Dreamscape

(Photo by Mike Curiak, 2005)

I’ve been glued to Iditarod Invitational race reports. Web update voyeurism has pretty much defined my day. That and my job ... in there, somewhere.

Despite an alder-choked trail setback, Pete Basinger is still tearing up the race. After he left the Puntilla Lake checkpoint at mile 165 yesterday evening, he opted to take the long way around, adding 33 miles onto what is already a 350-mile race. After nearly 18 hours of no new information, the race officials finally had him into the Rohn checkpoint, mile 210, at 11:15 a.m. and out two hours later. Word is he slept a little out on the trail last night. He had 140 more miles of what is reported to be hard, fast trail ... some of it with little to no snow, which is good if you’re a biker. And at 1:15 he still had nearly 30 hours to finish in record time. Can Pete bike 140 reportedly hardpacked miles in 30 hours, even on little to no sleep? I don’t personally know Pete, but I’m guessing it would take a grizzly bear waking up from hibernation in the -30-degree night and eating both of his tires to stop him. And even then, I don’t believe he’d stop.

Pete’s three trailers, seasoned Alaska cyclists Jeff Oatley and Rocky Reifenstuhl, and impressive Wyoming-based newcomer Jay Petervary, left Rohn at 8 this evening. No word yet on which route they chose to get to Rohn. It sounds like the alder obstacle is beyond relief - six miles of thick bushwhacking. If they heard the same information that was posted on the news board, they would have been crazy not to follow in Pete’s tire tracks, even with river overflow concerns, so I'm guessing they did the extra mileage as well. But either way, they made it.

I have a feeling that by the time I wake up tomorrow morning, this race is going to be over. And I believe Pete will have completed whatever impossible mission he set out to do ... whatever drove him to tell Geoff in July that the Iditarod Invitational “is all I think about.”

Speculation at this point is all I have ... speculation and stunning pictures of the ghost trail to McGrath, stretching closer to the Great Unknown than anyone should dare to go.

“In the past week, I’ve gone from maybe doing the race in a few years to maybe doing it next year,” Geoff wrote on the MTBR forum. “And now, with all the excitement I’m feeling from just tracking it online and seeing these pictures, I can’t imagine not doing it next year ...”

And I’m sorry, Mom, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel the same way.

Glad I'm here, wish I was there

I did sit on the couch with an ice pack on my knee for a decent part of the morning, squinting out the window at a brutally unfair blaze of sun until I could take it no longer. Even if my knee still can’t bend far enough to pedal a bicycle, at could at least drag it somewhere. Anywhere. Anywhere but here.

I decided to drive out the the glacier visitors center and go for a walk. A simple walk. I’d take it slow and loosen up my knee. I started at the edge of the lake, making my way across the ice. I veered of the trail when the footing became too uneven and shuffled through several inches of soft, unbroken powder. Even during the popular hours of a beautiful early Sunday afternoon, the wide-open lake ice serves as the perfect crowd sifter. Skiers, walkers and runners fan out in all directions, across all points, so a gimp like me can waddle along in peace.

I walked for a while, watching every step, focused only on my gait and how far each knee came up. Several minutes passed this way. And half-hour maybe. It’s hard to say. I was out for a walk, trying to ward off the creeping crazy of cabin fever, and I was still completely preoccupied with arbitrary steps. Enough so that when I looked up, I felt momentarily lost. Ahead of me, huge, electric-blue ice chunks of the Mendenhall Glacier loomed like city buildings, so close that I could only see the tips of the jagged peaks rising beyond the skyline. I turned around to see dark puffs of clouds encompassing the sun, their backlit edges burning blinding holes in the sky. Craggy, snow-covered mountains seemed to tower over even the clouds. And I admit ... I stopped for a moment, baffled. Baffled that this place still exists. Baffled that this is where I live. Baffled that even as a partial cripple, I have the option of gimping out here an hour before I have to be at work. Baffled that I can stand in the midst of this handicap-accessible white world of ice and feel - if only momentarily - as though I’ve accidentally discovered some deep and unchartable wilderness. Baffling.

