FAIRBANKS — The Bureau of Land Management will allow a 100-mile human-powered race in the White Mountains National Recreation Area in March but with a few stipulations, the biggest of which is the race will begin on a Sunday instead of a Saturday as was originally proposed.

The race, which is open to cyclists, skiers or runners, will be held March 21-23. BLM approved the permit request this week after sifting through 96 comments that were received during a 30-day public comment period.

The Sunday start will lessen the chance that other users will be displaced from the three cabins the BLM agreed to let race organizers use as checkpoints for the race, said Collin Cogley, an outdoor recreation planner with BLM.

“There definitely was concern about cabin conflicts, so we moved the race start from a Saturday morning to a Sunday morning,” he said.

The three cabins will be used for five nights. The Cache Mountain cabin 40 miles into the race will be reserved for racers on Sunday night, and the Windy Gap (60 miles) and Borealis Lefever (80 miles) cabins will be reserved on Sunday and Monday.

Normally, the earliest cabin reservations can be made is 30 days in advance, but the BLM made an exception for the race, Cogley said.

“We took a hard look at what they needed and didn’t give them anything more than they needed,” he said.

Race organizer Ed Plumb was happy to hear the permit was approved and said moving the start to a Sunday is no big deal, though it might make it harder to round up enough volunteers for the race.

“I’m totally amenable to shifting dates,” Plumb said. “My biggest concern is to have as little impact on users and the recreation area itself. If switching to a weekday time frame will do that, I’m fully for moving the race.”

The race in the 2-million-acre recreation area 40 miles north of Fairbanks has generated considerable interest from Alaska’s extreme racing community. There is a limit of 50 entries, and a field of 66 racers, including several of the state’s top extreme athletes, have signed up for the event.

Starting the race on Sunday will significantly reduce the chances of other users being displaced from cabins, Cogley said. The occupancy rates in the three cabins during the past three years for Saturday and Sunday was 78 percent compared to about 50 percent on Sunday and Monday.

“There’s still some historic use on those days, but it’s a lot less than if it were a Saturday night,” Cogley said.

All racers will be required to park in a parking lot across the Elliott Highway from the Wickersham Dome trailhead to avoid parking congestion, another concern raised in the comments, Cogley said.

Race organizers must also provide portable toilets for racers to use at checkpoints to prevent excessive use of the outhouses at cabins.

Another concern raised was the amount of firewood that would be used at the cabins serving as checkpoints, Cogley said.

Plumb said that won’t be a problem. If anything, race officials probably will burn less wood than normal users because the cabin will be full of people most of the time. Even if that’s the case, Plumb said he plans to leave cabins with more firewood when the race is over than they had when it starts.

“We’re definitely not going to leave (the cabins) with no firewood,” he said.

BLM also is requiring race organizers to leave cabins with full propane bottles for lanterns and stoves.

A few people voiced concerns that the increased number of trail users would cause a safety concern and intrude on their solitude, Cogley said.

“We’re not going to try and stomp on anybody’s feet and take away their wilderness experience,” Plumb said.

Cogley doesn’t think BLM is opening the door to more races in the White Mountains by approving the permit for the race, which was one of the concerns raised in the public comment process.

In addition to requiring a permit fee, the BLM also requires insurance, which is not cheap, he said. Similar requests for events in the White Mountains will be taken on a case-by-case basis, he said.

“We’re not anticipating that we’re going to get swamped with these races,” Cogely said.

BLM will send a letter to everyone who submitted comments about the race, and there is an appeal process for anyone interested in taking the agency’s decision to the next level, Cogley said.

Contact outdoors editor Tim Mowry at 459-7587.