On the Trail with Ron Stiffler in the CB300

***Ron Stiffler on his dogsled. Photo courtesy of Ron Stiffler***

Michelle McAfee - CRR Staff

On Saturday morning, January 14, Ron Stiffler ran his sled dog team through a tunnel of cheering people lining the streets of Glennallen at the start of the Copper Basin 300 (CB300) sled dog race.

“We were parked over at the Caribou Motel and had to cross the road to get to the start line, which is kind of hectic. You’ve got 12 dogs hooked up that are screaming, jumping, and ready to go. When they’re all fired up like that, it’s a lot of power,” said Stiffler.

Stiffler was impressed by what seemed like the entire community of Glennallen turning out at the start line and said, “The dogs were kind of like, ‘What’s going on? Why are all these people around us?’ It was a training experience for them. They can get spooked by things like that, but they made it without a problem.”

Stiffler placed a couple of experienced lead dogs in front to get the team through the starting line, which meant crossing parking lots and driveways in Glennallen and jumping over snow berms, all with a fresh team and not much snow.

“Stiffler was impressed by what seemed like the entire community of Glennallen turning out at the start line and said, “The dogs were kind of like, ‘What’s going on? Why are all these people around us?”

It takes months to train a team. Stiffler started them in September when the temperatures dipped low enough to hook them up to a 4-wheeler. Snow hadn’t flown yet, so he started with 2-4 mile runs to get the dogs in shape and slowly built them up to longer distances. “We train very similar to how a marathon runner trains. We need to build up their stamina slowly over a few months,” said Stiffler.

In November, the team was running 40-50 miles at a time, four to five days a week. By December, the dogs learned what it’s like to do a long run, 40-60 miles, then camp. And after four to six hours of rest, get back up for another run because that’s what they do in racing.

The dogs, wrapped in blue jackets with booties on their feet, settled into the trail, leaving Glennallen after starting 23rd out of 25 teams in the race. Stiffler, insulated in a heavy camouflage parka with a fur-lined hood, said, “We flew out of the chute pretty quickly. Then once we got out on the trail, it was smooth sailing for the first 50-mile run into Tolsona Lodge.”

***Ron Stiffler on the trail with his team. Photo courtesy of Ron Stiffler***

Stiffler heard the race doesn’t really start until the Sourdough checkpoint. From there, mushers meet the foothills of the Alaska Range. Teams trained on steep hills, like Stiffler’s dogs who consistently run steep terrain around Fairbanks, can pick up speed and gain on other teams with less experience in the hills.

“Honestly, it was some of the most technical sled driving I’ve ever done. It was really fun and exciting, from Sourdough to Meiers Lake. A lot of ups and downs, tight winding through the trees on a single snowmachine track,” said Stiffler. The trail was soft and punchy in some places, but the dog team knew what to do with it. That snow was like home.

This year’s race was warm, with 15 below zero temperatures at the start and ending at a toasty 0 degrees on the final day. “This time of the year in the interior, we get that nice inversion. When you climb the hills, it warms up. Some of those hills were probably near 5 -10 degrees above. Then you drop back down into the valley, and it gets down to 10-15 below zero, which is a nice temperature for me and the dogs - it’s pretty perfect,” said Stiffler.

The longest stretch of the race is from Meiers Lake to the Chistochina and the Red Eagle Lodge. It’s what racers call “The Hump Run” because the trail takes you over a big hill in the foothills of the Alaska Range.

“That was a tough one,” said Stiffler. “But honestly, it wasn’t as steep as some of the hills coming in from Sourdough. It was just a long, slow climb getting above treeline.”

Before The Hump, there were river crossings. Most years, there is open water to cross, but not this year. Stiffler said the team navigated some narrow, thin ice bridges while crossing the Gakona River. The ice was all glare with no snow to grip, meaning no traction for the dogs or the sled. “We made it without getting wet!” said Stiffler.

***Aurora on the horizon during a night run on the trail. Photo by Ron Stiffler***

Then the trail veered up sharply. Stiffler said it felt nearly vertical in pitch. He was behind the sled pushing as hard as he could, and the dogs were just crawling up the hill. The team hit the top, yanking the sled over the crest and immediately down a hill as steep as the one they had just climbed, nearly jerking the sled from Stiffler’s hands. He lunged for it, jumping on the brake as quickly as possible to keep the sled from overrunning the dogs.

“I didn’t see it coming,” said Stiffler. “Usually, you climb a big hill, and it flattens out a bit. I was like, ‘holy crap!’ and dove for handlebars on the sled. You do NOT want to run a dog over or lose your sled, which is just about the worst thing that can happen when you’re out there. If you let go of your sled, the dogs will not stop for you. They’ll just keep going. When you’re out in the middle of nowhere, you depend on them to get you along safely. Losing your team would be a big deal,” said Stiffler with a tense laugh, “It was definitely a wake-up call!”

Sleep deprivation on the trail was the most challenging part for Stiffler. “You’re not on your best game, kind of mentally not all there. You get loopy after the second or third day from lack of sleep” He said he rolled into a few checkpoints like a zombie, but getting even one to two hours of sleep before running again helped him push on.

The CB300 requires 18 hours of rest that each racer must take. Like many mushers, Stiffler took more – 20 total hours of rest during the race. Once he pulled into a checkpoint, he would take care of the dogs, get them bedded down, feed and check them all over, massaging any tight muscles. That would leave Stiffler about one to two hours to nap before hitting the next leg of the run. He said he slept about eight hours over three days.

After the harrowing night, the trail got easier. Stiffler’s voice took on a dreamy tone, “The sun started coming up in the early morning hours. Once over The Hump, it’s a big downhill into the Red Eagle Lodge. It was some of the most beautiful trail I’ve ever been on. It’s dead silent out there. All you can hear is the dogs’ feet hitting the snow, and myself breathing heavily from climbing steep hills.”

***Dogsled selfie. Photo courtesy of Ron Stiffler***

Stiffler doesn’t own the dogs he ran but has worked for the owner, Jake Witkop, the last two years. “About half my team were two-year-olds. I trained them all from puppies, and it was fun to see them excel. I ran a couple of them in lead for most of the race. They turned out to be awesome leaders up there. It’s cool to see the dogs grow up from little puppies all cute and playful to becoming pretty bad(a–) sled dogs,” said Stiffler.

The Yukon Quest 300 in Fairbanks starts on February 4, where Stiffler will be running his final race of the season. After this year, he will be qualified to run the Iditarod. “As of right now, I haven’t thought about that too much yet. It’s the largest challenge that we have in this sport. It takes a lot of time and money. It’s a huge commitment to run a thousand-mile race like that. I could see that being something in my future, but I have to decide after this winter if that’s something I really want to do,” said Stiffler.

Stiffler brings it back to Glennallen. He lets fly a hearty laugh, “It’s a big labor of love. Not just for the mushers but for the entire community to make an event like this happen. So many people helped put this race on and supported each musher individually to get them to the race start. It’s special and takes huge support.”

Fifty-nine and a half hours after starting, Stiffler and his dog team finished 10th. It was his first 300-mile race, and he said, “Just to get to the finish line was such a great feeling and personal success. But to get 10th place felt really good, knowing I did the best I could overall to get to the finish line. It’s a good feeling.”

Nik Merlino and McCarthy River Tours & Outfitters sponsored Stiffler for this race. This summer, Stiffler plans on returning to work as a raft guide for the McCarthy-based company.