Last weekend, my roommates and I had the unique opportunity to run a checkpoint in the “greatest mid-range dog race in Alaska”, the K300. The K300, is named for the 300 mile course that begins in Bethel and runs 150 miles up the Kuskokwim river before turning around and heading back to this wonderful “city”.Joe, Ariel and I were stationed in the village of Kalskag. It was about an hour flight in one of those tiny prop planes that make you feel like you’re on a never-ending rollercoaster ride. My family will be shocked to know that I decided, in order to combat the stomach plummeting turbulence, to just pass out. Waking up in Kalskag I thought we had accidently flown to Anchorage. There were trees AND mountains…well actually the locals called them “hills”, but after living in Bethel for the past six months where the highest point in any direction is a water tank...they were MOUNTAINS!
Our job in Kalskag was to check dog mushers into the checkpoint as they arrived and make sure they had everything they needed for their dogs such as food and hay. 18 Mushers from all over the state originally signed up for the race, which included an $800 entrance fee. However, the weather and trail conditions were so poor that 5 mushers dropped out before the race even started, leaving 13 Mushers to take part in the race with a $100,000 purse. The temperature was dipping into the -50’s with wind-chill and good snow was hard to find with the majority of the course running on glare ice. (We recently had a warm spell and a snow drought). Among the group of 13 that decided to brave the conditions were some of the best mushers in the world including 4-time Iditarod winner Martin Buser and perhaps the most famous musher of all Lance Mackey. Mackey has won the last three Iditarods, was an ESPY nominee in 2008 and is also featured in Lance Armstrong’s Livestrong campaign as a recent survivor of throat cancer.
When we landed in Kalskag on Friday afternoon it was about -15 degrees…and a mere -40 degrees with wind-chill. Standing on the runway (in most villages it's just a gravel strip) it hit me, like a 40 mph gale of ice-wind, how underdressed I was for the weekend. I was wearing a jacket that had served me well for all of my snowboarding/outdoor adventures out east but it definitely was not intended to spend hours in the bitter Alaskan cold. I also was wearing leather “work boots” which became a running joke at the awards banquet. Joe, Ariel and I became lovingly known by the mushers and K300 staff as the “Three Stooges.” It was clear to everyone involved that we hadn’t been in Alaska long when we showed up to the K300 without bunny boots. These very stylish boots are a staple in Bethel. They're about as warm as they are goofy.
Over the next few days the temperature was around -25 or so with wind-chill hitting -55. Experiencing this kind of cold on a walk to work is one thing. Standing outside in the middle of the night when it's that cold is an experience entirely unlike anything I have ever had. When it's that cold, your face masks, eye brows, beards (if I could go grow one) ice over from your breath and just looking into the wind forces your eyes to tear. It's almost too cold for a runny nose.
Our first night at the checkpoint we got to bed around midnight and woke up at 3am to prepare for the arriving mushers. Around the 3:30 the first mushers started to arrive. On the way up the course the mushers were required to take a 6 hr layover at our checkpoint, Lower Kalskag High School which sat right on the river bank. When a musher arrived we noted their time in and helped them park their dog team, which we discovered, was fairly miserable when you’re dealing with 14 exhausted/hungry dogs and 1 sleep deprived musher. If any of the dogs were injured or too fatigued to continue they would be left at the checkpoint, as “drop dogs”, under our care. The 6 hour layover seemed like a promising time for some sleep but it turned out that it just wasn’t meant to be. Just after the last of the mushers arrived in Kalskag (some four and half hours after the leaders) the frontrunners were already stirring, anxiously awaiting the green light to hit the trail after their mandatory layover.
Once the mushers all left our checkpoint, around 2pm that day, we were finally able to catch some sleep before preparing for their return early the next morning. The second and final time the mushers passed through Kalskag it was clear that the weather and trail conditions were taking a toll. Mitch Seavey, the reigning K300 champ arrived at our checkpoint complaining about sore eyes….Turns out his eyes were FROSTBIT! The brutal wind and grainy snow had been whipping Mitch’s bare face for hundreds of miles. “Where the #*$*@ were his goggles?!?!?!” you might ask. Welllllll, despite how crazy it sounds (especially going into a 40 mph headwind) racing without goggles is not uncommon. Eyewear easily fogs up from the musher’s warm breath. Sooo obviously, several mushers had some serious windburn and one other musher’s eyes were “frost nipped.”
While the frostbite on humans sounds bad, the dogs suffered perhaps the worst maladies of all…well, more specifically, the male dogs suffered the worst maladies. Something I had never considered was the dogs getting frostbitten...well...they do....and it ain't pretty. Parts of the male anatomy of a dog are pretty vulnerable. These dogs are then racing hundreds of miles where these “parts” are exposed to ice, frozen tundra and 40 mph winds. I’ll let your imagination do the rest... Lets just say that we had several male “drop dogs” that were none too happy.
Perhaps the coolest part of the entire weekend came at 5am Sunday morning…We knew that three mushers, Mackey, Buser, and Baker had all left the previous checkpoint within minutes of each other. However, over 50 miles a couple minute spread can easily turn into a 45 minute s
pread between mushers. This morning however, as we stood on the river bank, squinting into the piercing wind (tears were literally freezing at the corners of my eyes) we could just make out 3 headlamps off in the distance. Moments later the three teams (looking about as beat up as you can imagine) arrived within seconds of each other. Mackey’s team (winner of last three Iditarods, ESPY nominee) came sprinting up the river bank in second. I quickly checked him in, noting his time and having him sign the log. For the sake of a speedy turnaround Mackey asked me to hop on his sled as he grabbed the lead dogs and we maneuvered the sled around the checkpoint back to the river bank. I think that single moment of sheer glory, actually standing on a legendary musher's sled is about as close as I’ll ever get to racing in the Iditarod. You gotta start somewhere!Just like the marathon, every musher (and checker in this case) tells themselves that they will “most certainly NEVER put themselves through this misery again.” And yet, at the banquet, the mushers, though tired, were once again in good spirits…many of them even declaring their candidacy for next year’s K300 title. They were in such good spirits that the Veterinarian, Radio guy from Anchorage, our Race Marshall and a few mushers had no problem dishing out some good natured trash talk about the “Three Stooges at the Kalskag checkpoint” during their few moments on stage to accept their awards. We eventually got enough recognition that the MC decided it was necessary to introduce us to the semi-confused crowd.
The winner, John Baker, ended up finishing the race in just about 50 hours. That’s right, 50 hours on a sled in -50 degree weather and maybe 6 hours of sleep over the 3 days. May I also point out that for the first half of the race he was going INTO 30+mph winds.
The K300 was an absolutely amazing experience but I have come to a somewhat devastating realization…
I NEVER want to be a dog musher!
