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Stage Stop

The terrible pull of sled-dog racing

By Michael Wolcott

The night before Fisher showed up, I had fallen asleep in the feed room again. I dreamed of home, and the usual winter treasures - hikes in Grand Canyon and southern Utah, rock-climbing in the mild sunshine near Flagstaff.

I woke up in a plastic chair, melted snow pooling around my boots. It was 14 below zero in the dog yard. The Colorado Plateau was indeed a dream; this was northwest Wyoming, midway through the most exhausting winter of my life.

I had been tired for three months, since taking the race job in late September. Twenty-five Alaskan huskies were mine for the season, to train like the world-class athletes they were. It took about a hundred hours a week, in all kinds of winter weather. This voluntary exile in the frozen north, like many endurance tests, had its roots in romance: I had met a Wyoming girl who ran sled dogs, then become a musher myself.

I fed, watered and doctored the dogs, shoveled their shit, broke up their fights and dug out their doghouses after each snowstorm. In late January, the 16 best would haul me around western Wyoming in the International Pedigree Stage Stop, a 10-day, 400-mile dogsled race with a $100,000 purse.

My buddy Fisher - who could have been mellowing in the desert or backcountry schussing outside Durango - had reluctantly agreed to be my partner in this race venture. He had given up a month of his life to help me train the dogs and be my race handler - driving the dog truck, providing logistical support, serving as my personal assistant, cheerleader and mental health consultant. I, in return, would owe him. Forever.

When he appeared at the kennel that morning in early January, Fisher was the cavalry coming over the hill. I fought an urge to kneel and kiss his Sorrels.

"You're my hero," I said.

"I guess things are desperate around here."

"Well, yeah. I'm about worn-out."

"And you smell like dog shit," he said, stepping back. "Look like it, too."

"Thanks for the pep talk."

"No problem. No charge."

We stood in the feed room for a wordless moment, grinning. I gave him a bear hug and we went outside to run some dogs. It was like old times.

The two of us had learned mushing at the kennel two winters earlier, guiding Jackson Hole tourists up a picture-postcard drainage called Granite Creek. Our boss, Frank Teasley, was an eight-time Iditarod veteran who financed his racing with the tour business. He was also director of the Stage Stop, and could not drive a team in his own race. That's why I had the trainer's job.

Fisher and I had worked like slaves that first season, but managed to keep laughing. He's a little blue-eyed guy in his 20s, with don't-give-a-shit good looks and a misleading air of innocence. I'm middle-aged, darker, a perfect foil. We did excellent stand-up for the clients, which brought in good tips. Neither of us returned for a second guiding season, though. "I don't need to be miserable to be happy," was how Fisher had summed it up.

Indeed, mushing is an occupation that's long on misery and short on comfort - an obsessive disorder, a disease masquerading as sport. Still, an undeniable romance surrounds the world of sleds and dogs. Think Jack London, Robert Service, and the Northern Lights. Think of Balto.

The reality is more like single parenting - endless work and worry, blessed with moments of pure magic. You are never really free and you never question the lack of freedom. There isn't time. Instead you give the dogs what they need and draw strength from the crazed racket of huskies begging to run, from the whisper of paws on fresh snow. Once every two weeks you drive 30 miles into town for groceries, but you are always with the dogs.

You become addicted to them, hopelessly in love with their beauty. Not just cosmetic beauty, but something closer to the bone - Alaskan huskies will pull you and your sled a hundred miles in a day, sleep outdoors at forty below and wake up to do it again. A sled team is also beautiful:

It is a half-hour before sundown, the temperature hovers at zero. You push a featherweight wooden sled into the dog yard and toss an armload of harnesses on the snow. The huskies run to and fro on their chains, barking like banshees, leaping up on their houses. Pick me. Pick me. These creatures are not wild, but they're not pets, either. They are sled dogs. Everything in their breeding and training has shaped them into the world's experts at one thing: tearing ass down a snow-packed trail. You hook up a dozen dogs. They jump over and onto each other, pound the ground with their front paws, bite their own lips. They throw themselves against their harnesses, again and again, threatening to break the tether rope, sending up a furious noise. You pull the quick release. The sled shoots out of the dog yard. Instantly there is silence. You are flying up a winter canyon and the snow is sprinkled with diamonds. Eight miles out, in the blue light of dusk, the temperature has dropped 20 degrees. Just ahead, three ten-foot heaps of snow block the trail - an avalanche. You wonder if the dogs will drag the sled into the half-frozen creek to avoid the snow banks. Instead they stream up and over each one like salmon climbing a waterfall. The sled, and your heart, go airborne.

