I don’t want to say that this Mad Blogger jinxed things in my last post by having the audacity to refer to the weather in Alaska as benign. So I won’t - blame myself, that is. That said, I clearly took the info on the NOAA National Weather Service for the Tanana region way too much at face value. Turns out, it was anything but friendly.
We last left Anna and her now 15-dog team camping trailside after leaving the checkpoint of Manley (race mile 137) Tuesday afternoon. I expected her to camp trailside until the evening hours and then travel the rest of the trail to Tanana. That 50ish mile run overnight turned out to be a doozy.
From brief texts I’ve gotten from Anna, updates from Kristy, and looking at info online, the reality of the ground conditions on the overnight trail into Tanana were nasty. A blow hole outta nowhere. High, gusting winds, some combo of sand, snow, snowy sand, or sandy snow blowing everywhere. Nary a nook or cranny was spared. The winds blew down the hastily planted trail markers (remember - the change to this race route happened only a couple weeks before mushers hit the trail) and blowing snow quickly covered up any snowmachine or sled tracks.
Which is how Anna and her team got off the trail. Anna knows better than to travel too far without spotting a reflective trail marker, especially in low visibility conditions. But the trail was very icy and rough, and stopping the dogs - let alone anchoring them anywhere with a snow hook - was not happening. Anna travelled farther out of her way than she would have liked before she got the dogs stopped and got a satellite signal to lob out a call to Kristy.
At least partially for situations like this, the race amended the rules a few years back to allow for 2-way communication devices. Mushers do travel with two SPOT GPS trackers attached to their sleds, which feeds the tracking info to the Iditarod Insider GSP service. But aside from SOS buttons, the devices don’t do the mushers much good out on the trail. Fortunately, GCI set Anna up with a cell phone with satellite commutation capabilities, and thank goodness they did (full disclosure, GCI is a Seeing Double sponsor. But this isn’t a shameless plug - service worked out there when Anna needed it the most).
Anna was able to find a sat signal and get Kristy on the phone. Kristy pulled up the Iditarod GPS tracker and was able to give Anna directions to get back on the trail (head north-northeast to the river, then keep that on your right while you travel west). Anna and her team had gotten turned around off the trail, and in the low-vis conditions, Anna wasn’t confident committing to a direction without knowing it was the right way (when you find yourself in the bottom of a hole… put down the shovel). But when Kristy could give her a heading, she pulled out her compass, got her bearings, and found the river. Not long after that, she saw some sled tracks and finally spotted a trail marker.
And of course, once she got back on the trail and in an area with some shelter from the biting sand-filled wind, she saw regular trail markers again and knew Tanana couldn’t be far off. She arrived in this 3rd checkpoint, 202 miles into the race, shortly before 7am Wednesday morning, March 5th. I believe she was reported into checkpoint in 20th place.
If you saw the Iditarod Insider video interview of Anna in Tanana, you might have been concerned she was sporting a couple black eyes or something. That’s what I first thought. But once I heard the full story and watched the video again, I realized… that’s sand and dirt residue sticking to the one part of her face that was exposed to the elements. She wasn’t wiping at tears from emotion, she was wiping the tears and snot away that her body was using to try and flush that darn sand out of her eyes, nose, and mouth. Exfoliating your eyeballs in a sandstorm? No thanks.
Anna spoke highly of lead dog Shoshanna during the interview. She put Shoshanna back in lead during the worst of the wind and sand storm. Of course, leave it to the most senior dog on the team to take charge and lead them in.
Anna took additional rest time in Tanana, making sure she could get plenty of nutrients and water into the dogs and let them rest up before hitting the trail again. I know she paid a lot of attention to the dogs’ paws and also gave them each a thorough massage between naps, as well as short walks around on leash to stretch their legs.
It was during this that Anna felt her pup Maverick was moving kinda stiff. He got some extra TLC, but still seemed sore. With the next stretch of trail the longest of the race at 117 miles, she decided it was best to send Maverick home. She hated to do it, but she hated even more the thought of him sustaining an injury on that long stretch and having to have him in the sled basket some or most of the way to Ruby. And so Maverick says goodbye to his teammates and catches a flight home with the Iditarod Air Force. Kristy will pick him up in Anchorage.
