Jessie Royer 3rd in Iditarod XLVII
Jessie Royer earns third place in Iditarod XLVII. Jessie arrived at the Burled Arch in wind driven snow. Since Peter Kaiser and Joar Leifseth Ulsom arrived early this morning, the banner over the arch has been taken down. This is a regular occurrence when the wind picks up. The forecast is for winds 10 – 20 mph from the east with a chance of snow. Thus far, they’ve got it right and it’s impacting the run to Nome from White Mountain.
Jessie Royer at the Burled Arch March 13th
Royer has 17 Iditarod starts and 17 finishes. Prior to 2019, she’s been in the top ten six times. She placed 4th in 2015 and now has climbed one step up the ladder to 3rd. Royer recorded her best time in 2017 with a run of 8 days, 18 hours and 8 minutes for 5th place. Royer first competed in Iditarod in 2001. She claimed 14th place and earned Rookie of the Year honors. Royer completed Iditarod XLVII in 9 days, 18 hours and 34 minutes.
Royer has posted the fastest time from Safety to Nome in 2001 and also in 2014, respective run times were 2 hours and 42 minutes then 2 hours and 24 minutes. Today’s run from Safety to Nome took Royer exactly 4 hours. Now granted there is a re-route into town because of the lack of sea ice but for the most part today’s time speaks to the snow, wind and trial conditions which Royer explained in an Insider interview.
Royer Praises Her Leaders for Their Work on the Drifted Trail
At the finish line, Royer dropped her snow hook then worked her way to the front of the team loving and thanking her dogs. Somebody asked, “Why do you do that?” Royer replied, “I’m here because the dogs got me here. They deserve the credit.”
When interviewed, Royer was asked what was special about Iditarod. Jessie listed a whole bunch of reasons – incredible scenery, connection with dogs, mushing life style and her list went on.
Royer received the Leonhard Seppala Humanitarian Award in 2017, the Lolly Medley Golden Harness Award in 2009 and the Most Inspirational Musher Award in 2017 and 2018. The 2018 award had to do with her willingness to help in the rescue of Jim Lanier and Scott Janssen outside of Safety. Royer who had already completed the race, had gone out to Safety by snowmachine. When the call came in for help she immediately headed to the distressed mushers to lend a hand in bringing them off the trail.
Royer grew up on a cattle ranch in Idaho. She’s worked on ranches as a horse wrangler and horse teamster. She got her first sled dogs when she was 15 years old. She worked with Doug Swingley (4 time Iditarod Champion) to learn sled dogs in Montana. Jessie moved to Alaska in 1998. She’s won Montana’s Race to the Sky and she’s a winner of the invitational La Grande Odyssée in France.
A couple weeks prior to Iditarod, Royer finished the Yukon Quest. She was one of four (Martin Apayauq Reitan, Paige Drobny and Matt Hall) to do so. Royer and the others feel that doing the long races in the same season is an advantage for both athletes and coaches. The coaches and athletes get into the camping and checkpoint routine in the Quest and quickly return to efficiency in Iditarod. The dogs tend to return to their most efficient state of metabolism very early in the second race. Jessie has completed two Yukon Quest Races.
On paper and by the GPS Tracker, we’d expect to see Aliy Zirkle arrive as the fourth place finisher later this afternoon perhaps around 16:00. Also on the trial to Nome from White Mountain are Matt Hall, Travis Beals, Paige Drobny and Ramey Smith. Looking for arrival of that group before the clock strikes Thursday, all depending on the trail conditions with blowing and drifting snow.