And you are hooked.

Like any addict, you will know craving, and you will chase the high. To revisit the essence of that moment, you will routinely endure frozen hands and feet, chronic sleep deprivation and more physical work than most people ever know. And - for awhile at least - you will not be able to imagine doing any other thing.

Training goes well. A week before the race, Fisher and I load sleds for an overnight trip, a shakedown (the Stage Stop format includes three nights outdoors). Everything goes right. We bivvy in our nylon sled bags and cook frozen meat for the team over a homemade alcohol burner. The dogs sleep in their harnesses, on piles of straw. The Milky Way shimmers overhead.

Race day. Twenty-two mushers - including some of the world's best - crowd the staging area in downtown Jackson Hole. Their Ford 350s and Dodge Rams are powered by Cummins turbo-diesels, V-10 power-strokes, small nuclear reactors. Fisher and I wheeze into our slot, driving a four-cylinder Toyota flatbed that sports a hand-painted plywood dog box.

The morning is gray and miserably cold, but a thousand people line the streets. The dogs have raced before, and are used to crowds. I'm not. The 3-mile route includes a handful of difficult 90-degree turns. I have one goal: no wrecks in front of the audience. The run takes 12 minutes. I do not crash.

At the finish, Fisher grabs the leaders and leads the team to the truck: "How was it?"

"I don't know. It was all kind of a blur."

"Pay attention tomorrow, OK?"

"What's tomorrow?"

"Togwotee Pass. Forty miles over the Continental Divide. It's when this race really starts, remember?"

"Oh, yeah. Sounds grim, though. I think I'll just close my eyes and hang on 'til it's over."

"Good plan. I'll start drinking heavily as soon as you're out of the gate."

"Deal."

The 60-mile drive to the next day's start - at an RV park north of Jackson - takes almost two hours. Our little four-cylinder dog chariot is grossly overloaded with 16 dogs, two sleds (in case I destroy one), 400 pounds of dog food, gang lines, harnesses and much, much more. Top speed seems to be about 35 mph.

Only 20 spectators have turned out. The day is sunny, bad for the dogs. They can overheat even in subzero conditions. Today's leg starts with a 15-mile climb then drops 3,000 vertical feet into Dubois. When our number is called to the starting gate, we are frantically pinning makeshift reflective jackets - torn from old bed sheets - onto the dogs' harnesses.

The climb starts immediately. I run behind the sled to make life easier on the dogs. Frigid air burns at my nose, throat and chest. A voice booms out behind me: "Trail!"

It's Hans Gott, three-time Stage Stop champion. He's passing and making sure the rookie doesn't screw up and get in the way. I step onto the runners for a breather, slowing my team slightly.

"Just keep them to the right, Michael," he says and blows on by. I'm surprised - touched, really - that he knows my name. After a few miles the trail breaks out of timber. Twenty miles west, the Tetons rear up like Teutonic gods, shining platinum and silver.

The climb takes two hours. I'm spent, drenched in sweat and headachy in the sun-glare, but the dogs are fine. After 10 relatively flat miles, we begin the wild plunge down the east side: for 15 miles, the sled barrels along as fast as I dare let it, careening around blind corners, throwing up rooster tails of corn snow where the sun has softened the trail, skidding sideways in the icy shadows. I'm not racing, exactly, just trying to hang on.

The first time we roll, I'm dragged 50 yards, plowing through an S-turn before righting the sled. For one sickening instant, I cling to the steering bow with a single hand, while 12 dogs try to yank it away. The second time I biff, the iron snow hook flies out of the basket and sets, stopping the team cold. I tip up the sled, pull the hook, and soon we arrive in Dubois.

