Mike Morgan preps for his 16th Iron Dog
Mike Morgan has competed in every Iron Dog since 2009 except for one. He has finished twelve times, ended in the top three eight times, and won the race twice. Now, he’s going for his sixteenth Iron Dog.
This year may be the toughest conditions he’s seen yet. There’s below average snow throughout the race trail. Some areas, particularly leading up to the first checkpoint and again after Rohn, have almost no snow at all. In the interior, some of the snow has melted or been rained on and is now packed liked “concrete,” according to Morgan.
“We’ve never had one this bad. We’ve had some bad years,” said Morgan. “This is probably the worst I’ve seen yet, as far as on this end.”
Usually, he would start training around Thanksgiving, but because of the late snow, this year he wasn’t able to start until about a month ago. He has only gotten about half the training miles as he usually would by this point, and he knows that there are parts of the course where he will have to go slower than he would otherwise. “You know, Mother Nature’s the boss,” he said.
Still, he’s optimistic about the run. Morgan partnered up with last year’s team mate Bradley Kishbaugh again and the team with be starting with bib number 6. Slowed down by an issue with the rear suspension on their sleds, they came in second. Now, they’ve spent about 100 hours working on their new Polaris sleds, trying to be as meticulous as possible.
“The idea is anytime you work on the machine in the race, it goes against your time. So, our intent is not to have to work on them,” he said.
Morgan started competing in snow machine races when he was 14 years old back in 2000. He grew up in Nome and was inspired by great Iron Doggers like Nome’s own Evan Booth and others who came through town. A quarter-century later, he’s one of the top racers competing.
“It’s been a huge sacrifice. It takes a lot of time to do it all. You can go out and do the race, but to race for a win is a whole different level,” said Morgan.
It’s worth the sacrifice to him. “I just love to compete, and I love to challenge myself,” he said. He hopes he inspires young Alaskans in turn. “You gotta break up that long winter doing stuff outdoors or you’ll pretty much go insane.”
This year, despite the conditions, he said he hopes he just gets a clean race.
“I look forward to getting to the finish line. Honestly, the conditions are so brutal, I can’t say I’m necessarily looking forward to the conditions,” he said. “Just looking forward to coming into my hometown, hopefully in a respectable position. It’s always nice seeing the hometown crowd.”
There are four Nomeites competing in the Iron Dog this year: rookies Wilson Hoogendorn and Bubba McDaniel (Team 4); rookies Louis Green and his partner Joshua Knox of Selawik (Team 32), and race veteran Morgan and Kishbaugh. Chugie and Kevin Farley were also initially planning to compete but decided to take the year off after Kevin was injured.
The Iron Dog’s pro class starts their race on February 15 at Big Lake. Racers are going to Kotzebue first and will arrive on Tuesday, February 18 in Nome. Wednesday, Feb. 19 is spent in Nome for “wrench day” and halfway point ceremonies and a banquet will be held at the Mini Convention Center in Nome.