YQ300: Wrap Up

Going into this race, my goal was to not only finish but do so with a happy team. Right now, I am sitting in the house at the kennel, listening to the dog yard go crazy. Sometimes that’s a sign that a dog is loose or a strange car has pulled up the driveway. Today, it’s because Peach and Junior are tackling each other; Gold and Sanka are boxing, and Cloud and Gravy are taking turns jumping on top of each other. On top of it all, Mismo and Bronze are barking and letting everyone know they want to play too. After 300 miles, that’s a happy sight to see. To me, that means we had a successful race. All 13 of us are ready to hit the trails again.

I’ll be candid. This race had some tough moments, both physically and mentally, for both me and the dogs. While I had never done a race this large, neither had Peach, Cloud, Bronze, and Gold. Of course, we had some experience on the team. Junior, Mismo, Kodiak, Iron, and Champ have all completed 1,000-mile races in their careers. A few of them even won the YQ1000 the last time it ran this direction! Unfortunately, I didn’t have Champ for long in this race due to some personal issues of his. I tried so hard to combat these issues, but I could only do so much at -40F in Two Rivers. I knew it was cold, but I didn’t know just how cold. The first thing I did once the team was parked was find a vet. I filled her in on his history and what I had been doing for him. We discussed that dropping him would be the best thing for him. I knew I was going to miss him as we climbed Rosebud on the next run, but he needed to stop. Thus ended Champ’s journey with me.

Leaving Two Rivers, I had Junior and Mismo in lead, Sanka and Kodiak in swing, Peach and Cloud, Iron and Faff, Bronze, and Gold and Cayenne in wheel. Allen had warned me about the difficulty of the trail leaving Two Rivers. I was lucky enough to traverse it in daylight. Things were going smoothly up until a creek crossing, and that was the start of the trouble. The creek was open. Mismo and Junior hit the brakes, my front end bunched up, and then Mismo tried desperately to avoid the water by going straight down the creek where it was still frozen. I hooked down and walked up to assess the situation. The creek was only about 3ft wide. 2ft deep in one area and 3in deep in another. We could make it through the 3 inches. I pulled Junior and Mismo to the edge of the water and told them to stay. They watched me walk back to the sled. I pulled the snowhook and said “Ready??” Mismo jumped into action, pushed Junior to the 2ft deep side and made a leap that only big, tall Mismo with his long legs could make. He lands on the other side; dry. If dogs could talk, I’m sure Junior would have expressed some verbal opinions about her running mate. The rest of the team followed Mismo’s example, except Bronze who overthought the whole thing and landed right in the middle of the creek. On the other side, we didn’t have a chance to catch our breath. The trail immediately started snaking downhill in tight S-curves that sucked your sled into the trees and threatened to throw you sideways if you weren’t paying attention. Allen’s advice for me on this trail? “Hold your snowhook in your hand. That way, when you get bucked off, you still have a hold of something.” I am very proud to say I kept both feet on the runners and the sled upright all the way down. I was even able to stop and pick up someone else’s axe that was in the middle of the trail. I probably wouldn’t be able to catch them before they reached Mile 101, but at least I could prevent them from getting any more penalties further down the trail. After the twists and turns, I stopped the team in a flat, open area to check how wet everyone’s booties were and clean the ice off Junior and Bronze. I knew Luther Buhr was not far behind me because he had caught up to us at the creek, so I wanted to be sure he had room to pass. He shared some opinions about the difficult trail as he went by, so maybe he didn’t have as good a time navigating it as we did. We didn’t see him again until Rosebud.

The advice I got for Rosebud was “Don’t ever stop. Run up that hill. If you stop, the dogs will turn around.” So I stopped a little ways from the base, gave the dogs all a hearty beef snack and sucked down an energy Gu myself. As we climbed, I could see two teams camped out about halfway up the hill. My team was doing really well until we caught them. As we tried to pass Olivia and Luther, Peach and Faff didn’t understand why we weren’t stopping too. They kept turning around, creating more work for the others. Once we got passed Olivia and Luther, they started to follow us. That’s when it got really steep.

I was off my runners, pushing and running. I had left a lot of stuff behind in Two Rivers to make my sled lighter, but it still had some weight to it. My arms and lungs were burning. To add insult to injury, every time I slacked, the 2-year-olds would stop and look back at me. I kept saying “Alright! Let’s go! We’re almost there!” to encourage myself and the dogs. Except we weren’t almost there. What I thought was the top was actually just a short plateau before the trail turned 90 degrees and got even steeper. Now, between the YQ1000 mushers and the other YQ300 mushers ahead of us, the hillside was pretty torn up. I was trying to run and push, but my feet kept slipping. Every time I slipped, my team stopped to look. Mismo, bless his heart, tried to find harder trail off to the right. To help him stay on course, I asked Luther to pass me. Olivia followed him. And my team stopped. Soon, Luther and Olivia were out of sight, and my team was looking at me, telling me to get off the brakes.

