Let the Arctic Games Begin

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Let the rest of the sports world ponder Johnny Weir’s red glove and Bode Miller’s gate straddling.

For international athletes taking part in events ranging from snowshoeing to the Eskimo knuckle hop, the Arctic Winter Games beginning today on the Kenai Peninsula are a chance to demonstrate the northern art of cooperation, rewarded by the games’ top prize -- a 6-foot-tall trophy narwhal tusk adorned with a carved soapstone bear.

First presented in 1978, the Hodgson Trophy -- named for Stuart Hodgson, a winter games founder from Canada -- isn’t automatically awarded to the team that collects the most gold. In the great north, where survival often is victory enough, sharing and fair play still count; the trophy rewards both.

“It has to do with a team’s conduct and sportsmanship, the big picture,” said Wendell Shiffler, a winter games vice president from Fairbanks. Shiffler will help count ballots from the more than 400 coaches, officials, reporters, Arctic Games representatives and others voting for this year’s Hodgson-worthy team.

In the make-do spirit of the Arctic, winners satisfy themselves with a photo of the trophy, an inscribed plaque and commemorative pins. After customs inspectors in Seattle delayed the trophy while it was en route to the games in 1982, the prized ivory tusk no longer leaves the Yukon Sports Hall of Fame in Whitehorse.

Begun in 1970 by leaders from Alaska and Canada’s Yukon and Northwest territories, the Arctic Winter Games are held every two years and attract high school age athletes from Russia, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Greenland, Alaska and Canada. Over seven days, athletes compete in the usual games -- wrestling, basketball, soccer and the like -- but also in traditional Inuit and Dene games seen nowhere but here.

Sweat-inducing, strategic events such as the 1-foot high kick, head pull and snow snake instill strength and diligence -- lifesaving traits in terrain that British author Mary Shelley once called “the seat of frost and desolation.”

The peninsula’s winning bid marks the fifth time that Alaska has hosted the games. Fairbanks was the venue in 1982 and 1988; Anchorage in 1974; and neighboring Eagle River in 1996. Opening ceremonies are Sunday in the central peninsula town of Soldotna. More than 30,000 tickets have been sold.

“People really, really wanted this,” said Donna Peterson, the Kenai Peninsula school superintendent who was part of an organizing committee four years ago. Convinced that the area’s 44 schools, Olympic-size hockey rink, modern sports center and cross-country ski trails could be parlayed into a winning bid, organizers went on to recruit nearly 2,000 volunteers from across the 26,000-square-mile peninsula, stretching into Cook Inlet south of Anchorage.

“When we first started talking about the games, it was just an idea,” said Peterson, who oversees the athletes’ care and comfort committee. It’s responsible for everything from transportation and shelter to food and medical help.

Now, she says, for every paid worker, there will be 10 volunteers. Top tasks: Ensuring that 1,000 beds are set up in seven schools, and delivering 48,000 meals in the coming week.

Peterson’s 17-year-old daughter, Jamie, has her own checklist. A standout volleyball player who’ll be wearing blue and gold for Team Alaska, Jamie Peterson splurged on a new pair of court shoes -- yellow -- that should be arriving any day. She’s looking forward to meeting new people and competing with other top high school players.

“I hope people come away from here getting to know the community, not just their teammates,” she said. “They’d see what a great, homey place this really is.”

Home to active Augustine Volcano, the peninsula is known for civic pride that routinely sees a thousand people show up for a high school choir concert. The games will be played in places as unlike as Homer, an end-of-the-road fishing village on Kachemak Bay, and Girdwood, the resort town that’s home to snowboarder and Olympic bronze medalist Rosie Fletcher.