The coldest race on Earth
Looking down at my battered shins at the end of the inaugural 430-mile (692-kilometre) Yukon Arctic Ultra, I was convinced that what I saw was simply another hallucination brought on by the sleep deprivation experienced by every multi-day adventure racer. Taped to each leg, just below the knee, was a perfect row of… tampons.
Wow, I thought, this even beats meeting the Pope during a bike race across Alaska (sat on a snowbank, he offered me some chocolate biscuits, which I refused on the grounds that they were milk, not dark). Blinking hard, I prodded at my leg, expecting it to morph into an elephant, a fridge, or another hallucinatory bathroom item – a hairy rubber duck, perhaps.
‘It’s okay,’ a voice quietly explained, ‘the tampons were attached on day six to ease the pain in your shins. They were the only things we could find to make a rigid splint. Don’t you remember?’
Eventually, of course, I did remember; first, the excruciating pain in both legs caused by trying to run hundreds of kilometres in deep snow with under-prepared calf muscles, and then a vague recollection of a race medic rummaging in a kit bag, a long ‘Hmmm, I wonder…’, and then the unmistakable sound of duct-tape strips being torn off a roll.
Secrets of the ultra
Pre-Google, these ultra-race tips and tricks were the stuff of legend, swapped among those in the know and often fiercely guarded from newcomers. On an early trip to cycle Alaska’s infamous Iditasport, I had swapped faxes with the race headquarters in the vague hope of gleaning nuggets of information on kit requirements. Advice wasn’t forthcoming, possibly because of the organiser’s hope that some poor novice would die in his race ‘to help publicity for next year’. Now, anyone with access to the internet can plunder the countless race reports, event blogs and forum postings for the latest hints and ideas on everything from kit to tactics.
Fast-forward to the Yukon Arctic Ultra (YAU). I had had the benefit of email contact with race veterans and arrived reasonably well prepared for 430 miles of sub-zero racing in an event that proclaims itself ‘the world’s coldest and toughest ultra’.
This biennial chillathon, held in February of odd-numbered years, traces the route of the Yukon Quest dogsled race, one of the two longest dog-mushing events in the world. Like its Alaskan counterpart, the Iditarod, the Yukon Quest has its roots in the gold rush of the late 1890s, when prospectors from across the world descended on the town of Whitehorse – now the starting point for both the YAU and the Quest – before rafting and paddling down the Yukon in home-made boats towards the goldfields of the legendary Klondike.
For prospectors, the prize was the fortune to be panned from the creek beds; for us, it was simply the satisfaction of crossing a snowy finish line in Dawson City, a town established purely because of the gold found in its backyard. The place is now a ramshackle collection of dirt streets, dusty saloons and rickety wooden sidewalks.
In my quest for Dawson, I would be swapping the bike for running shoes, a simple harness and a plastic sled. But it became apparent that the ultra-lightweight habits ingrained by snow biking would be difficult to shake off.
Preparing for snow
When cycling on snow, every gram can make the difference between your bike floating on the snow’s crust or sinking through it and forcing you to walk (and push). Now, count up all those metal zip tags, manufacturers’ fancy labels and even the long handle of your toothbrush. A frenzy of chopping, sawing, slicing and cutting is what’s needed. The end result is a satisfying pile of offcuts.
I applied the same mindset to preparations for the Yukon, starting with the means of dragging all my kit. Should I use a full harness and pulk, or a kiddie sled on a length of rope? My thinking was simple: keep the overall weight down and the latter would suffice.
A quick internet search turned up a range of sled options in the £20 bracket, many of which featured steering wheels and pink flower decals. I opted for a plain green model (minus steering) and drilled holes for a tow-rope attachment. A cannibalised rucksack waistbelt served as a harness. The tow rope was fed through super-flexible plastic conduit poles to stop the sled nipping at my ankles on the downhills. It was a simple, low-cost, lightweight set-up.
I visited the local sports shop in search of a sled bag. A basic football-kit bag, complete with zips that were easy to open with gloved hands, set me back £15. Its unnecessary padding was added to the growing pile of offcuts. The bag’s three large compartments held clothing, food and technical equipment. An extra-thick bin liner, secured to the base of the kit bag, was pulled up and over to form a snow cover.
Fuel, food and fire
I could rely on my trusty MSR Whisperlite stove to burn whatever fuel was available, and a large titanium pan made by the same company was my lightweight choice for melting snow. A pan grip (drilled out like a piece of Emmental cheese) was added to the cook set, along with a one-litre MSR fuel bottle and an extra emergency half-litre plastic fuel bottle, just in case the weather turned nasty and forced a multi-day bivvy. A fire-starting kit (containing striker, kindling, alcohol swabs and waterproof matches) went into a watertight bag that I kept on me at all times in case I fell through river or lake ice and needed to build a fire to reheat myself.