My arms couldn’t push anymore, and the dogs thought I was stopping intentionally. I set my hook to catch my breath. When I say “set my hook,” I don’t mean like you would normally set a hook to prevent your team from running off without you. I threw my hook ahead of the sled like a grapple hook then climbed up to push it into the snow backwards to prevent the sled from sliding back downhill. I climbed to the front of the team with my smaller hook and set it as if I was tying them out to camp. And then I went down the line and spent a solid minute with every dog: thanking them for pulling as far as they did, telling them I loved them, and cuddling them. As I moved my way towards the wheel dogs, I moved Peach back to just above wheel. She was the most eager to turn around, so I wanted more dogs in front of her, pulling her forward. I also switched Gold and Iron because Iron was more willing to pull the weight of the sled, no matter how hard it was. When I reached the sled, I released the snowhook, trusting my small hook at the front of the team to hold us in place. I turned around and climbed back up to Mismo and Junior, grabbed the small hook and started pulling. Slowly, we started up the hill. Eventually, I couldn’t hike fast enough to keep in front of the dogs. Suddenly, little Cloud, who was positioned behind the swing dogs, PASSED ME. Head down, leaning into her harness, and not even glancing at me.

That was my first glance into what Cloud could do. This was her first race ever, and even at mile 250 she was grinding forward and banging in her harness to keep moving. We came upon 3ft deep overflow just 6 miles from the finish, and everyone hit the brakes except Cloud. She walked right up to the edge like “Come on, guys. It’s not that bad.” I’m not sure she realized that, as the smallest dog on the team, she would literally be in over her head. If I had a Golden Harness to award, it would go to Cloud.

Once we were over Rosebud, we came down into 101 and were looking at climbing Eagle Summit after a short rest. I was not looking forward to it. I was even less excited once the sun went down. Allen had also coached me on how to go down the steep side of Eagle Summit slowly and in control. This involved using all four brakes: bar brake, drag mat, chains and snowhook. I was not looking forward to doing so in the dark. Regardless, I tried to keep in high spirits for the dogs. Maybe it worked? We approached the mountain, and I got ready to push and run again. But I didn’t need to. The dogs were so eager for the climb that I hardly had to pedal. They even pulled me up for a bit while I stood on the runners! We reached the top in no time, and I rewarded them with fat snacks at the top. I wish I had video from the top to show the steepness of our descent, but I was so nervous about maintaining control I didn’t need to add “keeping ahold of a camera” to my list of problems. Fortunately for us, several teams had been down before us, so the mountain side was pretty scraped up. I didn’t even need to use the snowhook trick. We reached the bottom and then stopped to watch Luther Buhr come down, in case he had issues.

I intentionally kept the team slow and let Luther pass us. I was concerned about possible shoulder injuries that may have occurred during our descent through the soft snow and wanted to keep a close eye on every single dog. I knew there was a mandatory vet check in Central, and I wanted to take mental notes of anything I wanted them to pay special attention to. Before the race, Aliy referred to me as a “helicopter mom,” and she was right. I worried for nothing. Once we reached Central, the vets did a very thorough exam of each dog. I really owe those two vets (Greta and Kimberly) a huge thank you because they really put my mind at ease. They noted some weight loss on a few dogs but only had positive notes on everything else. Greta even told me it was the best looking dog team she had examined in Central! After a positive vet check and little sleep, we were off to tackle Birch Creek.

Birch Creek has a reputation. 82 miles of the same twists and turns. It’s boring, redundant and often cold. Our plan was to run about halfway and camp for two hours then continue. We did just that. Everyone ate a meal, myself included (a bigger deal than you might think because my nerves had prevented me from keeping anything down for about 24hrs). We were lucky with the temperature, which hovered around 0 degrees. After two hours, I put fresh booties on everyone, and we pulled out of our camp spot and back onto the main trail. Right away I noticed Cayenne stepping oddly with her front right leg. I stopped to check her out, manipulated her leg to see if it hurt. She didn’t protest, but she also wouldn’t put it down. Nervous that she was just stonewalling, I decided to bag her. As I was settling her into the sled bag, she kicked her legs out and stood on my tracker. For anyone who doesn’t know, the spot trackers have two emergency buttons that send out SOS signals. One is for non-emergent situations, and the other goes directly to Search and Rescue for life-threatening situations. Activating either one disqualifies you from the race. You have to press and hold either button to activate it, so it’s not like you can accidentally bump it and get disqualified. However, a 40lb dog standing on your tracker could probably set it off. I spent a long time wondering if there would have been a beep or a flash or some other indicator that it had been set off or if a SAR helicopter was suddenly going to appear out of nowhere.

