Wow! Charlotte and Rodeo got the West Yellowstone Race going again! It was a blast. I ran 10 dogs in the 12 dog class, and even though I had some issues, it was great fun.
First day: I took off 13th. Of course, the fast guys all passed me quickly and stayed ahead of me. I was doing pretty good, until about 5 miles into the there was a downhill, it wasn't the only on the trail, not by a long shot, but it was the only problem one. It wasn't very steep, and was in fact a nice, gradual mostly straight downhill. It looked innocent enough, so I let the dogs do a slow lope down it. Not hard enough that they would hurt themselves, but a decent pace since it was in fact a sprint race.
I was having to ride the brake a lot because the dogs were really fired up. I was standing on my left runner, using my right foot to brake because that is my dominant foot and I'm a lot better at braking with that foot, so when I'm in unfamiliar places, esp. on downhills, I use that foot because I'm more reliable with it. All was going well, I was keeping the dogs at the pace I wanted, when suddenly... the brake hit a large rock under the snow, giving me a hard jolt which bounced my foot off of the brake. I tried to catch myself with my left foot, but since I was already off balance, I stumbled and fell. I kept a hold of the handlebar. I'm always amazingly calm in situations such as these. First I attempted to do a pull up and get myself up enough I could get my feet back on the runners. I could have possibly done it, even though I can't do pullups (one of those adrenalin surges), but going down the trail at about 12 mph with my knees dragging was too much pull down and back on me. Next I tried to remove my right hand from the handlebar and push down on my brake with it while coaxing them to stop. They slowed down dramatically, and I thought I might have it, but as I tried to pull myself up I found that my muscles were all shaking and were now almost useless. The dogs picked up speed again, going faster than ever now. I returned my hand to the handlebar so I could hang on as long as possible. Then I tried to flip my sled.
Now, most of the time, if I'm just standing next to my sled, I swear it will fall over if I just look at it sideways. But that day, no matter how much I yanked and jerked, the sled just would not flip. I couldn't get enough leverage.
I knew there was supposed to be a turn coming up soon that had race volunteers at it. Hopefully it would be quickly and they would help get the dogs stopped. I drug for a little ways further, and then reached what I call the critical point of my strength. The longer I could hold on, the closer we got to the volunteers, and thus help. But say they were still another half mile off; I couldn't hang on that long, and if I tried I wouldn't have enough strength left to get up and run after my team. I made a very difficult decision, and let go of the sled. I scrambled to my feet, yanked my hat off to prepare to start running. I could see the team ahead of me down the hill. My team dogs were starting to overrun my leaders, so now they would be a big mess. That would help as they might possibly tangle up enough they couldn't run, but on the other hand a dog can get seriously hurt like that. I started to run and then saw something that made me happy and mad at myself all at the same time. Just 100 yards or so ahead were the volunteers. I hadn't been able to see them dragging because all I could see was the back of my sled bag. They were giving me a look like I was totally stupid for letting go. "Catch that team!" I yelled, praying they could somehow do it.
Folks, I have to say it. Race volunteers are most caring, helpful, people out there. Without thinking about their own safety, the 2 men waded into my string of dogs, bringing them to a stop. I sprinted to them as fast as I could and set the hook and began straightening out dogs. I asked one man to stand on my sled brake as I wasn't sure how well the hooks would hold here. I watched as musher after musher helped me. I finally got going again, after probably 15 minutes of straightening them out. Soon afterwards I was in a big wreck with another musher. We still have a disagreement about what happened out there, but in the end everything worked out fine. That was definitely not my day.
The next day was going smoothly, but once again on the hill I lost my footing as my brake caught a rock. This time I managed to get my knees on one of the runners and get back up. Not even a minute later I started to shake again. That day went much smoother, even though I was now only running 9 dogs in the 12 dog class because one of my girls came into heat.
I ended up finishing next to last, but it was a great learning experience for both me and the dogs. Until next time...
