School Has Adopted Jan Steves and Her Pack of Dogs as They Race in Alaska
Posted: Thursday, October 13, 2016 1:06 pm
Prairie Elementary School students crowded excitedly into the auditorium for a special assembly on Friday featuring Iditarod musher Jan Steves.
This was Steves’ seventh visit and fourth all-school assembly. The relationship between the Iditarod musher and Prairie Elementary began back in 2013 when Cyndy Johnson’s third-grade class became interested in the Iditarod after reading about a musher in a story on Inuit Drum Dancers.
“Learning about the Iditarod was driven by the kids’ own curiosity,” Johnson said.
Johnson had recalled hearing about a female musher from Washington and soon found Steves online. The class wrote to Steves who replied and then came to visit the class in person. So began a great partnership that has positively benefited the school and its students for several years.
The relationship has also impacted Steves who says that she has taken Prairie Elementary’s motto of “Work hard, play hard, always be kind,” to heart and now applies it with her dog sled team. Steves has raced in the Col. Norman Vaughan 25 Serum Run, the Don Bowers Memorial, the Klondike 300 and four Iditarod races.
Steves began mushing following a career of ski instruction.
“In 2007, I took my dad out to eat and shared my dream of racing in the Iditarod with him,” Steves recalled. “He said, ‘If anyone can do it, you can.’ Two months later I ran my first race and two months after that I volunteered at the Iditarod to learn everything I could.”
She participated in her first Iditarod race in 2012 and finished in Nome, Alaska, with the Red Lantern award, handed out to the musher who comes in last place.
Steves shared pictures of her various races, her dogs, their Alaska home and their daily work routine with the Prairie students. She walked them through the dogs’ training process, which begins before the snow falls, utilizing a four wheeler instead of a sled.
“We go through subdivisions, past barking dogs and loose dogs,” Steves said. “It’s great training because out on the trail you never know what you’re going to come across.”
Dog food for Steves’ team is ordered by the ton and only lasts about two months. She orders 50-pound blocks of frozen meat and has a freezer stocked with salmon to keep her dogs healthy. The daily routine of feeding, watering, training and cleaning up after 20 dogs is strenuous, not to mention the constant shoveling and trail maintenance that comes with the snowy Alaskan winters.
“It’s a lot of hard work,” Steves said. “But the payoff is all the beauty of Alaska.”
Her work ethic comes in handy when it’s time to prepare for the race. Steves showed pictures of the pre-prepared, sealed and frozen meals that she makes in advance. These, along with packages of wool socks, gloves and other supplies, are packed ahead of time and then distributed to the 17 checkpoints along the Iditarod route.
“You send out more than you need because you never know what you’ll need out there,” Steves said.
These checkpoints are open 24/7 during the race and are staffed by veterinarians to check the dogs along the way. There are no doctors, however, and Steves once had stitches removed by a veterinarian during a race.
Steves described preparing food during the race by placing it in a snow filled cooker and bringing it to a boil. She showed pictures of her dogs sleeping along the trail in their running formation and said she sleeps right there with them.
The students gasped aloud as Steves showed a beautiful picture of brilliant, emerald green Northern Lights followed by another of her dogsled team racing beside a string of impressive Alaskan mountains.
“You can see how tiny we are in the vastness of Alaska,” Steves said.
According to Steves, the trail is different from year to year and even hour to hour as snow levels and weather conditions change. Temperatures can be brutal, even dropping below negative 50 degrees. She showed an image of her dogsled team racing in these conditions, dressed in coats. Then she showed a picture of her face peeking out from her hooded parka, her eyelashes caked in ice, strands of frozen hair sticking out from her hood.
“Sometimes you can’t even see the trail,” Steves said. “The dogs know where it is though, so you have to trust them.”
Steves is familiar with difficulty and challenge. Last year, she was badly injured in a sledding accident only 10 miles into the race. Yet, she continued over 50 miles more until several broken ribs and a collapsed lung forced her to seek medical attention. Also last year, her home was destroyed in a wildfire. She shared pictures of rebuilding her home and life with the children, teaching them that even seemingly insurmountable obstacles can be overcome with tenacity, much like completing the Iditarod.
“Those who have earned the Red Lantern award, please stand up,” Steves said at one point, calling attention to the students who have shown stamina and perseverance in Prairie Elementary’s Idita-Read program that began in 2014.
Every March, while the Iditarod mushers are racing in Alaska, Prairie students are getting into the spirit with their own competition.
“The kids have a map with Iditarod checkpoints on it,” Johnson said. “As they earn points they progress through each checkpoint, eventually crossing the finish line in Nome.”
The school’s main hallway features another map in which classrooms compete with each other to be the first to Nome.
Students earn Idita-Read points by reading books and passing Accelerated Reader tests, among other things. Those who cross the finish line are given a dog tag in the shape of a paw. Throughout the month, teachers incorporate Iditarod information and activities into their lessons. Children follow the progress of their favorite musher, which is broadcast daily along with the school’s morning announcements.
“We are all going to be racing to Nome this year,” Steves said. “I’ll be racing with my dog team and you’ll be racing there by reading. My dogs and I are training five days a week and I hope you’re training too. Get lots of sleep, eat healthy and read every day. Then you’ll be prepared for your big race.”