We continued on. The sun set. We continued. We were passed head-on by Dave Turner and Jeremy Traska as they raced back down Birch Creek to the finish. We continued. Cayenne slept. We passed Jacob Witkop heading to the finish. All of this reminding me that we would layover in Circle and just head right back out onto this stupid creek again. I am unashamed to say this was my lowest point on the race. Unashamed because I heard everyone else, including the front runners of the 1000-mile race, were also in bad spirits coming into Circle. We passed beneath a trestle bridge that I knew was not far from Circle by road, and it really messed with my head. I kept thinking we’d get off the creek at the next bend, and the next bend, and the next bend. At one point I thought, “Well, if Cayenne did hit my button, we can get in the truck in Circle. We don’t have to do this creek again. We’ll be done!” Then Madeline Rubida came from the other direction and shouted “You’re getting there!” I got out my ski poles. I owe a huge thank you to her, as well. An hour later, we turned a bend and saw the trail markers indicating a turn off the creek!

We climbed off the bank and climbed and climbed. The trail kept going up and up. I even said out loud to the dogs “We have to go down at some point, right?” Turns out, you don’t. Eventually, I could see light pollution ahead of us. There isn’t much light pollution in Alaska, let alone that far outside Fairbanks. Typically, I would be annoyed at light pollution. It makes the stars and aurora hard to see. Not in that moment. Then Sean Underwood came from the other direction and shouted that I was almost there! “You hear that, guys! Come on, let’s go!” We pulled into Circle in good spirits.

Circle was the first checkpoint where Aliy didn’t greet me. She had to leave after I left Central to make it to Dawson before Allen got in. So it was up to Ryan and my dad to be my main handlers. From what I’ve heard after the race, they took it very seriously. They even helped another team clean up after their musher so there was a spot for me to park!

Cayenne was my first concern after we parked. A vet came over and checked her out. Again, she didn’t protest. I told the vet, Andrew, that I would walk her around after she ate and slept and only take her if I thought she could make it. In fact, when I walked her around a few hours later, she was running around and pulling to go see the other teams and generally acting like her normal super sassy self. She ate really well (not a trait that Cayenne is known for), which told me she was ready to go. My best guess is that she was tired and possibly slept weird on her leg when we were camped. The extra rest she got in the sled bag seemed to be exactly what she needed. She pulled hard all the way back down Birch Creek!

Leaving Circle, Faff was limping. I had been wrapping her left wrist the entire race as a precaution after she was dropped in Copper Basin with Ryno Kennel for soreness. Despite my efforts, her limp was pretty bad. I thought there was a possibility she would stretch out of it, but was debating with myself as we headed back down the trail. Maybe Mismo sensed my uncertainty. Instead of taking the left turn that would have put us on the trail, he took a right turn into someone’s driveway that looped back around to the road. I took that as a sign. We headed back to the checkpoint to drop Faff. I owe another thank you to Greta and Kimberly, the vets from Central, who were also in Circle and assessed Faff and helped me make the decision to drop her. Also, a huge thank you to the four checkpoint volunteers that helped turn my team around on a dime so we could leave without disturbing other teams.

The second time down Birch Creek was rough. I could hardly keep my eyes open and was startled awake several times by bumps in the trail. It wasn’t long before I started scoping spots to camp for an hour, just long enough for us all to get re-energized. We pulled a little ways off the trail onto some leftover straw and we all closed our eyes for a bit. I took a 15 minute power nap and then handed out meat snacks and some dry kibble to power up the team. After taking off, Sanka was favoring her right wrist, so I wrapped it and let her rest in the bag for about an hour. When I put her back on the line, she was good as new. As we neared the end of Birch Creek, I started singing to the dogs. Dogs can feel your emotions, so they’ll be down if you’re down. I didn’t want them to drop in morale as we headed to the finish line. Granted, if they spoke English, they would know my song only sounded upbeat. To the tune of “The Song That Never Ends:” This is the trail that never ends, We’re never getting off this creek, my friends. Everyone seemed to keep good spirits, which made it easy to see when Bronze stopped having fun. She started to really drop back into Cayenne. I made the decision quickly to load her into the bag. She protested at first but settled in as we moved down the trail. I decided to keep her in the bag when it became clear just how tired she was. Bronze is easily startled by many things. Throughout the race, I had to make sure to give her as much straw as I could the first time I bedded her down because throwing extra straw on top would spook her, and she’d jump up and run around in a circle like I’d sat on her. As we bounced down the trail, not even the huge, jarring bumps phased her. When we turned around due to the overflow near the finish, she simply watched from her perch in the bag like “Wow, that sucks for you guys!” I asked the vets at the finish to check her out and they gave her a clean bill of health as she wolfed down meat snack after meat snack! She’s back to herself now and eager to go for another run!

