A Rookies Journey
November 13, 2005

This has been another week of firsts. That must mean training is going well, or at least we are making steady progress. For starters, Lexi Hill has rejoined the team. Lexi has been my coach and mentor for the last two years, not to mention running my second team (it is so nice not to have to run two teams myself each time we go out). This year Lexi’s work commitments have limited her involvement and Bonnie Foster has stepped up to the plate and really helped. Our new schedule, as of last week, is that Bonnie will run with me on Tuesday and Lexi will help me take the dogs camping on Friday night / Saturday morning. On Monday I will either run one big team, or run ½ the dogs on Monday and the second ½ on Wednesday.

Of course the first week of the new schedule proved the exception. Lexi works at the University of Alaska and there was a visiting professor and daughter from Australia that wanted a ride. It was far colder that either Australian had seen before, when we got to the track it was about 5 degrees F. Bonnie loaned us her 4-wheeler so we could run two teams, but we couldn’t get it started. It turned out to be just a fouled plug from running in compression with the dogs pulling it, but it was Tuesday before we figured that out. For the guest ride we used both machines on the two mile trail and tried to have the dogs pull start Bonnie’s machine without luck, so Lexi rode shotgun and we had all the dogs in one team for the rest (18 miles) of the run. The good news is that everyone is healthy, but that means we ran a 20 dog team on my 4-wheeler! Lexi said something about insanity, but I assured her none of my dogs had that problem. ?

Ft Richardson was closed to dog teams on Monday so we ran the Beach Lake trails. It’s been cold enough that even the swamps are frozen over, so the whole trail system is open, if very rough and rutted in places. The first thing you notice is how long a 20 dog team is. It is 8 feet per pair of dogs. That means the leaders were 80 feet in front of me. The second thing you notice is the incredible power of a 20 dog string. Just as we started the run, with the dogs screaming to go, we passed an intersecting trail and Tom Knolmayer running a team of about 10 dogs came out of the turn right in front of us. His leaders turned towards us instead of away and my leaders crossed under his lines behind his leaders. I managed to stop my team before more dogs “crossed the T”, and Lexi jumped off and she and Tom straightened the mess out in record time. It sure was nice to have a second person to handle that while I rode the brakes. I’ve got a parking brake, but a 20 dog string can pull the machine with the brakes locked. This is one of those things that is pretty simple with a 10 dogs string, but can be a real problem with 20 dogs.

When I said the trail was rough, parts of it were like running over a series of volleyballs. I was fairly well shaken (not stirred) but poor Lexi sitting on the rack on the back didn’t have a nice padded seat to land on. There was on place where we hit just right and I started to fall off the machine to the left when Lexi grabbed me – she was falling to the right and we countered each other perfectly. But it’s not all bad news. Trails like this check to see if your insides are still firmly attached (anything loose will be shaken off!). We had two more passes, one with a smaller team and the second with Jim Lanier’s large Iditarod team. Both went well and over all I was pleased with the performance. I had Bass and 7 of 9 in lead because I wanted my two most experienced leaders for this run. It’s really interesting. Running a large string like this it is real nice to have a second person while you get the “wiggles” out of the dogs. After a few miles they settle down into work mode and you could run 30 dogs without a problem, but before then it can be real interesting. That is the reason for the tag sled at the Iditarod start (remember that used to be a 20 dog race).

On Tuesday Bonnie couldn’t join me and Ft Richardson was still closed to recreational use. I really didn’t want to run two teams and didn’t want to run the Beach Lake trail system with a 20 dog string by myself – so it was back to the Lake Eklutna trail. I ran 20 dogs, by myself, on the old road along side the lake. This is a real first for me. Stepping up from 18 dogs to 20 may not sound like much of a change, but psychologically it is a BIG difference. I had Bass and 7 of 9 in lead, but Bass must have sensed my nervousness because he would not hold the line out. I finally replaced them with Lycos and Keiko. As I hooked up the last couple of dogs the snub line was so tight you could play a tune on it. I put chains on the 4-wheeler to have more control (we have about 1 inch of snow), and when I released the snub line the dog pulled the 4-wheeler with me on it and the brakes locked about 10 feet before I convinced them to stop. Right after the start there is a 90 degree turn to the right around a big tree. I tried to keep the dogs off the tree but Dijon, 2 back from swing, was drug into the tree. Luckily his neckline snapped (as it should) and he wasn’t injured. I stopped the team around the turn and he didn’t even seem to be very shaken.
With the cold weather we’ve had we are getting some glaciation (water running over the ground and freezing in place. It looks like a small glacier, but doesn’t move). Sure enough about 100 yards into the run we crossed three glaciated areas sloping down to the lake. The dogs went across like they had been doing it all their lives. I was so proud of them!

The rest of the run went without a hitch. The Eklutna trail has several reasonable hills and the 20 dog string pulled right up them (of course 20 of Jeff King’s dogs could have probably pulled my truck up those hills). At the 12 mile point the trail narrows and ends ½ mile later so we did a “come haw” (where the leaders bring the string around the sled / 4-wheeler and go back the way you came). The key here is for each dog to wait and follow the dog in front of him and not get distracted by the leaders coming past. And, of course, the leaders shouldn’t get distracted and stop to visit all their friends. I put Bass back in lead with Keiko for this exercise – with a 10 dog string it isn’t much to ask, but with 20 dogs the potential for tangles and dogs weaving back and forth as they pass their buddies is substantial. Bass, Keiko and the team pulled it off without a hitch – another gold star! After the turn, 12 miles into the run the dogs were still banging in their harness and talking to the trail wanting to run. We finished the 24 miles in 3:10 – not impressive in general, but it is the fastest run of the year so far. I worried that all this slow hard work would train the dogs to run a 7 mph, but as soon as they were able (had more dogs to help) they sped up and cruised at 9 mph.

Friday night / Saturday morning was our first camping trip of the year. We only have 1 inch of snow on the ground, not nearly enough to melt for water for us and the dogs. Camping like this I figured we would go through about 15 gallons of water. Rather than try to haul that plus straw, food, sleeping bags, etc on the 4-wheelers we decided to camp out of the car at the staging area. Another advantage is that if something didn’t work we are only a 15 minute drive from home. The dogs need to learn to rest before they are completely tired, to sleep in odd places away from their dog houses, and I need to learn to shut the mind down and fall asleep quickly in odd places myself.

We got to the trails at about 7:30 pm (after Lexi got off work). We had everyone harnessed, hooked up, and pulled the hook at 8:50. Lexi and I each took out a team and we ran 24 miles in 4 hours (see the difference the number of dogs can make) on the rough trails at Beach Lake. That means we got back to the trucks just before 1am. Then we fed the dogs and ourselves, put down straw for the dogs and rolled out the sleeping bags. About 2 am we turned in for our nap. At 5am we were up to clean up camp, water the dogs, eat breakfast, re-hook the tug lines and leave the area for our second run at 6am. This is the procedure that we will follow on all of the races this year, particularly Iditarod. As they say practice makes perfect (or in my case at least better) and that is the whole point. By the way, it was about 5 degrees when we went to sleep and warmed up to 10 degrees when we got up. We finished the second run at 11 am (they slowed down to 5 hours), fed the dogs, loaded everything in the truck / dog box and went home. By 1 pm I was done unloading everything, had the dogs watered and was ready for a break. The dogs were tired, curled up in their boxes and slept like logs. I was worried the run had been too hard on them, but by 9 pm they were all running around complaining that dinner was late. That is another classic rookie mistake – underestimating these incredible animals.


Keep ‘em Northbound
Eric
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