CARMACKS - For many of the top boats in the Yukon River Quest, the Carmacks Checkpoint, just under halfway to Dawson City, is a specially honed science.

The paddlers are guided into the moving water dock by Al Foster and the boat is held flush to the wood as they crawl out on wobbly legs. They are greeted by volunteers and loved ones and helped onto solid ground as voices hoot and holler their arrival. They stumble up a steep embankment and straight to the bathroom. Here, a shower awaits them and after, the promise of solid warm food and a change of clothes.

Sleep will come.

They have a minimum of seven hours to spend at the Carmacks Checkpoint, housed at the Coal Mine Creek Campground. More food and liquid before they’re set off again, nose towards the Five Fingers Rapids waiting downstream, and beyond, Dawson City.

Some 19 hours earlier the paddlers had started in downtown Whitehorse, sprinting towards their boats on the shore of the Yukon River from Rotary Peace Park at noon. The stampede of paddlers launched their boats and were off.

For 2014 Yukon River Quest winners, Steve King and Shaun Thrower, the start was slower than they would have liked.

Back for another crack at the 715-kilometre race, the Hereford, United Kingdom duo arrived in Carmacks smiling and cracking jokes this morning.

“It’s just a nice place to come, isn’t it,” said King, freshly showered and toting a thermos in his right hand and a burger in the left.

“There were some good boats in the race this year. There’s probably a good 10 boats contending, so we weren’t really sure quite how it would go,” he said.

With their slower start out of Whitehorse, the duo was playing catch-up to other teams.

“Our plan was just to get out as quick as we could off the start and then who was taking the pace and try and work them to get away,” said King. “That kind of happened.”

Across the flat section on Lake Laberge, King and Thrower, named 2 Numbnuts, worked with three other teams.

“The wind started picking up mid-lake, it was good for us because we could start surfing the waves in,” he said. “The voyageur probably had about 10 minutes on us by then. We’ll do well to catch them.”

The voyageur in question, Yukon Wide Adventures, was off like a shot from the start and hasn’t relinquished the lead since.

Stacked with top solo kayakers from past races, the voyageur crew of six is gunning for a course record.

They arrived in Carmacks at 7:16 this morning. Their boat, a sleek black vessel adorned with the team name along its side and each paddlers’ name stickered next to their seat: Gus Oliveira in bow, Wayne Anderson in second, Pat McClelland in third, Dave Hutchison in fourth, Stephen Mooney in fifth and Thomas de Jager in the stern.

The course record, which has stood since 2008, was set by another voyageur team, Kissynew. That year, a calm lake and a higher than average water level aided the crew to an under 40-hour time, finishing in 39 hours, 32 minutes and 43 seconds.

That year, Kissynew had arrived in Carmacks at 6:40 a.m.

The difference between 2008 Kissynew and 2017 Yukon Wide Adventures, is about the same between this year’s first and second-place boats into Carmacks.

The lake was kind to teams this year and only three had scratched as of the writing of this piece Thursday morning. SUP Yukon’s Stuart Knaack (standup paddleboard), the only local face in the first-official SUP category this year, scratched after Laberge. The C-2 team of 2 of Hearts also scratched after Laberge, as did Skagway’s C-2 team Grand Canoedlers.

Last year, the lake proved too much for SUP Joanne Hamilton-Vale after she contracted a parasite and was unable to keep any food down. She cried for 12 hours straight and, after watching all her fellow SUPs race, gave her wedding ring to a volunteer in Dawson under strict instructions not to return it until she finished the race.

So this year is unfinished business.

“I have a point to prove,” said Hamilton-Vale. “Even though I’ve proven it in other races, this race beat me last year and I need to prove a point – I can get to Dawson.”

She crossed the Lower Laberge checkpoint shortly after 10 p.m. last night and was expected to arrive in Carmacks before 5 p.m. today.

Eighty-six teams remain in the race and the first is expected to leave Carmacks just after 2 p.m.

CARMACKS — As of noon today, 33 teams had arrived at the Carmacks Checkpoint.

The earliest of the bunch, Yukon Wide Adventures, a mostly local voyageur team, pulled in at 7:16 a.m. They were followed by the K-2 team of 2 Numbnuts, who came in a 7:54 a.m.

The first C-2 team, Gorge Downwind Champs, pulled in at 8:12 a.m., while Saranac 4, the first C-4 team arrived at 8:38 a.m.

Four more voyageurs finished in the top 10 at Carmacks including Team 3-2-1-Go, who was fifth at 8:55 a.m.; local Team Ts’alvit who was sixth at 9:05 a.m.; Yukon team CAP#1, in ninth at 9:20 a.m.; and Goldilocks and the Three Bears, in 10th at 9:24 a.m.

Arm Wiggler, the top solo kayak, was in 7th at 9:08 a.m. and Strokes of Genius, a C-2, was in 8th at 9:14 a.m.

Three teams were scratched, including SUP Yukon’s Stuart Knaack, who was part of the inaugural crew of standup paddlerboarders to complete the race as an experimental class last year. A race volunteer said he pulled out at Lower Laberge due to heat exhaustion. He was expected to arrive in Carmacks to help support the other paddleboarders to Dawson.

The C-2 team 2 of Hearts also scratched at Lower Laberge and Skagway’s Grand Canoedles was also expected to scratch as they were not expected to make the cutoff time to get into Carmacks.

Carmacks will continue to be a busy checkpoint as the remaining teams arrive and spend their mandatory seven hours onshore before continuing on through the Five Fingers Rapids, another three hours of rest at Coffee Creek and on to the finish in Dawson City.