Alaska News

Iron Dog gets underway from snow-sparse Southcentral Alaska

In a cloud of dust -- snow dust, that is -- the Iron Dog, the longest and toughest snowmachine race in the world, stormed out of Big Lake on Sunday morning.

Concerns about the lack of winter in the Southcentral region of the 49th state were left in the swirling snow behind the sleds. The temperature was in the teens, and though the dusting of fresh snow didn't amount to much, it was enough to help cool the snowmachines' engines and lubricate the slides on which their tracks turn.

"Mother Nature has thrown up some obstacles," racer Tyler Aklestad told a reporter from Anchorage television station KTUU at the race start. But after messing up training for everyone, nature appeared to be granting a bit of a reprieve. Fears of overheating engines and friction-cooked tracks diminished with the drop in temperature and the arrival of some snow.

Though former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin showed up at the Iron Dog start to see off her husband Todd -- a four-time champion -- and mingle with the crowd, something she hasn't done in recent years, the overall turnout for the start was unexpectedly low.

Race organizers planned for thousands but instead got hundreds. The reasons why were unknown. Snowmachine riding is the most popular winter sport in Alaska, but it's taken a beating -- literally -- this year.

A big thaw across the region in January froze into trails of ice everywhere. In most places, the ice was rough. The Chugach National Forest closed to snowmachiners in late January due to a lack of snow cover. It took some of the fun out of the snowmachine riding for many, but it doesn't seem to be slowing the Iron Dog down any.

As the last of the 37 two-person teams to start the Iron Dog were coming to the line on Big Lake, the race leaders were roaring along the Yentna River to the north at speeds of 60 to 80 mph and closing on the first checkpoint in Skwentna, 90 miles from the start. The race provides live GPS tracking.

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Racers started at two-minute intervals. The times are adjusted later at rest stops. A variety of those are required on the 1,000-mile run to Nome. They are so complicated -- and riders' options so many as to where to take the rest -- that no one ever really knows who is winning until the race hits the City of Golden Sands.

Racers have a one-day layover and a bit of a party in Nome, then turn their sleds around to race another 1,000 miles back to Fairbanks. They should arrive there next weekend. The winning team is often determined by who -- whether by luck or by skill -- manages to avoid any sort of major mechanical breakdown or bone-crunching crash.

The racers travel in teams of two for safety, a kind of buddy system for high-speed snowmachine racing. Several riders have been seriously injured in past races, but no one has ever died. On at least a couple of occasions, that's been because of the team rule.

Race favorites this year are two-time defending champs Marc McKenna, the 39-year-old co-owner of McKenna Brothers Paving in Anchorage, and Dusty VanMeter, a 44-year-old oilfield worker from the Kenai Peninsula. They haven't always had the fastest machinery in the race, but they have always somehow managed to keep their Ski-Doo machines intact and in play near the front of the race.

They are expected to face stiff competition from Eric Quam from Eagle River, a former Iron Dog champ, and Brian Dick, an engineer and racer for Arctic Cat snowmachines in Thief River Falls, Minn. That pair, on Arctic Cats, were closing fast on McKenna and VanMeter as the race wound down the Yukon River on the way to the Fairbanks finish last year.

Many thought they were going to catch the leaders, but they blew an engine and the rest is history. They are back to try again this year. Dick, a rookie last year and now a veteran, could claim a big first if the team is successful.

No rider from Outside, as Alaskans refer to the Lower 48 and other non-Alaska locales, has ever won an Iron Dog in the 31 years since it started in 1984.

McKenna and VanMeter, along with Quam and Dick, are not the only ones with a shot at victory, however. There are 10 former champions in the race, including Todd Palin.

Some of them, like 54-year-old Scott Davis from Soldotna -- who won his first Iron Dog in 1985 and the last of six more in 2007 -- and Todd Palin -- 49 and also winless since 2007 when he teamed with Davis -- are getting a little long in the tooth. The duo has since split.

Others seem to have simply lacked for the right combination of partners, or luck, in the ever-shifting mix of Iron Dog teams. Quam won when riding with McKenna in 2008, but hasn't been able to get back to the winner's circle since. Fifty-year-old Andy George from Wasilla won with two-time champ Dwayne Drake in 2006, but hasn't been able to repeat.

And then there are those who often seemed poised to win, but just never made it. Aklestad, a 28-year-old rider from Palmer, and partner Tyson Johnson, 34 from Eagle River, head that list. Both are experienced and capable, and have found racing success elsewhere, but the Iron Dog has just never cooperated for the two of them over the course of its rough, tough, cold distance of 2,000 miles.

Though temperatures were in double digits at the start of the race in Big Lake, it was 20 below zero north of the Alaska Range and getting colder. Racers were looking at not only a long ride to Nome, but a cold and banging one on icy and rutted trails.

Photographer Loren Holmes contributed to this report. Contact Craig Medred at craig(at)alaskadispatch.com

Craig Medred

Craig Medred is a former writer for the Anchorage Daily News, Alaska Dispatch and Alaska Dispatch News. He left the ADN in 2015.

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