Race History

Race History:

Our very first race was The WyColo race near Laramie, Wyoming in January, 2002, which consisted of back-to-back 50 milers. In February 2002 we finished Montanas’ 350 mile Race to The Sky 17th place, the Red Lantern. In March, 2002 we traveled up to Dawson City, Yukon, and ran the 200 mile Percy DeWolfe Memorial Mail Run Race, finishing 13th out of 26!

With still very little experience, we ran our first Iditarod in 2003, in which I scratched at 800 miles. That was the low snow year when we started in Fairbanks, followed the river all the way to Kaltag, then did a 300 mile loop to Anvik and back. I got stuck in a bad ground blizzard with under-trained dogs and threw in the towel that year. I felt so low at that point that we leased several dogs to a friend and thought about getting out of sled dogs. After helping with some sled dog tours next year, I got enough inspiration to run the 2004 Race to the Sky, this time finishing 14th, another red lantern with an under-trained team.

Something snapped and I decided we’d try 2005 Iditarod but needed sponsors and another qualifier since I’d failed to finish in 2003. The sponsor money came from the most unexpected sources but we raised enough to train properly. Again, being another low snow year, most of the races in the lower 48s’ got cancelled so we trained in Montana, but had to run the Yukon Quest 300 on our way up to Alaska. Another red lantern but we managed to qualify for Iditarod 2005. I was grateful to finish 60th place and not win another red lantern(13 days;20 hours).

In 2006, we finished 9th in Race to The Sky and 63rd in Iditarod(13 days;22 hours). In the 2007 Iditarod I took a bad fall coming in to Rainy Pass and had to scratch that year. In 2008, with the help of dogs from Dan MacEachen and Aaron Burmeister we finished 4rth in Race to The Sky  and 47th in Iditarod. In 2009, after 4 Iditarods in a row, we trained for just the San Juan stage Race, finishing 4rth.

For 2010, we’d like to run 2 teams in the Seeley 200, 1 team in Race to The Sky, and try for a top 30 placing in Iditarod.