Yukon 1000 Canoe and Kayak Race  


longest Race 

The Story of the 2009 Yukon 1000

Team Bios
Results

Sunday 19th, morning
Sunday 19th, evening
Monday 20th after lunch
Race News, day 2
Race News end of Day 2
Overnight Results day 3
Thursday/Friday update
Friday/Saturday update
Saturday/Sunday update
Finished!
Sunday/Monday press release
Tuesday's press release

Yukon 360

Sunday 19th, morning

There are racers who have done their homework, and there are those racers who have not.

All the teams who are entered in the Yukon 1000 have put in a lot of time and energy into getting prepared: they are all good strong paddlers, and they are all prepared for the wilderness.

Most of the teams have got themselves the Spot devices, have registered them with the race, tested them, and become familiar with them. Some teams have not. Most teams are in Whitehorse and have contacted me. Some have not yet.

I have been scurrying around, and will continue to scurry around for the next day, trying to help those teams who did not do their homework in good time. I will be spending this morning with a couple of teams who have spot devices but do not have them set up right.

There are a couple more teams whose spot devices are not set up right and who have not yet contacted me. These teams are running the risk of not being allowed to start. It a team does not sent spot data while they are in this race, they are breaking the rules. Worse, they are putting the whole race in jeopardy. The race needs permission from the US Coast Guard to be run, and they expect to see this data. If teams do not produce the data, then permission for next year will be that much harder to get. I cannot allow a team to start if they are putting the race in jeopardy.

I will do what I can to help these teams get their act together, but I cannot allow any team to start unless I am convinced that they can comply with the spot tracking rule.

If a team starts, but then does not send data correctly in the first section of the race (Whitehorse to Carmacks), they will be flagged down in Carmacks and we will try to get their spots set up properly. If a team does not stop in Carmacks when flagged down, or if a team does not produce spot data in the second leg of the race (Carmacks to Dawson), they will be disqualified. I cannot stop them from paddling down river, but they will not be part of the race.

Teams have had months and months to get this working. I have been tracking some teams as they practice since before Christmas. If a team finds themselves disqualified over their lack of preparation, or lack of use of the spot devices, they have no one to blame but themselves. Setting up the Spot devices is not very hard, but it is not a traditional bush skill, not a traditional paddling skill. I know that. That is why there are pages on the web site telling people how to do it, and that is why I have been more than happy over the last 9 months to help people get it right. And that is why I’m spending so much time on this today (and yesterday, and probably tomorrow).

But why, oh why did it have to be left to the last minute?

Meanwhile, this afternoon, Shipyards Park, will be the boat and gear inspection, and the racer briefing.

Sunday 19th, evening

The boat and gear check went reasonably will. There were a number of issues that racers have to address by tomorrow morning, but that is only to be expected.

Almost all outstanding Spot issued were ironed out. There is now only one team which has not yet sent me a Spot message. They know that they will not start until that has been rectified.

The weather looks good for at least the first couple of days of the race. Sun with clouds, high of 19°C with winds from the South at 20kph. That should make the lake crossing pretty "easy".

Good luck to all paddlers.

Monday 20th after lunch

All the teams are away, all teams have successfully send Spot data to race control today.

One team, "aching joints" decided at the last minute that their boat was inadequate and switched to a new one. They left about 1:30 late, but that will probably not affect the race order at all.

The weather here is pretty good. a bit overcast, about 17°C, with winds from the South at 30-40kpm. That is a bit breeze, but it is from the South which means it is a tail wind on the Lake. It is still going to be rough, but no whare near as bad as if there was a head wind.

There are also other boats on the river.  This time of year you will meet other paddlers on the river before Dawson who can relay messages.  Past Dawson you encounter little traffic until you get past Circle.  In the Flats you will see river boats from time to time as people go to tend their fish camps. 

Race News, day 2

The overnight positions seem to be

Race News end of Day 2

Today was another beautiful paddling day on the Yukon, and the paddlers in the Yukon 1000 made good use of it. The race has divided into 3 parts, like all good stories. In the front are the three British kayaks, the voyageur and the canoe of team Price and Olson from Georgia and Florida. Then there is a well defined middle pack, and a long tail.

The first story of the day was all to do with the tail. The back marker spent Monday night about half way up Lake Laberge. Their last checkin Monday night was at about 10:45pm. Unlike all other teams, they did not send a morning checkin. One can, in the absence of real information, construct all sorts of scenarios why a team might fail to send their morning checkin. However, the race procedures are quite clear what should be done: The race coordinator shall call the team’s emergency contact and make it his or her responsibility. In this case, they said that they were quite likely to be slow to get going in the morning. By noon, the team still had not moved. So we called the emergency contact again. Again one can imagine all sorts of bad things. But this is a very bush savvy team with many miles in a canoe, so the guiding principle was “If you hear hoofbeats it might be zebra, but it is probably horses”. So the assumption was again that either they were slow getting going, or they had not set up their Spot device in track mode properly. The team was given a 30 minute penalty for going 6 hours in the day without checking in, and by 1pm they were on the move and tracking. The system works.

