When Hillarie Gossett and her husband, Tim, crossed the finish line of this year’s Iron Dog on Saturday, they were racing into history as the one of the few wife-husband teams to complete the Pro Class race. Hillarie said she felt strong physically and thankful that her sled had held up. But most of all, it signified that there is a place for the female racer in the World’s Longest, Toughest Snowmobile Race.

“It was nice not only being husband and wife, but being able to finish so clean,” she said. “We had tried to make the Top 10, and we came close, but we are happy, and we had good competition.”

In 2023, Hillarie Gossett became an Iron Dog veteran as part of the second all-female team to complete the Pro Class race – she and Ashley Wood finished in 14th place and etched their names as the first all-female team to complete the modern-day Iron Dog course, which includes the 375-mile Red Dog Loop around Kotzebue. In 2001, Missy McClurg (Thibodeau) and Jackie Page (Robinson) earned “first all-female finisher” status, placing 15th in a time of 60 hours and 23 minutes in the traditional route that went to Nome and back.

Completing the Iron Dog itself is an achievement: Look at this year’s statistics alone. Of the 30 teams entered in the race, only 16 made it to the finish line. When Gossett and Wood raced in 2023, only 15 teams finished. So, completing the race this year, and in the record books with her husband, made this a particularly special accomplishment. As motivation, and to keep them focused while racing, their kids, 6-year-old Parker and 11-year-old Grayson, left them messages on their windshields to remind them of what they had waiting at home.

Parker wrote to her dad, “I love you Dad” and Grayson “wrote “WWJGD” – which stands for “What would Joe Gugel do?” (Gugel and Tim Gossett were partners in 2024, earning top rookie honors for their strong finish).

To Hillarie, the kids wrote: “You can do it” and “Focus on your goal.”

One of, if not THE earliest, couples to enter the race was Melinda Lyman and her husband, Doug, who attempted the Iron Dog Pro Class in 1987. They had gone to the local shop in Anchorage and spied two Yamaha 540s for sale; the sleds had been used in the 1986 race.

“We went ahead and bought them,” said Doug Lyman, retired and living in Idaho today. “We did a little practice out in McGrath, where we lived, and when it came time to go, we shipped them into Anchorage.”

Melinda was the one who wanted to enter the race, the couple agrees. She said it just sounded “fun,” and she enjoyed riding with her husband.

“The kids were too little, but he could ride,” she said of Doug. “We were there for the fun of it, and I would recommend it to any couple who thinks they would enjoy it.”

The couples’ fun didn’t last long. Before they even reached the first checkpoint Doug’s engine seized up and they were at a standstill.

“We got through all the steps to make it to the start, and we just didn’t get very far,” Doug Lyman said. “Eventually we just had to scratch.”

Melinda Lyman said despite their early departure from the race, at least they gave it a try and she doesn’t regret it for a second. At the time, very few females were racing, and she thinks that her entry just added fuel to a growing group of female racers who would follow. She said she is thrilled that the Gossetts finally ticked the “husband-wife finish” box.

“We never raced again, but it was fun,” Lyman said. “We always said the kids will have a great story to tell: that their parents raced – or tried to race – the Iron Dog.”

Hillarie Gossett, who is now a two-time finisher, said her first finish with Ashley Wood was monumental to her to just prove that she could do it. From a female perspective, it was empowering to finish, but her goal was not gender-specific: it was personal.

“Ashley’s always, hand over fist, been one of the most talented female racers in Alaska,” she said. “Not many women can ride at the level that men can ride, and she’s one of them. Ashley had been on the trail before, but for me, there just was a lot of anxiety about it. It was a more emotional race in 2023, and we had to be a lot more reserved to make it to the finish. This time, we were both racing much harder and faster than we did before.”

Finishing with Tim, she said, required her to stretch her physical and mental boundaries. The pair have known each other since they were teenagers, and they have raised a family together. But the stress of sleepless nights and up to 680 miles on a sled a day?

That’s a whole other level of partnership.

Tim and I have always been really direct communicators,” she said. “When you’re out on the trail, there’s not a lot of time for soft skills because you’re on the clock. But I appreciate the directness. Just being able to have that blunt conversation … it’s not just male-female. You have to get it done.”

Team 26 Hillarie and Tim Gossett at the finish of the 2025 Iron Dog Race - photo by Tracy Try.

The Iron Dog, more and more, is becoming a landscape where women can compete. This year’s race featured three female racers – Wood with Andy Gocke as Team 2, and Danielle Levine with her father Larry, as Team 16. Both scratched due to injury and mechanicals, but both are already veterans. Gossett is this year’s example, but it goes all the way back to the first woman to successfully cross the Iron Dog finish.

Bill and Doreen Long at the Rohn checkpoint during the 1989 Iron Dog Race. They raced trail class that year alongside the pros. Doreen was the first female racer to ever cross an Iron Dog finish. Joyce Logan photo

Doreen Moore (then Doreen Long) was 23 years old, just under 100 pounds and had to use blocks of 2-by-4s to reach the running boards.

“When I did it in 1989, no female had crossed the finish line,” she said. “(Iron Dog Hall of Famer) Bob Kowalke said, ‘we’re going to make that happen,’ and we did.”

Furthermore, Doreen and her then-husband Bill Long were, and remain, the first husband-wife to cross the finish line. The difference? They entered the trail class, as it was called at the time.

“We didn’t have the money to enter the Pro Class, so Bob said to just enter the trail class and that’s what we did,” she said. “It wasn’t the thought of, ‘oh, you are making a record,’ it was more that we just wanted to do it.”

Back then, Moore said, teams all rode together. She and Bill were riding alongside Pro Class racers Bob Gilman, John Faeo, and others. The race that year started in Nome and headed south.

“I’m riding a machine like every guy out there so it’s not apples to apples,” she said. “They were big and heavy, and what you have on that machine is all you can use. We had to carry everything. It was really kind of brutal. A lot has changed today, and the machines are better.”

Moore said she is happy to see so many more women entering – and completing the Iron Dog Race, proving that Alaska women are strong, capable and competitive. Gossett is carrying that message forward too.

When in Nome, she stopped by a shop class that had teams of students rebuilding engines.

“The all-girl team was the one who could put the engine together the fastest,” Gossett said. “It was cool being able to be in Nome this year and show kids like that that I’m also married, and I’m also a mom and I also run my own business, and I also do my own snowmachining. It’ good to show these young ladies that these societal constrictions you feel don’t have to be there.”

Team 26 Makes History as one of the first husband wife teams to finish the Pro Class

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