal blood and guts sounds fun, Toonik Tyme might be for you.
Solomon Awa shaves ice off his polar bear carving during the ice sculpting contest at last year's Toonik Tyme. - NNSL file photo |
Festivities begin later this week for the 2016 event, which runs from April 15 to 24 and includes many different shows and activities.
Some people will get a taste, literally, for seal blood and guts on April 20 during the Fear Factor event at the curling rink.
"We're going to have a large tub with seal blood and guts inside it and you're going to have to bob for oranges," said Toonik Tyme Society president Travis Cooper.
As far as speedy sleds, things looked dark for a moment, but Iqaluit company C&K Services came to the rescue and saved the event's iconic snowmobile race with a generous sponsorship this year.
"It was a huge relief," said Cooper.
"It draws in a huge crowd. It's probably one of the events that takes the largest amount of interest for people in Iqaluit and Kimmirut. We've very grateful to C&K Services to be able to provide the two communities with this sort of opportunity."
The race sees competitors traverse 250 km from Iqaluit to Kimmirut and back. This year's event caps off the festival on April 24.
Cooper said record times aren't known because back in the day that information was shared by word of mouth, but said the race takes a little over three hours for the top competitors.
"It's definitely one of the more exciting events," he said.
"It's a high-endurance race, it's a speed race, it takes in so many different factors to be able to do a race of this nature that it's not for everybody, and the people who are able to do a race like this, it takes a special kind of person to do it."
A partnership with the Iqaluit Rotary Club has also afforded the opportunity to have Saskatchewan Roughriders football player Jorgen Hus give a speech on bullying.
Cooper also particularly looks forward to the traditional Inuit village this year, which he says is always a huge draw.