The next bit of drama was at the front of the pack, with a formal complaint from team 10, the Voyageur, regarding teams 1 and 4, two of the kayaks. The basis of the complaint is that the kayaks do not have maps, are purposely obstructing the voyageur, are assisting each other and are using the voyageur for direction and mapping. These complaints will be investigated at the end of the race when we can talk to both teams. There have been rumblings of bad blood between kayaks and voyageurs in races up here before, but this sounds more bitter than most. I do not want to prejudice the case, so I will say no more, other than to say that in all race sports, from Formula One to dog mushing, there is sometimes friction between teams, and when you are racing hard, it may be to your best advantage to push the limits either by questionable behaviour or aggressive complaints.

The teams are now spread out over a huge distance. The first boat blew through Carmacks at about 2pm, the rest of the top five by 3pm. At that time, the back marker was still only half way up Lake Laberge, and the bulk of the racers were between Big Eddy Woodyard and Selkirk Rock, half way between Hootalinqua and Carmacks.

Overnight order:

Overnight Results day 3

Wednesday was an uneventful day, as it should be, with the boats making good progress down the river in what appear to be almost perfect conditions. We thought the leaders would get into Dawson before stopping, but they chose to make camp just upstream. The Kayakers continue to make me look foolish as they continue to dominate the front holding positions 1, 2 and 4 with the voyageur in 3rd. But the race is not even half way done, and the teams must be starting to hurt. The leaders are making very comparable times to the front runners in the Yukon River Quest, despite having heavier boats and the water level being lower. But they do have that 6 hour rest each night!

The overnight order was as follows.

Thursday/Friday update

By the end of Thursday, the leaders of the Yukon 1000 had passed the half way mark, and all 17 teams had successfully navigated Five Finger and Rinks Rapids. On Wednesday evening, the lead pack of five boats had all camped within 25 km of Dawson. These teams passed through Dawson between 5am and 7am Thursday, and by the end of the day all but three teams in the race were into or past Dawson. The Paddling time to Dawson for teams 1 and 4 was 42 hours, for teams 10 and 15 it was 43 hours. Team 11 took 44 hours.

The front five teams are now well into Alaska. It is encouraging to see the result times on the web page change from PDT to AKDT as the teams pass through Eagle. The leaders are still team Hendron, but they have not been able to shake the chasing pack of two other kayaks, one canoe and the one voyageur team in the race. Any of these leading teams could easily go on to win. The Yukon River becomes very wide and very braided after Circle, and teams can gain or lose a lot of time depending on which channel they choose to take. Nevertheless, team Hendron and their pursuers are surpassing all expectations, and look to be on course to complete the distance in less than the seven days organisers had predicted.

The sad news for the day is that Team Fruit Loops, Mary Houck and John Ders, has had to withdraw. John was taken to the clinic in Dawson where medical personnel advised them not to continue. They made the decision to paddle slowly to Dawson rather than press the panic button on the Spot device that all teams are required to carry. We are very sorry to lose them, and we wish John a speedy recovery.

It shows the calibre of the paddlers in this race that they pressed on to Dawson even in light of potentially serious medical complications. The spirit of the Yukon 1000 is one of complete self-sufficiency, and Team Fruit Loops exemplified this spirit admirably.

The weather continues to be exceptional along the course of the race, and all forecasts indicate that this trend will continue. The software set up to monitor the race is working perfectly, and up-to-date information on racers` locations can be viewed online at http://yukon1000.com. The one exception is team All The Way 2, who did not check in between 12:09pm Thursday and 2:20am Friday. This is a serious offence by the race rules, and a penalty will be imposed.

The Spot devices are wonderful devices and help family and friends not worry as long as there is information. But the flip side of that is that as soon as information ceases to flow, people can worry unduely.

Going into Friday morning, the race order was:

Friday/Saturday update

At the end of only their fifth night on the river, the leaders of the Yukon 1000 were approaching Fort Yukon, and all but one of the teams had crossed the border into Alaska.

Teams Hendron and All the Way 2 are still battling it out at the front. In their canoe, Price and Olson look to have caught up the voyageur, vying for third overall, along with After the Gold Rush. The main pack are approximately one day behind.

At the rate they’re travelling, the front pack may finish the race as early as Sunday afternoon.

