ULTIMATE CHALLENGE

MAT-SU — You might think it would be difficult to find the motivation to ride a bicycle, ski or run hundreds of miles through the wilderness in the dead of winter.

After all, neither of this year’s ultramarathons comes with a cash prize.

But when asked why a person would put themselves through this, Kathi Merchant, one of the organizers of the Iditarod Trail Invitational — which starts Sunday — lists a half dozen.

• “It’s totally off the road system. It’s just such a unique place out there.”

• “It’s an Iditarod Trail culture that’s out there.”

• “For the top contenders, it’s just a challenge between them.”

• “Half the field in our race is from Europe. This is something they can’t find over there, it’s remote and it’s wild and it’s cold,”

But it’s the challenge that seems to be at the top of that list. Merchant said she’s been told for years that she should try to compile trailside stories posted to various racers’ blogs into a book.

“There’s so many compelling stories out there of the people and the trail,” she said.

The Iditarod Invitational actually includes a pair of races. Some racers go 350 miles to McGrath. Others press on to Nome for the full 1,100 miles of the Iditarod Trail. She said that the number of competitors is capped at 50 and that most of those competitors are on bicycles.

“The last few years the interest in winter mountain biking has gone berserk,” Merchant said.

It’s an invitational, she said, in the sense that not just anyone can sign up. Organizers conduct an interviewing process and racers have to have experience surviving in the outdoors, preferably on a similar wintertime endurance race.

Which, in a way, is where the Susitna 100 comes in. The Susitna 100 is less selective but has tighter rules regarding the amount and type of equipment participants have to bring. Merchant said that when she gets people wanting to race but who have no experience, she directs them to the Susitna 100.

That race is also two races, one 50 miles long, the other 100 miles. Both start at the Point MacKenzie General Store. The 50-mile race goes to Flathorn Lake and back, the 100-mile race goes to Alexander Lake and back.

The Susitna 100 began and ended last weekend and drew a record number of entrants. As of race day, 130 people were signed up, but a little over a dozen of those didn’t show up.

Both races draw a lot of interest from foreign countries. Rita Wade, an organizer of the Susitna 100, said this year’s installment included racers from South Africa, Germany and Italy. Merchant said the Iditarod Invitational tends to draw most interest in Italy and the United Kingdom In Italy, she said, there have been two documentaries produced on the race.

Wade said recent cold weather had set the trail up nicely for some competitors and not so nicely for others.

“For the bikers it was just blazing fast. It was fast all the way along for them. There was only one section where anybody slowed down enough to have to breathe,” she said. “For the skiers they had no glide. The snow was very cold and your glide goes down. It was very difficult for them, a lot longer than normal and we had some people drop out.”

Trail conditions are a major factor in both races. Merchant, who spoke Thursday as she got ready to head into Anchorage for pre-race events, said she’s gearing up for a lot of questions.

“I know everyone is going to quiz me at the pre-race meeting: ‘What are the trail conditions? What have you heard?’” she said.

The unpredictability, she said, is another piece of the race’s appeal.

“That trail is never the same,” she said.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.