Royer takes third in Iditarod

ALASKA – After crossing under the burled arch in Nome at the end of the 2019 Iditarod sled dog race, musher Jessie Royer dropped her snow hook and worked her way to the front of her 11-dog team loving and thanking her dogs. When asked why, she replied, "I'm here because the dogs got me here. They deserve the credit."

Placid Lake area part time resident Royer, 42, and her 14-dog team took third place in the 1,000-mile sled dog race from Anchorage to Nome, Alaska. This success came on the heels of placing ninth in the Yukon Quest, a 1,000-mile international sled dog race from Whitehorse, Yukon Territory to Fairbanks, Alaska that started Feb. 2.

Royer got her first sled dogs when she was 15. She worked with Doug Swingley, four time Iditarod Champion, to learn sled dogs in Montana. 

Royer won her first race and was the first female winner of the 500 mile Montana Race to the Sky in 1994 at age 17. She currently has a kennel of 70 Alaskan Huskies on Shining Shirt Road near Placid Lake.

Royer's first Iditarod was in 2001.  She took 14th place finishing in 11 days, 23 hours, four hours and 40 seconds and earned Rookie of the Year honors.

Royer's Iditarod career includes 17 starts, 17 finishes and seven years finishing in the top ten. She recorded her best time in 2017 with a run of 8 days, 13 hours and 8 minutes for fifth place.  She placed fourth in 2015 and climbed the ladder to third this year with a finish in 9 days, 18 hours and 34 minutes.

Prior to this year's Iditarod in February, Royer finished her second Yukon Quest.  She along with Iditarod mushers Martin Apayauq Reitan, Paige Drobny and Matt Hall completed the back-to-back 1,000 milers this year. 

The Yukon Quest 1,000 Mile International Sled Dog Race gets its name from the "highway of the north," which is the Yukon River and the historical winter land routes traveled by prospectors, adventurers and mail and supply carriers traveling between the gold fields of the Klondike and those in the Alaska interior.

Royer's rookie run was in 2017 when she took eighth place finishing in 11 days, five hours and 38 minutes. This year she placed ninth finishing in 10 days, four hours and 19 minutes.

Royer said the Quest was a training run to help train her younger dogs. She did an equal run/rest ratio with leaders Seal and Striker.

"We weren't trying to push it or race hard, we were just out having fun, getting some young dogs out on the trail and seeing how they did," said Royer.

Royer said it was -45 degrees Fahrenheit the first night. Royer was placed in 15th on day 3. By day 5 she had moved into 12th place.

Armchair musher Jodi Bailey wrote in her blog on the Yukon Quest official site, "Now do not let Jessie's 12th place into Dawson [half-way check point] fool you. She can never be underestimated. Right now she has more rest then run, and knowing how smart she is I have to think this is absolutely what she wants."

Royer was true to the prediction moving into 11th by Day 8 and finishing 9th of the 27 finishers with 10 dogs.

Royer brought four of her Yukon Quest team to this year's Iditarod including her leaders Seal and Striker.

This year mushers were only allowed 14 dogs, down from 16 in the past. When Royer left Koyuk March 11 at 4:55 p.m. with 171 miles to Nome, she was down to 11 dogs in harness.

She was pleased that she only dropped three dogs. The temperatures during the Iditarod were mild hitting highs during the days in the 20s and 30s throughout the entire race.

"We pretty much swam up the Yukon River because there was so much water and overflow," said Royer.

Royer said the dogs don't want to run very fast in the heat. The trail conditions were slush and water and were very slow. Her dogs handled the warm temperatures pretty well but the water took its toll on their feet making it hard for them to dry out.

"We really had to keep on top of doctoring them and keeping their feet healthy because they were so wet," said Royer. "You don't have that problem when it is cold out."

She dropped two dogs from getting sore feet from being wet all the time. She said she equated it to trench foot and added they would have finished otherwise.

She dropped her third dog because it had a sore shoulder. She said all the dogs are headed back home and doing well "bouncing off the walls and ready to go do something again."

Royer said the weather and trail conditions always present the biggest challenges.

"You just train the best you can, with as many different conditions as you can and when you get to the race, you do the best you can with what you've got," said Royer who said two other years were rainy and wet.

Royer said the best part of the Iditarod this year was the camaraderie with the other mushers. She has known first place finisher Pete Kaiser, second place Joar Leifseth Ulsom and fourth place finisher Aliy Zirkle for years and raced against them before.

"They are just really awesome, awesome people and I had a lot of fun traveling with them. They have been three of my favorite mushers for years and it just happened that we all four got to travel together at the top," said Royer. "Even though we are competitors we are also very supportive of each other."

Royer said she was pretty excited to come in third and was really proud of her dogs.

"I worked hard at it. We stayed focused, preserved through whatever came our way and kept a good attitude," said Royer. "It is always tough. You just have to stay strong, stay positive and no matter what comes, handle each day as it comes and never get down."

Royer won $39,000 for her third place finish. While that seems like a lot, she said it cost her between $80,000-$100,000 to get to the race. Because she doesn't have any big sponsors, she does the tours out of Seeley Lake with her J Team to support her team. This was the first year that she went into debt to run the Iditarod.

"It's not just tours or sponsors, it takes a little bit of everything to make it work," said Royer. "I'm always looking for sponsors. It takes the support of family, friends and community to pull this off. I definitely don't do it by myself."