Around lunch time on Friday, Team Aching Joints, who were bringing up the rear, decided they were simply having too much fun on the river and contacted race control to inform them that they have elected to take their time and enjoy the experience, rather than exhaust themselves racing for the finish. They will continue to be monitored should they choose to check in with their Spot device, but they are no longer official competitors in the race. The latest update from them was at 9:20am on Saturday, from 18 km past Fort Selkirk.

Team Tanned Rested and Ready, the current red lantern team, left Dawson at about 9am Saturday morning.

The finishing ceremony will be held in Whitehorse on August 1st at the Yukon Inn, and results can be monitored on the website at http://yukon1000.com.

Overnight positions:

Saturday/Sunday update

The leaders of the Yukon 1000 Canoe and Kayak Race will be arriving at the Dalton Highway bridge today. Teams Hendron and After the Gold Rush are running close together, less than 50 km from the end. The front 5 teams all look to be on course to finish today. All the Way 2 are running third. Yukon Voyageurs is fourth, closely pursued by Price and Olson in the first canoe team. Perhaps most striking in the front pack is the ascent of After the Gold Rush. They have kept up with the leading pack since the beginning of the race, but in the last day or two they have surged up the field, moving from fourth place and at least two hours behind the Hendrons to first place. They ended yesterday camped alongside Team Hendron, but appear to have stopped 15 minutes earlier. For teams of this quality, it’s now almost a sprint to the finish, albeit it a rather long one.

A couple of teams failed to make their evening check ins last night, but there has been nothing to panic about. Both teams sent OK messages this morning, and all teams remaining in the race were on the water again by about 6 am. Prerequisites for entering the Yukon 1000 include, above all else, experience in wilderness travel. Teams are equipped with enough food to last them 3 weeks, water purification systems, and all sorts of safety equipment. Race officials decided long ago that while we encourage the most competitive paddlers to enter the race, it is just as easy to track slow teams as fast ones, so it is no surprise that there is a huge spread in the field. Every team involved is more than capable of fending for themselves on the river for as long as it might take a casual tourist to float to the Dalton.

Overnight positions:

Finished!

Team Hendron and Team After the Gold Rush WIN! In a stunning time of just 6 days, two hours, the two English teams reached the Dalton Highway bridge together. More to come. Congratulations!

We have arranged a deal by which you get 10% off Air North Tickets.  Contact info@yukon1000.com for information on how to take advantage of this deal.

I just received a call from Russ Dawkins, one of the paddlers in Team After the Gold Rush. He informed me that they and Team Hendron crossed the line together today, after approximately 6 days, 2 hours and 11 minutes. GPS data should confirm their story. Congratulations to these incredible athletes. An unbelievable feat. Choice quote from that interview: "If it had gone on one more day, I think I would have died."

Sunday/Monday press release

The first ever running of the Yukon 1000 Canoe and Kayak Race, the world’s longest annual canoe and kayak race, is drawing to an end. The first five teams have already completed the 1000 mile race, which starts in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, and continues along the Yukon River into Alaska, ending at the Dalton Highway Bridge, the last road access on the river. Team After the Gold Rush put on an incredible show of speed in their kayak over the last few days of their race, catching up Team Hendron shortly before the finish. The two teams from Richmond Kayak Club in England finished together to share the honours as overall winners, completing the course in just 6 days, 2 hours, 11 minutes and 7 seconds. All the Way 2 finished third, followed by Yukon Voyageurs, in the only voyageur, and Price and Olson, in the first canoe. The ten remaining teams spent the night spread out over the river from 22 km past Slaven’s Cabin to about 71 km before the finish.

The race has been a huge success thus far. Only two teams have withdrawn during the race, one for complications of a pre-existing medical condition, and the other because they were simply having too much fun and wanted to take their time to enjoy the river. The others have all either finished, or look to do so within the next few days. The bulk of the pack should finish within the next couple of days.

Family and friends of the competitors, as well as a significant number of paddlers interested in competing in the future, have been enjoying the unique way they can monitor the results, with the website, Yukon1000.com, providing automatic real-time updates and detailed Google Earth images of the teams’ locations. The success and functionality of the system has been confirmed by this race, and the same system will be in place for the Yukon 360, which takes place on a different river each year on Discovery Day weekend in the Yukon. This year, the race starts on August 15, and goes from Johnson’s Crossing to Carmacks, approximately 360 miles on the Teslin and Yukon Rivers.

Yukon 1000 overnight positions, end of day 6:

Tuesday's press release

Only four teams remain on the water in the Yukon 1000 race, with eleven having finished in less than 8 days after leaving Whitehorse last Monday.

While the race has been a huge success, inevitably a few wrinkles still need to be ironed out. Most of the teams acquired some sort of provisional penalties, and race officials are reviewing GPS track data to confirm that many of these penalties were not due to any actual rule infraction. If a team’s Spot data indicates a stop of just under 6 hours, it is very possible that, for example, the evening Spot check in took a few minutes to go through, thus showing them as making camp later than they actually did. Teams will not be penalised for such an occurrence, but official finishing times for some teams may vary slightly from what is posted on the results webpage.

