Formula 1 Asked to Hit the Brakes on Deadly Iditarod Dog Race Ties

Formula 1 Asked to Hit the Brakes on Deadly Iditarod Dog Race Ties

London – Liberty, the parent company of Formula 1, still allows sponsorship of the Iditarod – a dog-sled race across frozen tundra that has killed over 150 dogs since its inception – causing PETA to send a letter to F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali urging him to call on Liberty to cut ties with the deadly race. PETA points out that ExxonMobil, Jack Daniel’s, and Coca-Cola have all ended their sponsorships of the Iditarod and that the connection to the race through Liberty’s company GCI “risks tarnishing F1’s world-class reputation”.

“Talented F1 drivers like Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen love to race and can walk away any time, but dogs in the Iditarod do not choose this life, and many die during the thousand-mile journey,” says PETA founder Ingrid Newkirk. “PETA urges Formula 1 to tell its parent company to give the boot to the Iditarod, as every other big company has already done.”

PETA also notes that up to half the dogs who start the Iditarod don’t finish it, and during this year’s race, nearly 200 dogs were pulled off the trail because of exhaustion, illness, injury, or other causes, leaving the remaining ones to work even harder. A PETA US exposé of Iditarod mushers’ kennels has also revealed that arthritic and sick dogs were left chained up without veterinary care, dogs were dragged and injured during training, and one was even killed.

PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment” and which opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview, is now urging its supporters to join the call for Liberty to cut ties with the Iditarod.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk or follow the group on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.

Contact:

Sascha Camilli +44 (0) 20 7923 6244; [email protected]

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