UNALAKLEET -- Shaken, angry and a little confused, Hank DeBruin was camped with his dogs at the airport here Wednesday trying to figure out what had happened to his dreams of finishing the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race.

DeBruin, the owner of a sled dog tour business in Haliburton, Ontario, Canada, was flown to this Bering Sea coast checkpoint with his dogs after being forced from the race in Nulato on the Yukon River Tuesday. He was putting booties on his dogs in preparation of hitting the trail to Kaltag, he said, when he was summoned into the local school to answer a telephone call.

DeBruin might have been happier if he had simply decided not to answer the phone. On the other end of the line was Iditarod race marshal Mark Nordman.

Nordman wanted to know why the 47-year-old DeBruin and his 13 Siberian huskies had taken more than nine hours on the 50-mile run from Galena. DeBruin explained that it had been 40 below and that the team was fighting a headwind on the wide-open river.

Nordman, according to DeBruin, wasn't buying that excuse. He told DeBruin he was too far behind the nearest mushers down the trail. Jane Faulkner, of Kenai, and Celeste Davis, from Montana, were closing on Kaltag, the next checkpoint, as DeBruin was leaving Nulato.

DeBruin argued that though his team was slow, it was still on pace to finish as the fastest-ever red lantern in the Iditarod. Nordman wasn't buying that, either, DeBruin said.

The race marshal announced he was imposing Rule 36, the "competitiveness" rule. The rule states:

"A team may be withdrawn that is out of the competition and is not in position to make a valid effort to compete. If a team has not reached McGrath in 72 hours of the leader, Galena within 96 hours of the leader or, Unalakleet within 120 hours of the leader, it may be presumed that a team is not competitive. A musher whose conduct constitutes an unreasonable risk of harm to his/her dogs or other persons may also be withdrawn."

DeBruin was well within all of these time limits. He had cleared McGrath with days to spare and reached Galena less than 72 hours behind the arrival of then-race leader Jeff King from Denali. By DeBruin's reckoning, he was a full day ahead of Iditarod doomsday.

Still, Nordman decided DeBruin was too far out of contact with Davis and Faulkner, who teamed up for most of the 150-mile push up the Yukon to the Kaltag Portage. In the race marshal's eyes, that apparently put DeBruin in the "unreasonable risk" category, although DeBruin appears as comfortable traveling on the trail as most Iditarod veterans. He has spent a long time around dogs and in the Bush, and it shows in his trail skills.

But Nordman was in no position to see that. He had only numbers to look at. Debruin's speed of 5.4 mph was almost 2 mph slower than that of Faulkner and Davis on the run to Nulato. DeBruin was given an ultimatum: Scratch from the race or face withdrawal. He scratched rather than face the ignominy of being booted.