7 March 2007 - Wednesday - Day 2 of Iditarod in McGrath

Walked to the checkpoint right after work.

We begin to really hear the horror stories coming from the mushers who stayed in McGrath. When I asked the musher from Argentina, Hernana Maquiera, how the race had been up to now, he told me that the last 20 miles had been fun; up until then he had never been so scared in his life. Rainy Pass was steep and icy. He said the team was going far faster than he felt comfortable, but there was no way to slow them under those conditions.

Most told about the blizzard in Rainy Pass. One guy tried to go through but before he reached the summit, he couldn’t see his lead dog and when he checked on them, he found most of the dogs' eyes were frozen shut, so he went back. One told how he had been blown off the trail and had to ice hook his dogs and go looking for the trail. About a mile away he finally found about 1 inch of the five foot pole sticking above the snow, so he went back and got his team and proceeded. By that day, 14 teams had scratched at or before Rainy Pass. When Dave Tresino came in, his eyes where so badly swollen shut and his dogs were sick. He stayed in McGrath longer than his 24 hours hoping for an improved condition in his dogs but had to drop 6 or 7 dogs because of the illness. He would return about 5 hours after he left McGrath the next day and scratch. He said that when they started the incline, he discovered that only 7 of his 9 dogs were pulling. With 9 pullers, he would have gone on.

That evening, one of the mushers, Linwood Fiedler, gave me a great big hug of appreciation for all the kitchen staff. He said the food and hospitality were wonderful in McGrath. I would see him again on Friday when they brought most of the scratched racers to McGrath to be flown out. That visit he wasn't as friendly; he had such a badly frostbitten ear that he will probably lose it. He told that he got hot as he untangled dogs so he took his hat off and his ear was frozen solid when he got back to his hat.

That night Gerald Sousa's sled came in with a passenger. Matt Rossi had lost his team. He said that after such a grueling course, he was relaxing coming into McGrath. When the sled hit a bump, he fell off and the dogs kept going. Snow mobiles took him out to find his dogs about 8 miles from McGrath. They were right where he expected them to be. But, he had done the right thing. The mushers have every kind of survival gear, but without the sled, they have nothing. So he decided to stay on the trail and was soon picked up.

Others that came in and stayed a while were Rich Swenson, who wasn't as macho as I had expected. He looked more like a libarian. He told the head of McGrath food and hospitality that the veterans love to stop in McGrath and are not telling the young fellows about it because they don't want it to get too popular. Let the rookies go on to Takotna and the steak dinner.

Tommy Lesatz who had the biggest smile and hearts throbbing in young and old females, and Andy Angstman, whose parents were here from Bethel to spend time with him; his sister was here from college in Minnesota.

I told Tim Osmar that in his rookie year, my daughters were attending Tustemena Elementary when he visited his old school. He barely made the age limit that year. He now has four children and one of them is about the age my daughters were back his first year.


The pictures show how the dogs are bedded down around the check point and also extra sleds sent ahead for the mushers.

Some of the more competitive racers will change sleds because of different conditions. Others just send ahead in case their sled breaks. The first night, Mackey came in with a broken runner. Matt Rossi took parts off the sled stored here and repaired the sled he had been using

A worry that night was that one of the rookie women mushers was lost. When she was finally found and gotten to Rohn, she and her team had been out in the blizzard for over 36 hours. She and J.G. Jones, both took Ptarmigan Pass north instead of Rainy Pass west to get to Rohn. They both came through McGrath on Friday when they were transporting mushers out of the bush. She may have wanted to continue, but the vets wouldn't let her take the dogs out so soon and that put her too far behind to be competitive.

J.G was disqualified because he lost a dog. He told me that instead of going in a pretty line of dogs, they went through the pass in a big bunch. When he untangled them he discovered the missing dog. He was very hopeful of the dog being found and said that she was the one dog who sleeps with him. One of the officials felt that the chances of finding the dog were very slim, what with hunger and wolves. J.G.'s feet were so badly frostbitten that after his shower, he asked for plastic bags to put over his feet to go out to the garage which was serving as the dorm because he couldn't get his boots back on.

Lots of wonderfully interesting men and women involved with the Iditarod.