HUMAN

Name: David Hendrix

Age: 27

Residence: Atlanta Georgia

Occupation: Controls Engineer

Years involved with Iditarod: 3

Iditarod Roles: Volunteer/Communications

Current Location: Nikolai, Alaska

Date of Photo: March 8, 2022

Temperature: 25F Outdoors 

What, who or how and when did you first get involved with the Iditarod?

I first became involved with Iditarod three years ago when a group of local friends invited me up to work comms for them. I didn’t know what was involved, what had to happen, what anything on the trail was like, but I was super excited and it was an opportunity that I knew that I couldn’t pass up.

What is your Why? Why are you here TODAY and involved with the Iditarod?

I’m here today and involved with Iditarod because I think that it is a unique experience that has garnered a lot of attention in the past and has fallen out of the public eye. You ask anyone in the street today and they understand the name, but they don’t understand the race itself. And I feel that coming and actually working on it and seeing what’s happening and being involved with it is such a unique experience for such a small number of people and seeing the community support and seeing all the people that come out and seeing all the people that watch it online is reminding me that it is such a unique part of our culture and especially the culture of the Alaskan natives that did this so many years ago. And being a part of it is such a huge benefit to me and to everybody else involved as well.

Tell me about just one of your most memorable Iditarod experiences.

One of my most memorable Iditarod experiences was working in McGrath the first year as comms three years ago, and never having been in an extreme cold environment before in my life and having it be negative 30 degrees, waiting on the first musher to come into to the checkpoint at 3:00 AM in the morning. The whole community is out, the kids are out, they’re all out of bed. Everybody’s excited. There’s rime frost over everybody’s fur ruffs. And everybody’s just having a great time. And having that first musher come in and everybody cheer for them. And even the second and third and fifth and 10th mushers to come in that day and we stay up all night, we make it happen. We see how excited everyone is, and we’re just braving that extreme of an element for the first time in my life really was an amazing experience.

What in life do you know for sure?

What I know for sure in life is that experiences are what you take with you. And have all the money in the world. You can amass whatever you want, but in the end, spending it is what actually gets you happiness because you come out here and I have to spend certain amount of money to come out here and volunteer my time. I’m not paid, but for me, having this experience is worth well more than anything else I could buy and with any material, object, or possessions. And I think that no matter what we end up with in life, the experiences are what we treasure the most.