I have been in a weird state since the finish where it feels like no big deal that we finished. Of course we finished. But then I think about the last 20 miles heading up Birch Creek. Where I thought an accidental emergency button was a viable excuse to scratch without scratching. Overcoming that and finishing with 12 healthy dogs really is a big deal. While I’ve been doling out thank you’s throughout this post, the biggest one is still left unsaid. Thank you to the dogs. They did the work. They got us to the finish line. And they did so in good spirits. It’s to them that I owe this race.

Here’s a quick dog-by-dog recap:

Junior: I don’t have much to say about Junior because nothing extraordinary happened with her, which, in and of itself, is extraordinary. She was an “invisible dog.” I never had to worry about her. She never slacked. She didn’t let Mismo push her around. She did her job. And she was a pretty good cuddle buddy in the truck cab back to the kennel after we finished!

Mismo: Mismo was the perfect lead dog for this race. He kept us on the trail (except for that momentary lapse of judgement on Rosebud). Even as we came into 101 and Central, where the trail travelled on the road off and on. I didn’t even need to give him commands. He found the trail. I could always count on him to get the team up and excited too, barking and howling.

Kodiak: Kodiak was another “invisible dog.” I honestly don’t have much to say about him because he was just so consistent and steady and reliable. I would only say this: Tucking all your feet in under you does not prevent me from putting on your booties, buddy. It just prolongs the process.

Sanka: I think Sanka’s strengths in this race were keeping a positive attitude despite how tired she was. There were times where she wasn’t having fun, but she kept going. And she always asked for cuddles any chance she could. Sanka was the first puppy that I ever witnessed being born, four years ago. I was excited to have her on this race for that reason, but I really feel like we bonded over the race. When she was riding in the sled bag, she only kept looking at me, while Cayenne and Bronze both kept their eyes on the team.

Cloud: I have already talked about Cloud a bit. I was really impressed by this dog. She really grew up and matured in this race. No obstacle was too big for her. Sometimes she made everyone else look like they were slacking.

Peach: “Peach is just peachy!” That’s what Greta wrote in my vet book in Central. She, of course, was talking about Peach’s physical state post-vet check. But it could apply to the whole race. Peach is different than the other two in her age class. Where Cloud and Razz are “rough n tough and hard to diaper,” as my Dad would say, Peach is a little more emotional and sensitive. I had no doubts that she could do this race, but Peach did. I could tell when she was tired because she would always look back at me, waiting for the “woah” command to stop. But, to her credit, she kept pulling and working through it.

Iron: Iron was another veteran that I could really rely on. His shining moment was going up Rosebud when he was the most eager to keep pulling. That’s why I moved him back to wheel, hoping he could get the sled moving enough to create slack in the line that would get everyone else moving. He was another motivator that would start barking and getting everyone excited to get moving.

Faff: I really wanted Faff to finish this race, especially after being dropped in Copper Basin. Faff was the cheerleader. She was always the first to start barking, no matter how tired she was. Combined with her size and her willingness to work, we really missed her on the way down Birch Creek. She is hanging out in the SPK dog yard while Ryno Kennel traverses the rest of the Yukon Quest, next to her half-sister Peach and Kodiak. Still barking up a storm and making everyone play with her.

Champ: I don’t have much to say about Champ because I didn’t have him for long on this race. I can tell you that I missed him going over Rosebud and as we worked our way back down Birch Creek. I could have used his eager spirit and motivational howl.

Bronze: I knew this race was going to be tough on Bronze. Much like her brother, she works hard. With no long races on her resume, I knew this would be a physical and mental challenge for her. Up until the point when I carried her, she really gave me her all. I almost think her issue near the finish was partially mental. Much like myself on the way to Circle, I think Bronze had a “We aren’t there yet??” moment. It’s demoralizing. I am most excited to see her excited and jumping around the yard now. We’re more experienced now and ready for another run.

Gold: I really wanted Gold to finish this race. I don’t have favorites. Except I do, and it’s Gold. He is so patient when you are getting the team ready, and then he works so hard. Almost too hard. I knew he would tire himself out on this race, and my goal was to care for him and make sure he rested and ate and re-energized properly before the next run. He was my best eater the entire race, something I can’t say for him while at the kennel. He even ate everyone’s leftovers. He barked as we went up Eagle Summit, cheering everyone on. And he always smiles!

Cayenne: Cayenne really showed me what she was made of on our second trip down Birch Creek. I felt like we were both in a similar place as we reached Circle. And still as we left. Okay, time to get back to work. We had our little cry, time to get this done. She never complained. She just worked.