Willow Tug 300 Part 1

When I was in college, the night before final exams I would have nightmares about having registered for a class and forgotten all about it until that night.  Sometime it was so real I would get up and check my schedule to reassure myself.

The 2011 Willow Tug 300 started much like that.  I used to be able to put a 300 mile race together at the drop of a hat, but it had been two years and I had a definite feeling I was forgetting something essential – like dogs or a sled?

Dallas Seavey called me a week before the race and asked if I would run a team for him while he was doing the Yukon Quest.  He had some dogs he wanted available for the Iditarod – dogs that could do 1 one thousand mile race, but not 2 – and some young dogs that needed race experience.  Since he was paying the bills (and being broke was the only reason I wasn’t racing my team this year) I said sure.  I asked Pat Schue, another Texas transplant, if she would help me get started and meet me at the finish line, and she was wonderful!

Pat and I drove up to Willow to get the dogs getting there in the dark.  Jen had left our 12 dogs in three rows and I asked Pat to load them while I got the other stuff we needed.  Ready to go, I count the dogs in the truck and come up with 11.  Pat counts them, only 11 dogs.  I look at the three lines of houses – no dogs.  Check the truck – nobody is hiding.  I walk down the line of houses – sure enough, Lucky, a female wheel dog, is lying in her house sound asleep (or faking it well).  Convincing Lucky that she really does want to run, I load her and we are off.  Is this an omen?

Race day dawned clear and cold, a beautiful day for running dogs.  The race started at 10 AM, I was bib number 20.  With 2 minutes between mushers I easily came up with a 10:18 start time (I do have a Ph. D.  In Physics no less!).  I packed the sled while Pat dropped dogs and started getting them ready.  Watching time closely, I feared we were running just a little late and started to push.  The team ahead of me was hooking up and we were not done booting.  Push just a little bit harder and we had everybody in line ready to go a 10:15 – Whew.

But the 18th place team hadn’t left yet.  Hmmm.  Check my watch – it is 10:20 and they still hadn’t left.  The starters must be running a little late.  Watch the dogs closely and it dawns on me that 20 times 2 = 40, not 20 and my start time is 10:38!  Oh, well – we are ready.  Pat and I visit a little.  At 10:30 I notice Soleil in swing, was on her neckline.  The snap on her tug must have come loose – walk up there and Roadie had chewed through Soleil’s tug line.  For some funny reason Dallas uses the Seavey double tree system where the tug goes through a spreader on the gangline and isn’t easily replaced.  And I have no spares!  Now what?  Grab my conventional spare tug out of my sled, tie a knot in it to make it shorter and promise Soleil to fix it later.  Then notice a chewed neckline.  Replace that only to see another chewed tug line on Roadie.  Oops!  Run back to the truck, starting to sweat a little, and strip 4 tug lines off my gangline section.  Replace Roadie’s tug with another straight tug with a knot to make the distance right and find two more chewed necklines.  That is the last of my spare necklines from Jen, grab some of mine, run back to the sled and the timer says “go” – what an auspicious start to a three hundred mile race! :-)

Eric