My down sleeping bag and waterproof, breathable bivvy bag lived inside a waterproof stuff sack that was oversized to aid packing at –40°C. A Therm-a-Rest Z Lite mat completed the sleep system, which was strapped onto the sled alongside the kit bag.
Working hard in dry, super-cold conditions means wearing layers with as many ventilation options as possible. Cold can be dressed for, but a sweat-soaked body can spell disaster. I packed zipped base layers, a windproof jacket with pit zips, a synthetic-filled jacket and trousers (the latter with full-length zips) and a selection of face masks, headbands, hats, gloves and mitts.
My principal food was ‘power balls’: a sticky concoction of oats, honey, coconut, sultanas, peanut butter and whatever else was cheap at Whitehorse’s budget supermarket, mixed together in the bathroom rubbish bin, moulded into snooker-ball-sized lumps and hung out of the hotel window to freeze overnight. Delicious. An assortment of pepperoni, nuts, jelly sweets, salmon strips and chocolate raisins were also packed into three drop bags and dispatched to the handful of checkpoints along the way.
On the trail
And so to the race. Twenty-four hours before the human-powered competitors left the downtown starting line, 30 teams of dogs hurtled out of Whitehorse to begin the Quest. It was an inspiring sight. Conditions were good; bright sunshine, –25°C and a hard-packed trail.
Thankfully, our race day dawned the same. We were soon racing up the frozen Yukon River in a drawn-out snake of runners, skiers and bikers, pausing only to adjust clothing to regulate temperature, to snack and hydrate, and to take the occasional photograph.
During the night, plummeting temperatures meant that the trail set up superbly, resulting in faster progress and bringing the 100-mile (161-kilometre) checkpoint at Braeburn into view within two days of the start. After a few hours of sleep, it was on to the Chain Lakes, some of which are more than 11 kilometres long and breathtakingly beautiful. Then into the hills, through patches of overflow (where running water flows across deep-frozen rivers and streams), forests, windblown tundra and into local villages where the welcome was as warm as the moose stew we gratefully lapped up.
By now, injury, fatigue and weather conditions had depleted the field to just a handful of competitors. As my Belgian friend Frank turned off towards the finish for the 300-mile race, I found myself at the head of the 430-mile race. And then it got seriously cold.
As I climbed out of Pelly Farm towards Scroggie Creek, the temperature hovered around –40°C; not a problem. Over the portage, the mercury dipped to –50°C; care needed.
By Scroggie Creek, it had plunged to –61°C without windchill. Stumbling blearily into the garden-shed-sized shack that is Scroggie’s only building, I learned from the race officials that the YAU had been temporarily halted, pending further weather reports.
As I shivered through the night, I was joined by four more competitors who had been picked up by snowmobiles and brought to safety. The temperature kept falling, and eventually the race director called time on the race because he couldn’t guarantee emergency response without endangering the lives of his staff. We didn’t argue.
Two days later, in a balmy –45°C, a bush plane skied onto the river beside the Scroggie Hilton and shuttled us back to Whitehorse, wearied, frostnipped and vowing to return. Two years later, I reached Dawson in a little over ten days to claim third place in this epic winter event.
‘But what about your toes?’
‘Running shoes?’ said the old Yukoner, staring at my feet. ‘At 40 degrees below?’ I smiled nervously and assured him they would be fine. ‘Sure they will, but what about your toes?’ he said with a chuckle.
To be fair, I had received the same reaction from everyone else who heard I was planning to tackle the Yukon Arctic Ultra in a pair of trainers. It seemed crazy – how could a thin strip of fabric and rubber cope with such extremes of temperature? The answer is simple: with every step, the foot flexes, forcing blood through the foot (and its five little extremities) and maintaining a safe temperature.
I had discovered this secret while cycling Alaska’s Iditasport in a pair of Arctic overboots I had bought on the promise of them being, well, Arctic-proof. Riding across the frozen Bering Sea, toes long since numbed, I had been forced off the bike by uneven ice. In frustration, I started to run. Warmth returned almost instantly.
Five years later, lining up for the YAU, I put my faith in the Alaska experiment and donned a pair of waterproof, breathable Montrail Hurricane Ridge XCR trail shoes, one size larger than my usual shoe size to accommodate extra socks and swollen feet. They worked perfectly.
