Copper Basin 300 Race Recap
January 19, 2003

By Tyrell Seavey, Seavey's Iditarod Racing Team

Amber was one of the stars in Tyrell's team.  Amber is a 3-year-old with only limited racing experience, but she knows when it is time to go.

What a riot!!!  The Copper Basin 300 is the highlight of my mushing career thus far.  I entered the race with a mixed bag of young dogs from my team, old veterans, and a few dogs from the main racing team who lacked racing experience.  When we emerged at the finish 300 miles later, I had a group of hardened determined champions.  We didn’t win the race, but hey, don’t tell them that. 

What we did do is show ourselves, and the world, that when the chips are down we saddle up and go for it.  Because the majority of my team was inexperienced, I started the race on a conservative schedule.  By adding an extra 2-hour rest early on in the race I was able to preserve my dogs speed and strength for longer than most of the other competitors, but I was of course, 2 hours behind.  As the race progressed I began to see the dogs’ strength building, and could see that we had a considerable speed advantage over most of the other teams that I was running with, so I started to let the dogs run longer and faster than I had originally planned. 

By the halfway point we had moved back up into 15th place.  By the time I pulled into the checkpoint at Meier’s Lake (150 miles into the race), I had convinced myself to take an extra 3 hour rest, but then as I started to park the dog team I saw how eager they were, and it became quite apparent that they weren’t going to sit still for a 3 hour rest.  That’s when my competitive side kicked in.  I loaded up some extra food, dropped a dog that looked like he needed the rest, and pulled out 5 minutes later, passing several teams who were camped in the checkpoint.  To my surprise, we still had good speed, and I moved up to 9th place by the Sourdough Checkpoint.

The Copper Basin 300 race rules requires all of the mushers to take several mandatory rests. These rests can be taken at the mushers’ discretion.  I opted to take my mandatory 8-hour at Sourdough.   I finally got a chance to get some sleep, nearly 3 hours actually, which is good considering all of the chores the musher is responsible for.

The run from Sourdough to Wolverine was an awesome one.  We pulled into the Wolverine Checkpoint in good position and took a 4-hour rest.  When it came time to leave to checkpoint, there were 7 teams all leaving together racing for the 6th through 13th positions.  It was crazy.  After 250 miles here were 7 teams separated only by a matter of minutes.  I packed up quickly, and left in 9th.  Again our superior speed paid off, and we were able to pass 2 more teams, which put us into the finish in 7th place.

This race was a great learning experience for me.  There were many lessons learned in the Copper Basin 300 that were far easier learned here and now rather than 500 miles into the Iditarod.  I think I will be better prepared for the Iditarod, and hopefully avoid some costly mistakes on the trail.

The trail conditions have deteriorated here at home, so we are off again.  We plan to be training out of Glennallen again for the next several weeks.  We will keep you posted...

© 2002 Ultimate Iditarod, Snowcrest Racing Sled Dogs, Seavey's Iditarod Racing Team
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