Alaska, in 1997, before settling in Healy, Alaska by 1999. They have two young daughters, Abbigal and Molly. The cabin they lived in at Eureka was owned by former Iditarod champion Susan Butcher. He and his family are currently living on Murphy Dome Road in Fairbanks Alaska. They still own the kennel in Healy. The family owns and operates Kami Kennels, primarily composed of Alaskan Huskies. Kami is a respectful Japanese term for sacred spirits, and Brooks chose the name to symbolize the importance of his family. Brooks has visited schools as a motivational speaker since 1993, participates in Mush for Kids since 1997, and from 2003 has been a trustee of the Alaskan Children's Trust. He attempted to commit suicide at age 16, and suffered from depression in his 20s. As a result, he began working with the Alaska Mental Health Trust in 2005, in an attempt to reduce the extraordinarily high rate of suicide among Native Alaskans. Racing Brooks won his first race, the single-dog Junior North American Championship, when he was four years old, with his dog Sam. He went on to become the first person to win the race three times in a row, and by 14 years of age he had won every class in the race. He started competing in long distance races in 1992 and 1993. Brooks placed 17th in his first Iditarod, in 1994, and won the Rookie of the Year Award. He consistently improved his ranking for the next three years, breaking into the top 10 in 1997 with an 8th-place finish. After two family deaths less than 10 days before the 1998 race and recurrent dog problems, he completed his worst finish in 1998. In 2000, he returned and has consistently placed in the top 10, with his best a back-to-back pair of 2nd-place finishes in 2002 and 2003. In 1998, he won the drawing for the Joe Redington, Sr. Award, and in 2000 he won both the Sportsmanship and Most Improved Musher Awards. Brooks is one of the few Alaskan Natives competing in the modern Iditarod, which is a considerable change from the early days of the Iditarod. In 1976, more than one quarter of the entrants, including the record-breaking Emmitt Peters, were of native descent. The most common reason given for this paucity is the expense of the training and equipping a competitive team. Rural Alaskans find it