After the third leg, we're in 12th place. I have hung onto the sled. None of the dogs have died. I am almost pleased. But driving toward the evening banquet (there's one in every host town), Fisher seems troubled: "If we're only sleeping four hours a night and working our asses off," he says, "why are we the last team to the staging area every morning?"

"Same reason we're the last ones to leave at night," I say. "We don't know what we're doing."

"Got it."

Day four. A cable network is filming the Big Race. They want to know what it's like to be a handler, so they're traveling with Fisher. His filthy hands clutch the steering wheel, his face is unshaven and haggard. He turns to the camera and flashes a crazed grin: "If you like hard work, long hours, no pay and sleeping outside in subzero temperatures, well, this is your gig."

It's a take.

Day five ends, with 200 miles to go. I'm beyond tired, but each run is better than the last. This second camp-out is high in the Wind River Range. We climbed 2,000 vertical feet today and finished sixth. My dogs look great. We've moved up to ninth place overall. I won't win, but I might succeed. Tomorrow we drop into Lander.

I'm kneeling in the snow massaging Aspen's legs when Mark Nordman, the race marshal, stops by. Nordman is a big guy with a full, black beard and glasses that give him a professorial look. He's a longtime official at the Iditarod, a bigwig in the sport.

"How's it going?" he says.

"OK," I say, rubbing liniment into Aspen's paws. "Her feet are a little soft. I have to watch her."

"I've been watching you," he says. "You take good care of your dogs. This is your first race, right?" I nod.

"You're a hell of a dog man."

I wonder if I've heard him right. This week has been pure struggle. I say something appropriately humble. But I'm also imagining the final banquet, how modestly I will accept the outstanding rookie award.

Lander is a disaster.

The day is sunny and 35 degrees, way too warm. The snow has turned to slush. Ten miles from the finish, Aspen seems unfocussed, distracted. I pull her out of lead and put in Mary Lou, a barrel-shaped black-and-tan powerhouse. The team picks up a bit, then Aspen starts neck-lining. I stop and check her gums; she's not dehydrated. But a half-mile down-trail, she collapses. I'm stunned and scared. She seems OK, though, just worn out. I put her in the sled. The extra 50 pounds slows us even more. I run as much as I can.

After two miles, Mary Lou goes down. Her limp body skids on the soft snow, twitches once and lies still. Her eyes roll back in her head. I think she is dying. I want to vomit.

A dogsled passes. "Send a vet," I hear myself say.

Three minutes later, two snowmobiles roar up - a race veterinarian and Nordman. I force myself to meet their eyes. The vet checks all 12 dogs, while sled after sled passes. Aspen and Mary Lou will be OK, the vet says - heat stress and mild dehydration. But they are out of the race and will get snowmobile rides to the finish. The vet takes her time, checking every dog. Jill has bad cracks on both front paws. "She should have been wearing booties," the vet says. "Let's give her a ride, too."

I nurse what's left of my team down five miles of switchbacks to Lander, while Mary Lou's skid into the snow replays in my head. I think of Jill's paws and my face burns with shame. Hell of a dog man.

The parking lot is empty. Fisher grabs the leaders without a word, leads them to the truck and starts watering.

"I don't know what I'm doing out here," I say. "I fucked up, bad."

"Forget it, Wildman. Go somewhere and chill. I'll load 'em up."

My boss, Frank, walks up, wearing his yellow Race Director jacket.

"It's always warm coming into Lander," he says. "Rick Swenson carried in three dogs one year and still won."

I can't speak, so I nod and turn away. But there is nowhere to go.

Sled dogs are hierarchical pack animals, and the musher is the alpha. On the next day's run there is a dead man on the back of the sled, and the dogs know it. I finish last for the second day in a row.

"I'm thinking of dropping out," I tell Fisher.

"C'mon Wild," he says. "Why would we do that? Wait, don't answer that. Let's try again: Where are you gonna be in 50 years?"

I force a grin. This is an old routine. The answer comes out deadpan, in stereo: "Dead."

"There it is," he says.