Andy Heading is a professional sports photographer who has cycled and run more winter ultra-race kilometres than any other European. For more information, visit www.racekit.co.uk. Follow Andy’s progress in this year’s race, or enter for the 2013 event, at www.arcticultra.de
Ten of the best
Don’t forget…
a leak-proof one-litre Nalgene bottle. It’s perfect as a hot-water bottle in your sleeping bag. In the night, it doubles as a pee bottle, because there’s nothing worse than climbing out of your bag at –40°C
February 2011
Wow, I thought, this even beats meeting the Pope during a bike race across Alaska (sat on a snowbank, he offered me some chocolate biscuits, which I refused on the grounds that they were milk, not dark). Blinking hard, I prodded at my leg, expecting it to morph into an elephant, a fridge, or another hallucinatory bathroom item – a hairy rubber duck, perhaps.
‘It’s okay,’ a voice quietly explained, ‘the tampons were attached on day six to ease the pain in your shins. They were the only things we could find to make a rigid splint. Don’t you remember?’
Eventually, of course, I did remember; first, the excruciating pain in both legs caused by trying to run hundreds of kilometres in deep snow with under-prepared calf muscles, and then a vague recollection of a race medic rummaging in a kit bag, a long ‘Hmmm, I wonder…’, and then the unmistakable sound of duct-tape strips being torn off a roll.
Secrets of the ultra
Pre-Google, these ultra-race tips and tricks were the stuff of legend, swapped among those in the know and often fiercely guarded from newcomers. On an early trip to cycle Alaska’s infamous Iditasport, I had swapped faxes with the race headquarters in the vague hope of gleaning nuggets of information on kit requirements. Advice wasn’t forthcoming, possibly because of the organiser’s hope that some poor novice would die in his race ‘to help publicity for next year’. Now, anyone with access to the internet can plunder the countless race reports, event blogs and forum postings for the latest hints and ideas on everything from kit to tactics.
Fast-forward to the Yukon Arctic Ultra (YAU). I had had the benefit of email contact with race veterans and arrived reasonably well prepared for 430 miles of sub-zero racing in an event that proclaims itself ‘the world’s coldest and toughest ultra’.
This biennial chillathon, held in February of odd-numbered years, traces the route of the Yukon Quest dogsled race, one of the two longest dog-mushing events in the world. Like its Alaskan counterpart, the Iditarod, the Yukon Quest has its roots in the gold rush of the late 1890s, when prospectors from across the world descended on the town of Whitehorse – now the starting point for both the YAU and the Quest – before rafting and paddling down the Yukon in home-made boats towards the goldfields of the legendary Klondike.
For prospectors, the prize was the fortune to be panned from the creek beds; for us, it was simply the satisfaction of crossing a snowy finish line in Dawson City, a town established purely because of the gold found in its backyard. The place is now a ramshackle collection of dirt streets, dusty saloons and rickety wooden sidewalks.
In my quest for Dawson, I would be swapping the bike for running shoes, a simple harness and a plastic sled. But it became apparent that the ultra-lightweight habits ingrained by snow biking would be difficult to shake off.
Preparing for snow
When cycling on snow, every gram can make the difference between your bike floating on the snow’s crust or sinking through it and forcing you to walk (and push). Now, count up all those metal zip tags, manufacturers’ fancy labels and even the long handle of your toothbrush. A frenzy of chopping, sawing, slicing and cutting is what’s needed. The end result is a satisfying pile of offcuts.
I applied the same mindset to preparations for the Yukon, starting with the means of dragging all my kit. Should I use a full harness and pulk, or a kiddie sled on a length of rope? My thinking was simple: keep the overall weight down and the latter would suffice.
A quick internet search turned up a range of sled options in the £20 bracket, many of which featured steering wheels and pink flower decals. I opted for a plain green model (minus steering) and drilled holes for a tow-rope attachment. A cannibalised rucksack waistbelt served as a harness. The tow rope was fed through super-flexible plastic conduit poles to stop the sled nipping at my ankles on the downhills. It was a simple, low-cost, lightweight set-up.
I visited the local sports shop in search of a sled bag. A basic football-kit bag, complete with zips that were easy to open with gloved hands, set me back £15. Its unnecessary padding was added to the growing pile of offcuts. The bag’s three large compartments held clothing, food and technical equipment. An extra-thick bin liner, secured to the base of the kit bag, was pulled up and over to form a snow cover.
Fuel, food and fire
I could rely on my trusty MSR Whisperlite stove to burn whatever fuel was available, and a large titanium pan made by the same company was my lightweight choice for melting snow. A pan grip (drilled out like a piece of Emmental cheese) was added to the cook set, along with a one-litre MSR fuel bottle and an extra emergency half-litre plastic fuel bottle, just in case the weather turned nasty and forced a multi-day bivvy. A fire-starting kit (containing striker, kindling, alcohol swabs and waterproof matches) went into a watertight bag that I kept on me at all times in case I fell through river or lake ice and needed to build a fire to reheat myself.
