One musher who was already planning as the trail unfolded beneath his runners was William Kleedehn, the 2008 rookie of the year. Kleedehn’s mission was never to be the fastest rookie up the trail, but as everyone who races against him says, Kleedehn doesn’t know how to travel slow. His mission was to get a core group of young dogs to the finish line and build leaders, which he did. He had five solid leaders at the finish line, he said.

The 11-year veteran of the Yukon Quest, which he’s come as close as eight minutes from winning, said the biggest surprise thrown at him by the Iditarod was its hills. Everyone always says the Iditarod is flat and the Quest has hills, a notion Kleedehn described as bull manure. The photos of the race always show mushers running over the flat sea ice or along the Yukon River, or some other flat surface, which is because most photos are taken near checkpoints.

“Nobody talked to me about those Topkok Hills,” Kleedehn said, referring to some of the last hills near White Mountain in the final 77-mile stretch to the finish. “There’s just as many climbs in the Topkok Hills as in the Black Hills,” which is a section of the Quest trail between Scroggie Creek and Dawson City.

“The Quest is just as flat as the Iditarod, if you ask me,” he said, indicating that neither race is flat, as he sat down for a burger and coffee at Fat Freddie’s, joining fellow Yukoners Hans Gatt, Sebastian Schnuelle and Gerry Willomitzer. “The Iditarod’s a lot tougher than it gets credit for,” Gatt chimed in.

For example, Little McKinley is a hill mushers must climb near the tail end of the race, when their teams are tired. It’s just one of several exposed knobs along the coast, which were thankfully tame this year due to calm winds. The Quest has its big hills with nasty, windy conditions, like Eagle Summit, but they’re typically up and over with quickly. He said he was grateful for being lucky enough to avoid high winds along the coast in his rookie Iditarod. “With a storm (on the Bering Sea), it could be 250 miles of Eagle Summit, thank you very much!,” he said, getting a big laugh from the veterans sitting around the table.

Kleedehn said he used to scoff at the Iditarod’s nickname as the “Last Great Race,” but has changed his mind, citing the way the trail covers such varied terrain and cultures such as the Athabaskan villages along the Yukon and Upik villages up the coast.

“I don’t think I finished a race. I think I finished a journey,” he said.