We load the truck for Evanston and spend three hours bucking a stiff west wind, creeping down the interstate at 40 mph. We miss the banquet - no biggy, there's one in every town on the race course - and learn that our host family has not shown up. The local race chairman says they'll put us in a motel. Fine. We're running on four hours sleep a night and don't want to talk to anybody anyway.

We haven't eaten since morning. Evanston is closed. But in the hall at the Super 8, there's a tray left out for the maid: dirty plates, wine-stained glasses and - score! - an untouched salad and a dinner roll. I grab the stuff as Fisher pushes open our door. I'm almost happy again: food, no social obligations, a warm bed. One bed.

I put down the salad plate. "I'm not sleeping with you, Fisher."

"We can put pillows down the middle."

"Whatever."

Fisher crawls into bed. I eat like a jackal.

"Wild, you're scavenging somebody else's food."

"Mine now," I say, mouth full.

"Go for it."

I crawl into bed and it begins to shake - Fisher's laughing, and pissing me off "What's so funny?"

"You. Me. All of it. The whole bloody show."

"Nothing funny that I can see."

He's giggling now, writhing under the puke-green bedspread.

"Fisher, shut up." This makes it worse. He's snuffling and chortling, laughing at his own laughter. I try to join in and can't.

"Look, I'm getting my sleeping bag. I'll camp in the bathroom," I say, and stomp out toward the truck. Gales of louder, more desperate laughter.

I stop three steps away from the room. A pause, then Fisher explodes one more time: insane cackling, a crescendo.

This time I get the joke. I won't be camping in the bathroom, and Fisher knows this: The sleeping bag is stowed in my sled, on top of the truck, tied down and wrapped in a tarp. It's buried inside the canvas sled bag, under the kibble, frozen meat, alcohol cooker, down parka, four dozen sets of dog booties, First-Aid kit and 900 other articles of gear. It would take a half-hour to get the thing out, and I don't have five minutes of energy left in my body. Fisher knows all this, and thinks it's funny. What's more, he knows that I know: He heard my footsteps, heard me stop in the hall at the precise moment I realized that the bag project was too big to tackle this late in an exceptionally shitty day. To Fisher, this is the funniest thing in the Universe.

And now I'm laughing, too.

The alarm sounds at 4:30. "Morning, dear. What do you want to do today?"

"Oh, I don't know. Let's pry ourselves out of this bed, stumble out into the frigid dark, feed and water 16 dogs, shovel some shit, put new plastic on the sled runners, freeze our fingers and then decide."

After chores we drive 20 miles to the start. The morning is grey as death. A bitter ice mist hangs in the air. Gas-station coffee burns in my gut. It's the same old show - giant trucks, dogs everywhere, mushers who know what they're doing. And us.

We stagger through the routine: unloading dogs, walking and massaging them, putting on harnesses and booties, loading the sled.

"Here we are, Wild. Yes! We are living the dream."

Today's run is 65 miles across steep, anonymous country covered with snow. A hundred bad things may happen. All either of us really wants to do is sleep. And there are three more days of this. The giggles strike again.

I walk around the truck to grab my numbered race vest. When I come back to the sled, Fisher clears his throat and breaks into song:

"Bamp-pa ba-bamp ba-ba-BAMP ba-ba-BA." Around the parking lot, a few heads turn.

"BAMP-pa ba-BAMP ba-ba-BAMP ba-ba-BAAAA!" It's the Universal Anthem of the Underdog - the theme from "Rocky." I join in, and we amp up the volume:

"Bamp-pa ba-BAMP ba-ba-BAMP ba-ba-BAAAAAAA!" More mushers and handlers stop what they're doing.

We climb up on our sad little plywood dog box and bring it on home: "Ba-ba-BAAA, Ba-ba-BAAA, Ba-ba-BAAA Ba-ba-BAAAA! BA-BA-BA, BA-BA-BA, BA-BA, BABABABA . . BA . . . BAAA-BAAAA-BAA AAAA!

Everyone stares, perplexed. Even the dogs are watching. We stand above it all, silhouetted in thin cold sunlight. We turn toward each other and high-five, then bow to the crowd. This race is in the bag, and we know it.

Michael Wolcott lives in Flagstaff, and no longer runs dogs. He still owes Fisher. The Wyoming girl still lives in Wyoming.