My down sleeping bag and waterproof, breathable bivvy bag lived inside a waterproof stuff sack that was oversized to aid packing at –40°C. A Therm-a-Rest Z Lite mat completed the sleep system, which was strapped onto the sled alongside the kit bag.
Working hard in dry, super-cold conditions means wearing layers with as many ventilation options as possible. Cold can be dressed for, but a sweat-soaked body can spell disaster. I packed zipped base layers, a windproof jacket with pit zips, a synthetic-filled jacket and trousers (the latter with full-length zips) and a selection of face masks, headbands, hats, gloves and mitts.
My principal food was ‘power balls’: a sticky concoction of oats, honey, coconut, sultanas, peanut butter and whatever else was cheap at Whitehorse’s budget supermarket, mixed together in the bathroom rubbish bin, moulded into snooker-ball-sized lumps and hung out of the hotel window to freeze overnight. Delicious. An assortment of pepperoni, nuts, jelly sweets, salmon strips and chocolate raisins were also packed into three drop bags and dispatched to the handful of checkpoints along the way.
On the trail
And so to the race. Twenty-four hours before the human-powered competitors left the downtown starting line, 30 teams of dogs hurtled out of Whitehorse to begin the Quest. It was an inspiring sight. Conditions were good; bright sunshine, –25°C and a hard-packed trail.
Thankfully, our race day dawned the same. We were soon racing up the frozen Yukon River in a drawn-out snake of runners, skiers and bikers, pausing only to adjust clothing to regulate temperature, to snack and hydrate, and to take the occasional photograph.
During the night, plummeting temperatures meant that the trail set up superbly, resulting in faster progress and bringing the 100-mile (161-kilometre) checkpoint at Braeburn into view within two days of the start. After a few hours of sleep, it was on to the Chain Lakes, some of which are more than 11 kilometres long and breathtakingly beautiful. Then into the hills, through patches of overflow (where running water flows across deep-frozen rivers and streams), forests, windblown tundra and into local villages where the welcome was as warm as the moose stew we gratefully lapped up.
By now, injury, fatigue and weather conditions had depleted the field to just a handful of competitors. As my Belgian friend Frank turned off towards the finish for the 300-mile race, I found myself at the head of the 430-mile race. And then it got seriously cold.
As I climbed out of Pelly Farm towards Scroggie Creek, the temperature hovered around –40°C; not a problem. Over the portage, the mercury dipped to –50°C; care needed.
By Scroggie Creek, it had plunged to –61°C without windchill. Stumbling blearily into the garden-shed-sized shack that is Scroggie’s only building, I learned from the race officials that the YAU had been temporarily halted, pending further weather reports.
As I shivered through the night, I was joined by four more competitors who had been picked up by snowmobiles and brought to safety. The temperature kept falling, and eventually the race director called time on the race because he couldn’t guarantee emergency response without endangering the lives of his staff. We didn’t argue.
Two days later, in a balmy –45°C, a bush plane skied onto the river beside the Scroggie Hilton and shuttled us back to Whitehorse, wearied, frostnipped and vowing to return. Two years later, I reached Dawson in a little over ten days to claim third place in this epic winter event.
‘But what about your toes?’
‘Running shoes?’ said the old Yukoner, staring at my feet. ‘At 40 degrees below?’ I smiled nervously and assured him they would be fine. ‘Sure they will, but what about your toes?’ he said with a chuckle.
To be fair, I had received the same reaction from everyone else who heard I was planning to tackle the Yukon Arctic Ultra in a pair of trainers. It seemed crazy – how could a thin strip of fabric and rubber cope with such extremes of temperature? The answer is simple: with every step, the foot flexes, forcing blood through the foot (and its five little extremities) and maintaining a safe temperature.
I had discovered this secret while cycling Alaska’s Iditasport in a pair of Arctic overboots I had bought on the promise of them being, well, Arctic-proof. Riding across the frozen Bering Sea, toes long since numbed, I had been forced off the bike by uneven ice. In frustration, I started to run. Warmth returned almost instantly.
Five years later, lining up for the YAU, I put my faith in the Alaska experiment and donned a pair of waterproof, breathable Montrail Hurricane Ridge XCR trail shoes, one size larger than my usual shoe size to accommodate extra socks and swollen feet. They worked perfectly.
Andy Heading is a professional sports photographer who has cycled and run more winter ultra-race kilometres than any other European. For more information, visit www.racekit.co.uk. Follow Andy’s progress in this year’s race, or enter for the 2013 event, at www.arcticultra.de
Ten of the best
Start the slideshow (10 pictures)
Don’t forget…
a leak-proof one-litre Nalgene bottle. It’s perfect as a hot-water bottle in your sleeping bag. In the night, it doubles as a pee bottle, because there’s nothing worse than climbing out of your bag at –40°C
February 2011
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