It sounds like most of the teams that were caught in the worst of the wind storm, like Anna, extended their rests in Tanana. And one team set the snow hook a final time. Rookie Brenda Mackey opted to scratch from the race in Tanana in the best interests of her dog team. All of her dogs were reported in good health.
On behalf of Seeing Double, I wish Brenda and her team safe and swift travels back to their home kennel in Fairbanks.
This leaves 32 mushers still racing to Nome.
As I write this, it is going on 8pm Wednesday in Alaska. Iditarod veteran Paige Drobny leads the pack at mile 310, and she is closing in on Ruby (race mile 319). The top 6 teams are all past the 290-mile mark. The back of the pack consists of 5 mushers resting at mile 202 in Tanana. That takes our lead-lag spread to over 100 miles, doubling the spread of the field in just over 24 hours. But even the front of the pack has over 900 miles to the finish, and they’ve only been on the trail about 2 days and 9 hours.
So much race left. All sorts of things can happen. Especially with Alaska weather, out on the Mighty Yukon.
Back to our favorite musher... GPS currently has Anna in 18th place, out of Tanana and at race mile 241. I expect she will camp twice along the 117 mile stretch to Ruby, the first near this mile marker.
The weather service still shows temps in this region topping out in the low 30s with lows in the high teens to low 20s Fahrenheit, but now there’s some snow forecast. I’m reluctant to say more about Mother Nature beyond that.
While Anna is on this long stretch to Ruby, your Mad Blogger will be working on the next update, which will include more information on the roles of each dog in the team and more about what it’s like for Anna and the dogs to camp trailside.
If you’re looking for more video and reading material, check out some of the stuff on Alaska’s News Source KTUU and Alaska Public Media. Another good one to peruse is Anchorage Daily News, but you only get so many free articles on their site (I found the $3.12 investment in a 3-month digital subscription worthwhile for unlimited access). And of course Iditarod.com. Consult the National Weather Service at your own peril!
There - now you have all my secrets.
Except direct lines to Anna and Kristy...
Below: screen shots from the Iditarod Insider interview with Anna in Tanana. And a pic I got from Anna out on the trail, taken after she's endured the worst of it.
We last left Anna and her now 15-dog team camping trailside after leaving the checkpoint of Manley (race mile 137) Tuesday afternoon. I expected her to camp trailside until the evening hours and then travel the rest of the trail to Tanana. That 50ish mile run overnight turned out to be a doozy.
From brief texts I’ve gotten from Anna, updates from Kristy, and looking at info online, the reality of the ground conditions on the overnight trail into Tanana were nasty. A blow hole outta nowhere. High, gusting winds, some combo of sand, snow, snowy sand, or sandy snow blowing everywhere. Nary a nook or cranny was spared. The winds blew down the hastily planted trail markers (remember - the change to this race route happened only a couple weeks before mushers hit the trail) and blowing snow quickly covered up any snowmachine or sled tracks.
Which is how Anna and her team got off the trail. Anna knows better than to travel too far without spotting a reflective trail marker, especially in low visibility conditions. But the trail was very icy and rough, and stopping the dogs - let alone anchoring them anywhere with a snow hook - was not happening. Anna travelled farther out of her way than she would have liked before she got the dogs stopped and got a satellite signal to lob out a call to Kristy.
At least partially for situations like this, the race amended the rules a few years back to allow for 2-way communication devices. Mushers do travel with two SPOT GPS trackers attached to their sleds, which feeds the tracking info to the Iditarod Insider GSP service. But aside from SOS buttons, the devices don’t do the mushers much good out on the trail. Fortunately, GCI set Anna up with a cell phone with satellite commutation capabilities, and thank goodness they did (full disclosure, GCI is a Seeing Double sponsor. But this isn’t a shameless plug - service worked out there when Anna needed it the most).
Anna was able to find a sat signal and get Kristy on the phone. Kristy pulled up the Iditarod GPS tracker and was able to give Anna directions to get back on the trail (head north-northeast to the river, then keep that on your right while you travel west). Anna and her team had gotten turned around off the trail, and in the low-vis conditions, Anna wasn’t confident committing to a direction without knowing it was the right way (when you find yourself in the bottom of a hole… put down the shovel). But when Kristy could give her a heading, she pulled out her compass, got her bearings, and found the river. Not long after that, she saw some sled tracks and finally spotted a trail marker.
