Brian O'Donoghue - My Lead Dog Was a Lesbian - Mushing Across Alaska in the Iditarod--The World's Most Grueling Race

“All right,” I shouted. The dogs chased the team ahead.

I leaned into the turn rounding the old Knik Museum. When I looked up, there it was, waiting for me: a curving fence rising toward a gap in the trees — the Iditarod Trail.

Dandy should be here. Mushing out of Anchorage, the absence of his trusted leader cast the only shadow touching Jon Terhune’s trail. His Kenai-conditioned dogs breezed through the warm passage to Eagle River, climbing a notch to forty-fifth position.

Watching other mushers streaming through Knik and racing off into the darkness, Terhune’s girlfriend, Dawn, brooded about the unknown dangers ahead. She couldn’t quit thinking about the money, time, and energy being squandered on this mad perversion of a sport. She thought about Terhune’s refusal to return to work the day before, as his company had demanded. Ten years with Unocal and her boyfriend had thrown it away — for what? By the time Terhune arrived at Knik Lake, Dawn was seething.

“You’re crazy,” she told Terhune. “And Joe Redington should be put in jail for starting long-distance mushing.”

It was a familiar argument. Terhune didn’t need a rerun. Certainly not there in the middle of Knik Lake. But he let her rage. He was going to Nome, regardless. And he really had no adequate response to Dawn’s main question: “Why do you do it?” Terhune figured the only answer to that was spiritual. You either saw that or you never would.

“How can you do this for a hobby?”

“It’s NOT a hobby,” Jon snapped.

The musher kept his cool. This was Dawn’s scene, and he let her play it out. Three hours slipped away in a breathy cloud of angry words. Every minute of the delay represented a major sacrifice to Terhune. But he knew she’d never appreciate that.

Barry Lee was disgusted with himself. The little cook pot for his personal food was missing.

While Lee fretted about this screwup, Dr. Nels Anderson faced a painful decision. His admirable, thrilling start was being derailed by illness. The two-time finisher hadn’t come back to the Iditarod Trail only to nurse a sick team to Nome. He resolved to scratch.

Lee hated to profit from another man’s distress, but he couldn’t let this golden opportunity pass. He talked the doctor out of his cooking pot. Anderson also sold him a spare set of runner plastic, dirt cheap. Depending on the hardness grade, a single set of runner plastic sold for $20to $50.Lee had lacked the cash to buy spares in time to ship them out with his food drop. Lee was particularly pleased with this last acquisition. He didn’t have any runner plastic waiting at checkpoints ahead.

Jeff King, of Denali National Park, trailed Barry into Knik. In the decade since he had made his one and only Iditarod bid, placing twenty-eighth, King had emerged as a champion sled-dog racer, winning the Quest, the recent Kusko 300, and numerous other mid-distance events. None of those victories counted against the competition here. They were tune-ups for the intense, jockey-sized musher’s return to this trail.

Anxious to test the dogs and himself, Jeff King overtook Lee in a narrow section as the teams were descending a steep slope. It was a lousy place to pass, but the driver from Denali managed it with style, dogs loping, steering his sled past the rookie’s team on one runner.

The slick demonstration of dog power and control left Barry Lee truly awed. He felt like pulling over and waiting for the snow to settle.

Daily needed to regroup. He felt lucky to have made it to Knik. That crazy trail out of Wasilla had been lined with badly parked trucks. Already exhausted from the hillside detour after leaving Anchorage, Tom was spent by the time he wrestled his sled past all the obstacles. The dogs dodged through without damage, but his sled had slammed into several of the trucks. Each time Tom feared the blow would finally kill his poor wife, who was still riding in the sled bag. But Fidaa managed to ride it out.

The passage to Knik was further enlivened when Daily lost his snow hook because of an improperly rigged line. Tom was retrieving the crucial hook, entrusting Fidaa with the dogs, when Jeff King mushed past them. Like Lee, Daily and his wife were impressed by the Denali Park musher’s smooth, powerful dogs. It gave Tom a thrill just watching them. Give me ten years, he thought, and my dogs MIGHT look that good.

The shoe-company sponsors were gone. They hadn’t bothered coming to Knik, and Tom was sure they were ready to dump him. They probably wished they had given money to the asshole shouting at him in Wasilla. So his own team took an extra minute getting out of the chute. Daily couldn’t believe the way the other racer had carried on.

Tom rested nearly seven hours in Knik. Midnight wasn’t far away when he adjusted his headlamp, hugged Fidaa good-bye, and pulled the hook, sending his team trotting across the quiet lake. The stars above were bright, and the woods ahead looked friendly.

Driving the last-place team — thus making him custodian of the Red Lantern in the largest Iditarod field ever seen — Tom Daily laid fresh tracks toward Nome.

Bonfire parties raged through the forest for miles. The festivities were widely spaced among the thick alders and stands of spruce. I’d betraveling alone with the dogs, then enter a clearing ringed by snowmachines and cheering fans.

My fleeting lead in the Last Great Race was gone for good. I knew that I’d probably see Nome before catching Swenson, Runyan, and the rest of the serious racers. But I hadn’t completely surrendered my bragging rights.

“Still ahead of Susan Butcher,” I shouted to the clusters of merry celebrants, attired in thick parkas and fur hats. It was a claim any Alaskan could appreciate. Thick mitts raised toasts in my honor.

Though well intended, my hurried departure from Knik backfired about ten miles out. Passing through a narrow, tree-lined alley, faster teams kept catching mine, resulting in a series of bruising passes. The trail here resembled an icy gutter. Burt Bomhoff, the old Silver Streak, was one of the few who successfully muscled his sled past us without slamming into my leaders. The blows left Rainy and Rat increasingly skittish, further slowing down my team.

It got so bad that I stopped each time someone approached and ran forward to protect my dogs. That was the situation when Dee Dee Jonrowe tried to pass. Her dogs were sailing ahead when her sled snagged my snow hook. Jonrowe continued on, probably unaware of the problem, and dragged my sled backward through the team, scattering dogs everywhere until the lines finally tightened, halting Jonrowe’s progress.

“Sorry,” she said, noticing the predicament at last.

Freeing my hook, Dee Dee casually tossed it back.

I was left standing knee-deep in a spaghetti pile of tangled lines. Seventeen dogs were balled up against my reversed sled. More than a few were growling.

Tying a midsection of my gang line to a tree, I began methodically sorting out the dogs.

Bill Cotter, a bona fide contender in this year’s race, rolled up behind my roadblock.

“What’s the problem?”

“Sorry, I got a big tangle here.”

“Well, we’re going to have a big pileup in a minute,” he said.

“Blame it on Dee Dee Jonrowe!” I shouted, feeling like an abused hit-and-run victim.

Cotter’s fears were realized as Roger Roberts, the cocky Loafer from Ophir, barreled into him from behind. Curses flew through the woods as Roberts tried to pass Cotter, creating another tangle.

“Sorry Bill,” I said as Cotter finally passed me after a 10-minute delay.

The Loafer cursed as he followed Cotter on by. Couldn’t blame him. I was a lousy rookie. He was a three-time veteran with hopes of winning real money. Then he turned and kicked Rainy as he passed her. He deliberately kicked my lead dog!