Been -10 to -15 the past week in the mornings. 6" snow a weekend ago. Everyone still on ATVs except us. Spending copious amounts of time with small teams, 5 and 7 dogs on sled. No appreciable mileage as with the busy summer season extending through September early training compared to past years has not happened and are bringing conditioning level up slowly.  Pretty easy to get caught up in the training furvor around here as there are at least 8 "competitive" sled dog kennels accessing various sections of the trail we run on. Training in October was sporadic due to a continuation of the fish guiding season and also time spent visiting family in the lower 48. We are now on a regular schedule, pretty much everyone every other day off and just before we make a mileage jump 2 or 3 days on in a row followed by a day off and then a mileage jump. With the jump in miles the first couple runs are followed by a couple days off before we go to every other day off. This pretty well sets the pattern and once the dogs are in condition, specific mileages are not always hammered out but rather we do maintenance training which tends at times to incorporate a bit more speed. We do not do steady doses of speed since we have a small kennel and every capable athlete needs to be at the starting line. Though injuries are a fact of life, we try and error on the conservative side. We are currently training with single lead, a method we frequently use this time of year to sharpen leader abilities. Have found single lead gets a better focus and response to learning what is needed/expected and then as winter progresses and races are closer on the horizon, leaders are paired up to see who works best together.  Early races paired leaders get their chance in the non-championship or preliminary races and from race to race front ends are rotated and tested.