And of course, once she got back on the trail and in an area with some shelter from the biting sand-filled wind, she saw regular trail markers again and knew Tanana couldn’t be far off. She arrived in this 3rd checkpoint, 202 miles into the race, shortly before 7am Wednesday morning, March 5th. I believe she was reported into checkpoint in 20th place.
If you saw the Iditarod Insider video interview of Anna in Tanana, you might have been concerned she was sporting a couple black eyes or something. That’s what I first thought. But once I heard the full story and watched the video again, I realized… that’s sand and dirt residue sticking to the one part of her face that was exposed to the elements. She wasn’t wiping at tears from emotion, she was wiping the tears and snot away that her body was using to try and flush that darn sand out of her eyes, nose, and mouth. Exfoliating your eyeballs in a sandstorm? No thanks.
Anna spoke highly of lead dog Shoshanna during the interview. She put Shoshanna back in lead during the worst of the wind and sand storm. Of course, leave it to the most senior dog on the team to take charge and lead them in.
Anna took additional rest time in Tanana, making sure she could get plenty of nutrients and water into the dogs and let them rest up before hitting the trail again. I know she paid a lot of attention to the dogs’ paws and also gave them each a thorough massage between naps, as well as short walks around on leash to stretch their legs.
It was during this that Anna felt her pup Maverick was moving kinda stiff. He got some extra TLC, but still seemed sore. With the next stretch of trail the longest of the race at 117 miles, she decided it was best to send Maverick home. She hated to do it, but she hated even more the thought of him sustaining an injury on that long stretch and having to have him in the sled basket some or most of the way to Ruby. And so Maverick says goodbye to his teammates and catches a flight home with the Iditarod Air Force. Kristy will pick him up in Anchorage.
It sounds like most of the teams that were caught in the worst of the wind storm, like Anna, extended their rests in Tanana. And one team set the snow hook a final time. Rookie Brenda Mackey opted to scratch from the race in Tanana in the best interests of her dog team. All of her dogs were reported in good health.
On behalf of Seeing Double, I wish Brenda and her team safe and swift travels back to their home kennel in Fairbanks.
This leaves 32 mushers still racing to Nome.
As I write this, it is going on 8pm Wednesday in Alaska. Iditarod veteran Paige Drobny leads the pack at mile 310, and she is closing in on Ruby (race mile 319). The top 6 teams are all past the 290-mile mark. The back of the pack consists of 5 mushers resting at mile 202 in Tanana. That takes our lead-lag spread to over 100 miles, doubling the spread of the field in just over 24 hours. But even the front of the pack has over 900 miles to the finish, and they’ve only been on the trail about 2 days and 9 hours.
So much race left. All sorts of things can happen. Especially with Alaska weather, out on the Mighty Yukon.
Back to our favorite musher... GPS currently has Anna in 18th place, out of Tanana and at race mile 241. I expect she will camp twice along the 117 mile stretch to Ruby, the first near this mile marker.
The weather service still shows temps in this region topping out in the low 30s with lows in the high teens to low 20s Fahrenheit, but now there’s some snow forecast. I’m reluctant to say more about Mother Nature beyond that.
While Anna is on this long stretch to Ruby, your Mad Blogger will be working on the next update, which will include more information on the roles of each dog in the team and more about what it’s like for Anna and the dogs to camp trailside.
If you’re looking for more video and reading material, check out some of the stuff on Alaska’s News Source KTUU and Alaska Public Media. Another good one to peruse is Anchorage Daily News, but you only get so many free articles on their site (I found the $3.12 investment in a 3-month digital subscription worthwhile for unlimited access). And of course Iditarod.com. Consult the National Weather Service at your own peril!
There - now you have all my secrets.
Except direct lines to Anna and Kristy...
Below: screen shots from the Iditarod Insider interview with Anna in Tanana. And a pic I got from Anna out on the trail, taken after she's endured the worst of it.
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