My First Race: Jr. Iditarod 2007

         Everyone said that it was 20 below at the start of the Jr. Iditarod, but I sure didn’t feel it. Of course, I was wearing a Refridgewear suit with layers and layers of fleece, so I was perfectly warm. My dogs are freight dogs, so they weren’t cold either under their thick coats.
         Beth, my mentor, and I got my pre-loaded sled off of the box and started laying out my gangline. I set my leader hook and triple checked to make sure that I wasn’t missing a neckline or a tug.

         I pretty much hung out after that. I happily accepted a free hot chocolate from the local 4-H group and greedily chowed down on a piece of cheesecake donated by the Alaska Cheesecake Company (a very, very popular sponsor).

         I tried to hide whenever I saw the camera people coming through, but some people from Dogsled.com ambushed me while I was saying ‘hi’ to Dusty. I cooperated in the interview, but when they realized that they made me nervous by shoving a huge camera in my face, they shut it off, joked a bit with me about the microphone (it had a dead squirrel-like thing covering it), and left.

         When the people next to us started to get ready, we started harnessing and hooking up the dogs. Ginger and Marty were in wheel with Dusty in team, Norman and Bert in team, Annie and Tigger in swing, and Baxter and Neptune in lead. My friend Forrest ran back and rode on the sled with me while everyone else walked the dogs up to the chute.

         The chute is the worst idea in the history of mushing. It felt like a thousand years while I listened to the man read my bio out loud. I stood on the sled nervously while the sled holders did a commentary,
         “You’ve been mushing for a long time.”
         “Talkeetna? I like it there.”
         “That’s a great goal.”
         It finished when it got to 10 seconds.
         “With a bio like that, you’re bound to win,” Forrest said as he slapped my shoulder. “You should win that scholarship for me. How much was it again?”
         If I hadn’t have been terrified, I would have jokingly punched him.
         “3… 2… 1… Go!”

         We were off! I tried to keep the guys slow, but they didn’t want to slow down. They settled into a trot after we passed a red building, and it felt as if everything had washed away. I was out on the trail just doing my thing now.

         We immediately dropped into last place right before Burma Road. I didn’t mind- that was where I wanted to be.

         I was amazed at how much junk was out there. I perfected the art of leaning down (while still standing on the drag might I add), keeping one hand on the handlebar, and catching a bootie or someone’s trash with the other. I picked up a lot of booties in perfect condition, and almost scored a break bungee, but my arm was too short.

         I don’t know exactly where we got off of the trail, but we did somewhere. I took our mid-day 1 ½ hour break there, and watered the guys. We went along, and then came to a trail that was a drop onto a river. I remembered someone saying that the drop onto the river was the best in years, so I was surprised to see a dirt covered, vertical drop one with a tree in the middle. On the sharp curve, I couldn’t get my borrowed sled to turn, and rolled it. I got that really bad sinking feeling when the handlebar was ripped out of my hands, and watched in horror as they went down the hill.
         “BAXTER, WHOA!!!” I screamed without thinking.
         Months of countless hours of frustration, headaches, and swearing paid off when the entire team stopped and looked back at me. I got up, fell down, and ran to the sled. I stood on the runners, and stared at the dogs. They had never stopped perfectly for me like that before (and never did again either).

         As we were going down the river, I thought that it sure didn’t look like the Big Su I was use to. When I saw a snow machiner, it dawned on me that I hadn’t seen a trail marker for about 2 hours or so.
         The snow machine stopped and shut off his engine.
         “Are you Jr. Iditarod?”
         “Yeah!” I said before stopping the dogs.
         “How did you get here?”
         I looked at him for a minute.
         “I… I don’t really know.”
         “Well, you’re on Fish Creek. Let me get you back on the trail.”
         We followed his snow machine until we got to a place where he helped get my dogs on the right trail. I thanked him and waved as we went down the trail.

         As the trail went on, I finally recognized the trail. We were on the lake and headed to the Dismal Swamp. We took a short break on the lake, and the trail sweepers stopped and watched me take care of the dogs. We talked a little bit (I was too shy to talk very much though), and then headed on.

