Friday, March 20, 1998
Copyright 1998 Anchorage Daily News
Top rookie nabs 20th
By DOUG O'HARRA
Daily News reporter
NOME - A chilly rain deepened the predawn dark as North Pole veterinarian Mark May followed his 10-dog team under the burled arch here early Thursday to seize the last paying position in the 26th annual Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race.
Still, the musher was happy. Over the last 20 miles in from Safety, he'd been one of the fastest racers, making the run in under three hours.
"I was in a hurry," he said, smiling in the cold, wet mist at the finish line as the flags above the arch flapped in the wind.
Behind him was a lot of rough, coastal trail.
"Glare ice, naked tundra, boulder fields and occasional stretches of good snow," he said. "The standard joke with us was: 'Which color (plastic) runners does better on tundra and rock?"'
For finishing 20th in 10 days, 10 hours, 44 minutes and 40 seconds - a time fast enough to have won any race prior to 1995 - May earned $8,078 and the "Rookie of the Year" award, though he is one of the more experienced rookies in Iditarod history.
The son of former Iditarod champ Joe May, Mark has been running and training dogs since his family moved north from Wisconsin in 1974.
When his father won the '80 race in then-record time, it was behind a team the May boys -Mark and his brother Paul - trained so well it went through the year undefeated. By then, sled dogs were in Mark's blood.
After becoming a veterinarian in 1989, he started doing his own sled-dog research, once taking a team from Knik to Nome along the Iditarod Trail to conduct blood tests. His first long-distance race was the Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race from Fairbanks to Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, in 1994.
A team trained by Mark and his wife, Liz, finished 19th. They improved to fourth in both 1996 and 1997, though the latter was a difficult year. The Quest trail ran right past the trail to the Mays' North Pole kennels, said handler Christ Talbott. After almost 1,000 miles, the dogs wanted to go home instead of on to Fairbanks.
That was not a problem this year on the trip to Nome, however, not even for a dog named Danger that ran the 1998 Quest in the team of Brian O'Donoghue of Fairbanks. That dog raced at least 2,100 miles over the past four or five weeks.
"There can't be more than 10 dogs that have ever done that," Talbott said.
"This is the 'Iron Man,' " May said, petting Danger. "He's not the fastest, but he's the best."
Speedwise, Danger and his mates on the towline did OK, though. Starting back in 43rd place, they steadily worked their way up through the Iditarod's 63-team field.
"My plan was to get into the race slow, get the team settled in, and then start picking people off," May said. His trail times were fast, often up there with winner Jeff King and runner-up DeeDee Jonrowe, but he rested his team more on a schedule of run five hours, rest three, run five and rest eight.
"I was a half a day behind (the leaders)," May said, "but I'd do the same speed."
His tough stretch came on the Farewell Burn early on. He broke a runner and had to make much of the 90-mile crossing balanced on one good runner.
Battered by that, he took his 24-hour layover in Nikolai, several checkpoints behind the front-runners. Then he started passing people and never looked back.
By the finish line, he was having second thoughts about sticking to his rest schedule in Shaktoolik instead of taking a chance and giving chase to veterans Joe Garnie, Bill Cotter, Tim Osmar and Ramy Brooks.
"I still had gas in the tank," May said.
Maybe next year, if there is a next year. May said he didn't know if he'd be back. He had to consult with the family, he said, but he was sure of one thing: "I have one of the best dog teams in the race."