Ramy Brooks

Alaska Native kennel owner and operator, motivational speaker, and dog musher who specializes in long-distance races. Brooks won his first race, the single-dog Junior North American Championship, when he was four years old, with his dog Sam. He is a former winner of the 1,000 mi (1,600 km) Yukon Quest dog sled race across both Canada and the U.S. Brooks is descended from the Yup'ik Eskimos and Athabascan Indians, two of the indigenous groups who were the first to mush dogs in Alaska. His grandfather, Gareth Wright, was a competitive musher who won both major Alaskan sled dog races of the 1940s, the American Championship (twice), and the Fur Rendezvous World Championship (three times). Brooks's mother is Roxy Wright (or Wright-Champaine), another kennel owner and competitive musher. She was also honored with the Mush with PRIDE Lifetime Achievement Award in 1996. The family owns and operates Kami Kennels, primarily composed of Alaskan Huskies. Brooks has visited schools as a motivational speaker since 1993, participates in Mush for Kids since 1997, and from 2003 has been a trustee of the Alaskan Children's Trust. He attempted to commit suicide at age 16, and suffered from depression in his 20s. As a result, he began working with the Alaska Mental Health Trust in 2005, in an attempt to reduce the extraordinarily high rate of suicide among Native Alaskans. Link to Wikipedia biography