YQ: Two Rivers – Day One

It’s 11.30pm Saturday evening AK time (it’s only 9.30pm in NZ – but it is Sunday)

Black Team

After a flawless start and efficient ‘disembarkation’ of the two tag sleds, Allen and his team mates continued up the trail towards Two Rivers.

The first 22-odd miles was along the Chena river before jumping onto ‘Baseline’ – the kennel address and our home trails. Luckily, the Quest trail doesn’t go directly past the kennel but Allen did have to negotiate the turn the teams would normally take to go home. When the race starts in Fairbanks this isn’t such an issue as the dogs are fresh, keen and very happy to go past the turn-off. It’s when it goes the other way and the dogs have run 900 miles, climbed all the big hills and could do with a straw bed that it could become as issue.

After passing the kennel the teams turned north up Pleasant Valley Road where they paralleled Chena Hot Springs Road for a time, passing the Pleasant Valley Store and the Two Rivers Outpost then crossing the road at Mile 27. Thanks to the ever vigilant road crossing volunteers (including our Wendy) who kept everyone safe – teams and motorists alike.

Allen stopped the team for a half hour snack/rest break after running for five hours – you can see this on the ‘full history’ section of his tracker.

It was a planned stop to rejuvenate the team before continuing on to the Two Rivers checkpoint. They pulled into the checkpoint at 8:18pm and will stay for “a few hours”. You will quickly find through our coverage that I have no idea how long he plans to stay at checkpoints or camp stops. He will have a Plan-A but that will always change depending on how the dogs and he are doing at the time. If he feels he needs to stay longer he will.

You’ll also notice that throughout the race the mushers will camp on the trail so don’t be alarmed if you see trackers stopped between checkpoints. There are often long distances between checkpoints or hospitality stops and it is not feasible to run point-to-point in this race. Quest mushers and dogs are well used to camping on the trail, regardless of conditions so they will be just fine. There are mandatory stops at certain checkpoints but other than that, mushers can choose when and where to rest their teams.

Once the team leaves Two Rivers they have their first serious hill to climb – Rosebud. Read at this link where I have talked about such the big hill with the innocuous name: “Rosebud Summit is the peak between Two Rivers checkpoint and Mile 101. It takes the teams from the Chena River Valley up and over to the Birch Creek Valley. It has an elevation of 3,640ft and when the race goes from Fairbanks to Whitehorse it is at it’s steepest.” The distance between the two checkpoints is 41 miles by dog sled or 100-odd miles by dog truck.

Temperatures have changed since the teams started in -20F this morning. Aliy said it was -35F at the kennel and I have heard word that it is around -40F at Mile 101. The dogs are well protected and will do great.

Red and Black Team (R&B)

Karolyn and her team stopped for a rest at around 9pm, just after the road crossing at race mile 44. As previously mentioned, Karolyn is running a conservative race schedule so will stop to rest the team often.

After their rest they will continue on to the Two Rivers checkpoint where we expect them to stop to rest again for a few hours before tackling Rosebud. After Two Rivers, the trails are new to Karolyn but Junior, Mismo and Kodiak know them well so will keep the ship steady.

The Quest visual content team are already doing an incredible job capturing these athletes along the trail. Check their Facebook page often to see more.

Refresh, refresh, refresh. How many times is that already? 5,000?