Not as much so, however, as the current standings of the Iditarod Invitational. This year’s race to McGrath is beyond compelling. The racers left at 2 p.m. Saturday and all the cyclists blazed down the hard-packed trail in record time. Now, more than 30 hours into the 350-mile event, they’re hardly showing any signs of slowing down. Pete Basinger, the winner of this year’s Susitna 100, took the lead at mile 90. At 24 hours, he was nearly halfway to the finish - 165 miles. Nearly 11 hours ahead of Mike Curiak’s 2005 time at that point, Pete was on pace not only to break the course record, but absolutely shatter it.

But then came news of bad conditions on the other side of the pass ... a maze of thick, twisting alders were choking the trail, which had been wind-blasted clean of most of its snow cover. The racers had only three choices ... wait for race volunteers to cut out the brush, which could take a day or more; plow right into the thick of it, knowing that bushwhacking could be extremely slow and arduous; or ride the side route, tacking on 33 extra miles but having a marginally better chance of smooth hardpack for the remainder of the race. What will Pete do? How will he get out of this predicament?

Last we heard, he was checking out of Puntilla Lake at mile 165 and was going to decide what to do once he saw the trail. Either way, he is heading into the communication-devoid “Black Hole” of the course. He faces another long, cold night on very little to no sleep, temperatures dipping below 0, and three very different choices that could make or break him. How will he fare? Will the three cyclists on his tail leave Puntilla in time to catch up to him? Will the alder predicament rob him of the record? Stay tuned!

Man ... I love this stuff. Especially since there’s so little solid information out there. Everything is speculative and subject to the revision by the wild imaginations of those who get to sleep in warm beds tonight. This is sports spectatorship at its best, if you ask me. For the latest, check here.

Hopalong

Today was a beautiful day: sunny sky, dry air, new snow and temperatures that haven’t been above freezing in more than a week ... leaving nothing but powder dusting as far as the roads and trails stretch. In short, perfect conditions.

I, however, can’t say the same about myself. Still have that mysterious knee pain. I’m unable to bend my right knee at more than a 30 degree angle without pushing through a lot of pain. It has good periods and bad, but what doesn’t change is how weak and sore it feels, regardless of what angle I have it at.

Since it’s been a week, I’m beginning to have a lot of empathy for what Geoff when through earlier this month, struggling with mysterious foot pains. It’s really frustrating, especially since I don’t know the diagnosis or even the cause. I had that theory about overextending it in a posthole, but who knows?

The worst part, beyond everyone asking me ‘Why are you limping?’ is that all of this pent-up energy is just pooling and fermenting inside of me. I’ve had to cut back my caffeine intake. Today, I went to the gym to do some upper-body weight lifting and pedal the stationary bike with my left leg while propping my right on the frame — just to get some of the shakes out. I even walked on the treadmill for a little while. My knee loosened up and felt great all afternoon, but this evening is back to being stiff.

I’m thinking about going to see a doctor this week. But if I’m going to drop a big co-pay on an ‘expert,’ I’d like something a little more substantial than vague guesses. Geoff received a lot of good info by reaching out to other ultrarunners on the Web. So I thought I’d do the same.

If you’re still reading after my gripe fest, maybe you can help me. My problem is stiff/soreness on the top of my knee, mostly in the tissue immediately around my kneecap. It’s tender enough that it hurts when I press down on the top of my knee. There was some swelling for three or four days, but that’s mostly gone down. It is getting better, just slowly. I’m not sure if the pain is in muscle or tendons. It’s basically right in the joint.

Has anyone out there ever experienced something like this? Since I don’t know exactly how it happened, any information will give be a leg to stand on, so to speak.

Thanks again. I know the importance of recovery and the virtue of patience. But recent comments about “major reconstructive surgery” just have me a little worried.

But if I can’t bike in this beautiful winter weather, at least I have a good sporting event to watch. The 350-mile Iditarod Invitational began today, which means that every 12 hours or so, some names will appear in white text on a black screen, telling me where each hardcore winter racer is located and when they rolled through. The updates are slow and not very visual, but for me, this is more exciting than the Superbowl. Go Pete!