The Spot data have proven to be invaluable, as family and friends have been able to watch the race unfold without concern for the safety of their loved ones. Relatively accurate estimates can be made regarding arrival times to organise racer and boat pick ups at the finish, and the painful waiting game that is all too familiar to support crews in all other marathon events is made much less painful. Before the advent of this new technology, a race such as the Yukon 1000 was simply not possible. The risks associated with exhausted paddlers being out of contact for so long, so far away from civilization, were simply too great. Many thanks to the people at Spot Satellite Messenger for allowing this race to happen.

Race organisers truly appreciate the many votes of thanks they have received over the last week.

It is now only two and a half weeks until the Yukon 1000’s sister race, the Yukon 360, starts on August 15th, in Johnson’s Crossing, Yukon. While those responsible for running the Yukon 1000 will be racing in the Yukon 360, most of the system is entirely automated, so whatever else happens, the live Spot data on the website will again be readily available for anyone with an internet connection. Entries are still being accepted for the 360 mile long event. The entry process is also automated, and the forms are available at http://yukon1000.com/360/index.html.

Positions as of Tuesday morning, and provisional finishing order:

Yukon 360

Team Bios
Results

The inaugural running of the Yukon 360, from Johnson’s Crossing to Carmacks last weekend, went almost flawlessly. The field was small, and almost entirely local, but the organisers are confident that will change in future years.

There were some last minute rule changes. The rules stipulated that teams had to be off the water by 10:30, and had to stop overnight for 8 hours. But the race was on the Teslin River where there had been recent burn. There was still some burning and a lot of smoldering between Boswell River and the Livingston Trial. That could be up to 3 hours of paddling time, so the overnight stop rule was changed to be: “You must be off the river between 11:30pm and 4:30am, and you must be stopped for at least 8 hours”. That meant that paddlers had 3 hours of flexibility on where to stop in the evening. In the event, it turned out that most paddlers opted for an early stop – early start strategy.

This time of year, the Teslin starts slow, and stays slow for a frustratingly long time. Even when it picks up, it still felt slow to the paddlers who were mostly veterans of the Yukon River Quest, which is run when the Yukon is more or less at its crest. This probably explains why paddlers stopped early, having paddled hard to try to get their GPSs to give the sort of speeds they were used to seeing.

The second day dawned warm and promising, and got better. There were strong tail winds down the Teslin, and for the front of the pack onto the Yukon. But as anyone who has paddled there rivers knows, they do not flow in the same direction for long, and whatever the wind direction is it will be against you somewhere. For the first 5 boats, that section was a 3 km stretch of river just before the 4th of July bend. This is a straight section pointing in exactly the wrong direction and the wind was breaking trees and kicking up waves almost a metre high -- short choppy waves as the wind was against the current. No one in the race, and there were some real river veterans paddling, had ever seen anything like this on the Yukon before. It was quite challenging. At the finish, paddlers were heard to mutter that they would cheerfully have passed on the tail winds to avoid that one section of head wind.

As the River turned more westerly and less northerly, the sections of headwinds became more frequent, although none were as intense as that one big blow. Even the leaders abandoned hope of getting into Carmacks on Sunday night. “Why fight a head wind and exhaust yourself when it will probably by better in the morning?” was the thought. So again, most paddlers opted for an early night.

Monday again started kind to the paddlers, warm even at 4am when the first paddlers were stirring for start around 5am, and remained kind with less wind and little rain until most of the paddlers were off the river.

There was one last minute withdrawal from the race: Tim Hodgson was not feeling well and felt it better not to start.

If anyone looks at the results page they will see one boat disqualified for “missing required gear”. This paddler did not have a boat. In fact, he was a ghost paddler, and only existed in the form of an extra Spot device that one of the other boats was carrying down the river. A small prank pulled by the organisers. We may even make a habit of it.

The low water threw off the calculations the race organisers had made about how long the race would take by about 3 hours, not bad for a first running of a race.

The entry fee for the race was $100 per paddler, and the race costs were very low. Each paddler was given a race T-shirt and poster, and the prize money (calculated on how much money was left over after costs were subtracted) was $269.71 to each paddler in the first place canoe, $134.86 to each paddler in the second canoe, and $67.43 to each paddler in the third canoe. No prizes were award for the single kayak entry, although he was given a bottle of Coke.

The organisers are already looking forward to next year’s Yukon 360, which will be run on the Pelly River from Faro to Pelly Crossing on Discovery Day Weekend 2010.

The final times for the racers were: