Post Race and Sleeping

Photo by Whitney McLaren

I apologize for the radio silence, but phew, we’ve been rocking and rolling! When finishing in Nome, you often have to wait at least a couple days until the banquet. Sleeping, relaxing, eating. While I have enjoyed skipping out on the normal banquet hubbub, I did miss the forced relaxation. This year, we finished in the morning. We had breakfast with our dropped dog crew (Tyler and Kelsey), then immediately drove home to Two Rivers. The next day I relaxed inside and hung with the dogs. But that was it. The following day we jumped into tours and catching up on every day life. To be honest, I haven’t even had time to really think about the race beyond watching a couple videos. Occasionally, little snippets of moments come flooding back, but honestly, I’ve had to focus on the next task at hand. I’d say that the dogs have rebounded faster than me. As I type, I’m watching out the window as they body slam each other, chew on their houses, dig in the snow, and wonder why we went from running hundreds of miles to only doing 10-15. I definitely feel a little dog guilt, but luckily, they’re headed out for an expedition on the Denali Highway starting Monday. That should could them happy!

All that being said, I do plan to share stories and write a dog recap. It just might take me a few weeks, so thank you ahead of time for your patience! Each night as I crawl into bed, I do think about how I want to write about napping on the Iditarod. How if it’s cold, I would crawl in my sleeping bag with all my clothes and boots on. I typically lie on my chest and one hip, curling my arms underneath my body and cocooning my head in both my parka ruff and sleeping bag. I would try to make the perfect air hole that allowed oxygen into my cave, but not so much cold air that my nose got cold. But when sleeping in a warm cabin, like Skwentna or Iditarod, woooeee! Those were moments of paradise. I’d lie flat on my back, one arm outstretched over my head, soaking in the warmth as if I was in a lawn chair on the beach. I can’t normally sleep on my back, but in the middle of the race in a hot cabin, for whatever reason, it was my favorite. There are few times in my life when falling asleep has felt as glorious as napping in a hot cabin on a thousand mile race.

Another sleeping story- it was near the end of the race. I had been traveling more or less with Paige since Nikolai (inbound). We ran though the middle of the night, picked up supplies in Rainy Pass, and then mushed a bit farther until we pulled over to camp on the side of the trail. We had our alarms set for a 3:50 AM wake up call. As the alarm sounded, I started pulling myself out of my cocoon of warmth. Paige was nearby, and I heard her say, “Let’s stay in the sleeping bag just 10 more minutes”. RED FLAG. Never ever give yourself just a few more minutes of sleep. That is a slippery, slippery slope. But Paige typically beats me in a thousand mile race, so I thought, what could be the harm? Forty minutes later, I jump out of the sleeping bag and say- “PAIGE! We have to get up!!” She crawls out of her sleeping bag and says, “Let’s just go home. I’m cold. This isn’t fun anymore.” To which I replied, “Paige, we can’t go home. We’re on a race.” She gives me a quizzical look and says, “we are?” At this point, I thought she was just teasing. She asks, “Which race are we on?” “We’re on the Iditarod, Paige!” Paige responds, “huh, where are we?” “We’re on our way to Skwentna,” I say. She looks extra confused now, which is understandable since it is strange to be returning to Skwentna. She says, “ok…so…what should I do now?” “Well,” I say, “let’s starting packing up to leave and get to the finish!” Shortly after this conversation, Paige has cleared out the cobwebs, and she was quickly prepping the team to leave. But for the rest of the race, this memory brought us lots of laughs!