         As we were going across the lake, I heard an airplane. The next thing I knew, there was an airplane landing right next to me. To my surprise, Dad popped out.
         “Dad, what are you doing here!?!”
         He waved and the pilot jumped out to take pictures. I groaned and kept going. I was probably breaking a few rules there.

         When we got onto the Dismal Swamp, it was pretty, well, dismal. A horde of crazies on snow machines zoomed past me at 90 mph, and then two bikers from the Ultrasport came up behind us and passed us. Poor Marty had never seen a biker on the trail before- he growled and did his “I don’t know what you are, but I don’t like you” bark. He looked back at me, and when they were out of sight he kept going. It really is a terrible feeling inside when a team of 9 sled dogs is passed by two guys pedaling furiously on their bikes.

         After the Dismal Swamp, we dropped onto the Big Su. A little tent was stationed next to the trail. They got my time, and then went back inside. I started pushing the sled up the bank.

         On the trail headed to Eaglesong, everything started to go downhill. My dogs started to get tired and cranky. Neptune, without warning, layed down and refused to get up. I walked him back to the sled and put him on it.
         Going to Eaglesong was not very fun. The sun started to dip, so I grabbed my main headlamp only to realize that the wire had broken in half at some point in my sled. I had to use my little back-up one instead.
         After going around the millionth curve and “Steep Grade” sign hills, I saw a paper plate that said “Eaglesong” with an arrow pointed down the trail. I got excited- we were almost there!
         The minutes passed. The sun was now completely down. I was nowhere near Eaglesong, yet I saw two more “Eaglesong Ahead!” signs. I started to get bitter and grumble.

         Finally, after what felt like an hour, I saw a sign that said “Eaglesong- 1 mile”. I happily mushed out of the swamp and was greeted by a strong wind on the river. The wind was excruciatingly cold, and came right at us. My leader Bax, who is an experienced Iditarod leader himself, saw the checkpoint and dragged the team up the steep hill and right up to the cabin. We checked in, and then I looked at the dogs. They were still looking good, but they were tired. I was 3 hours behind the leaders, and the cutoff for mushers to still continue is 4. I decided to scratch rather than push my dogs into the halfway at Yetna Station.

         The wonderful people at Trail Lake Lodge turned out to be good friends of my dad. They gave me water and hay for the dogs, and then fed me an excellent spaghetti dinner. I filled them in on what was going on with my family, and then they gave me a pep talk and told me that I was going to run it again next year. After we finished, they let me sleep inside the bunkhouse with the vets.
         The next morning, they fed me and gave me two choices. My dogs were looking great and ready to run, so I could run them into Willow and meet my dad, or I could fly them into Willow. I decided to drop Neptune and mush into Willow.

         The run out was great. I left around 6 AM, and was lucky to have a nice trail. The dogs did great going out.

         Instead of going back to Knik, we went up the Big Susitna River to Willow.
         The Big Su was cold. Very cold. My eyes started to burn, so I put on my goggles and pulled my baklava up to the bottom of them. Unluckily for me, my goggles started slipping down, and I couldn’t breathe through my nose. I didn’t dare take them off, so I breathed through my mouth and ended up creating a lovely wet mess that promptly froze to my face. My hands began to go numb inside my marten fur mittens, so I would alternate my hands and slap them on my legs. I ended up running beside the sled.

         Around 10 AM or so it started to warm up. I peeled off my frozen baklava and was very glad to only lose part of my chin with it. I put on a different scarf and left the goggles off. I snacked the dogs, and started to go again.

         I decided to stop the team again to check on my leader.
         “Whoa guys.”
         I stepped on the brake, and my foot ended up on the drag. I pulled my eyebrows together in confusion and looked down. When I stepped on it, all but one little prong of my brake had fallen off. I swore softly, grabbed the snowhook, and slammed it into the ground to stop the dogs. I looked back and saw my brake a few feet behind.
         “Ya know Bax,” I said to my leader, “this just isn’t cool.”
         He yawned.
         “Yep boy. I lost my brake. Do you know how essential a brake is when you’re running a team of the craziest freight dogs in the universe?”
         He looked back at me. His deep brown eyes gazed arrogantly into mine as if to say, “What did you do now, Pathetic Human?”

         I pulled up the hook and decided to keep going. The trail became a blur of white, blue, and the black of trees. It was flat and boring.

         Around noon, I saw a snow machiner way up ahead. As they came into view, I realized that it was my dad. I stopped the team, and he stopped and came over. We talked a bit about the race, and then he took some of my mandatory gear to lighten my load and told me that I was only about an hour or so from the finish (since I scratched, my sled wouldn’t be checked at the finish, so I didn’t need my mandatory anymore).

         The trail turned into the woods. It had names on signs that were unfamiliar to me, but I knew that I was nearing Willow. I became excited, and my dogs picked up on it. I began to sing, and every tail began to slightly wag while every tug immediately lost any slack that was there.

         We came onto a road, and I saw the snow machiner that helped me get onto the trail the day before. My leader Annie balked, and tried to run down the wrong street. He grabbed their neckline and helped them across.
         “I haven’t done that for you since Fish Creek!” he said good naturedly. “I’m really glad to see you finish.”
         I grinned and thanked him as we went across. Then we went down onto the lake.

         The finish was across the lake, but we were going around the perimeter of it.
         “We’re going home boys!” I shouted to my dogs. “We’re going home!”
         As we neared the finish, I could hear the people cheering. I was shocked- so many people had come to cheer ME on? An unknown from Talkeetna who had very few connections in the mushing world?
         In the moment of disbelief, I forgot about Annie. The sight of so many people scared her, and she tried to run away from them. The swing dogs followed her lead
         “Annie! Annie! It’s ok girl!” I said. “It’s ok!”
         Beth, who is Annie’s previous owner, came running through. I heard her saying, “I know her,” to someone who questioned her.
         Baxter put down his head and dragged Annie and the rest of the team to Beth. She ran beside us, and got my team across and finish line and to the truck. 

         When we stopped, I had a crowd of people flock to me. There was a fellow junior musher congratulating me. Someone I didn’t know saying “I have a list of Iditarod and Quest finishers who want to help mentor you for next year!” My mom and god mother saying, “Everyone here is talking about how wonderfully you took care of your dogs.” Two people I didn’t know saying to one another, “She came in on her own dog power! Can you believe it?”

         I jumped off and tried to hug the dogs. Annie was traumatized from all of the people, so I tried to calm her down as best I could. I went down the line hugging everyone and received a few sloppy kisses for it. We pulled the dogs up to the dog box, and I checked everyone’s feet (I don’t trust that job to anyone but myself), and had my handlers help me take off their harnesses and start watering them.
         Baxter decided to lie down and soak up some rays when Beth noticed something.
“Kristen, Baxter frostbit his penis sheath.”
         I ran over and looked him over while she went to find a race vet. I swore and checked him out. She came back with someone else that I guess was a race official. They didn’t seem too worried, but I was panicked.
         “Hey, it’s ok,” my mentor said, “even professional mushers get frostbit penises occasionally.”
         “Do you have any Desitin? I couldn’t find a vet, but a Quest musher recommended it.”
         I had some in my medicine bag, and started putting it in my arm pit to thaw it out enough to get it out. I somehow ended up with about eight or nine people watching me. When I put some on my fingers and put it on Baxter, I looked at his face. As I put it on, his face started to go from curiosity to absolute canine pleasure. I started to grin, and then giggle as he began groaning happily. Everyone watching began to smirk or chuckle quietly.
         After I finished, I put a belly band on him and then grabbed his head.
         “Bax,” I said as I held his face, “you better not begin to expect this after you’re all healed up ‘cause I ain’t doing it for your pleasure.”

         I washed my hands off the best I could in the snow, and then headed up to the Community Center. I took a nice hot shower, and finished a cheeseburger and chips in less than five minutes. When I finished, my dad drove to the airport to pick up Neptune, and I went down to the lake to hang out with the dogs. I ended up taking a nap in the trunk with Bert.

         After the banquet, I happily went home. I hadn’t officially finished, but I felt happy and accomplished. When I got home, I had Baxter stay inside for the next week and doctored him four times a day for the next five days or so. His swelling went down, and he healed up nicely.
         The other dogs were ancy and ready to run after a day of rest. I complied.