RUBY — In the Iditarod, actions often speak much louder than words, though sometimes the two also match up. Jeff King’s actions and words when he pulled in Friday indicate he was very happy with his situation, despite a two and a half hour deficit to rival Lance Mackey.

“You worried yet?,” a beaming King yelled over to Mackey as he parked his dog team, an inside joke King was dying to tell since last year, when Mackey barked the same three words at King after pulling in minutes behind him at Unalakleet. Mackey tipped back his head and laughed. “He just repaid me,” Mackey said. And his answer? “Ha! No. I’m more concerned with my team than with what Jeff’s got going.”

If there was any doubt about King’s mood, he answered it by jumping belly first onto a bale of straw he’d tossed on to a plastic toboggan sled. He rode the sled down a slick, snowy street of this hillside town to his dog team like a child atop a Flexible Flyer.

King got to this Yukon River village at 10:08 a.m., just over two and a half hours behind Mackey, who got here at 7:32 a.m. King’s full squad of 16 dogs still looked as happy as ever, and King described his unit as “the most complete dog team I’ve ever driven in the Iditarod.” Their speed, gait, timing, appetites and willingness to work generally have not flagged, he said.

Unlike Mackey, who said he’s having a difficult time feeding his team in the warm weather because his dogs prefer low-calorie foods like fish instead of energy rich meals with fat, King said he prefers the warm weather. “My dogs lose more weight when it’s cold,” King said.

King’s run time here was 10 hours, which includes about 10 minutes lost because he took off out of Cripple without his parka. He’d left it hanging on a tree, and doubled back to pick it up. Kjetil Backen left Cripple at 1 a.m. after dropping one dog, and was expected in to Ruby soon after King. But as the minutes ticked away to hours, there was a sense at this checkpoint that the eventual 2008 Iditarod winner was likely already parked here. It will be tough, but not impossible, for teams to whittle away much time on the likes of Mackey and King, this year at least. Both are moving well.

Still, Kjetil Backen and Mitch Seavey were both pleased with their situation, and their dogs, as they arrived about seven hours off the lead pace. Backen was relaxed and said his team was holding up very well. He’d run nonstop from Cripple and said it was a good experience for his somewhat inexperienced squad. They’re growing up, gaining character and he’s making new leaders, he said. He pulled in with favorites May and Lady in lead.

Seavey was a little bemused to be here fourth, saying he is acutely aware of his team’s weaknesses, being so familiar with them. “There’s things that need to be worked on, but they’re phenomenal athletes,” he said. Seavey has been trying to get his dogs to eat well in the warm temperatures, much like Mackey.

Seavey added a note of concession, saying it would take a lucky break for him to catch Mackey.

Given that the first teams to reach Cripple could not come off their 24-hour layovers until Mackey was already parked in Ruby, it seems they have an insurmountable deficit. DeeDee Jonrowe was 10 and a half hours off Mackey’s pace. As always seems to be the case, Mackey and King arrived in Ruby at the right time. Temperatures began to warm up to above freezing as they each settled in to their mandatory eight-hour Yukon River layover. Mackey would take off at 3:32 p.m., and King at 6:08 p.m. Fresh, wet snow had fallen on the Yukon River, but the trail there looked flat and easy, but probably a little slow and sticky.

King relaxes, chats, lets dogs run loose
King spent quite a while with reporters as he devoured a reheated packet of chicken and potatoes. All vestiges of Mackey’s seven course gourmet meal were long gone inside the community center. A few points that he covered:
* King talked about how Dickens, one of his favorite leaders, is really a “softie” at heart, on the wimpier side, yet she and all the others are “just charging.”
* Some dogs have been weak at times, but he’s held his tongue and watched them jog along without pulling, only to rebound and drive again.
* He said his updated version of the half-harness system he pioneered about four years ago is working very well. The harnesses he’s using now are modified pulka harnesses, which can be clipped on one or the other side of the gangline. If a dog develops a slight limp on one side, he switches to the other side and the soreness usually goes away.
* King noted that he has a couple of dogs that bark, yap and lunge whenever he hooks up to leave; and a couple others who make the same ruckus every time he pulls into a checkpoint. He singled out Klarney and Berkeley for being cheerleaders. Berkeley, he said, was a typical female dog, snarling at others while they eat and when one of the team slows down to relieve itself on the trail.
* King also marveled at the success of Lance Mackey, describing his team as “supernatural.” Even when it is not running as smoothly as it can. Mackey consistently posts some of the fastest run times, and characteristically can get up and go with relatively short rest.
* When a reporter asked King what’s next on the Yukon River, he replied. “If the going’s good, you do it in two legs, unless you’re Mackey. Then it’s one.”

He then went back outside in the suddenly hot afternoon sun and let a few of his dogs loose to trot around and sniff the snow before heading back inside the checkpoint for an afternoon nap.

Details emerge about the pass on the way to Cripple
When King passed Backen and Mackey, who pulled over in the heat of the day Thursday, on the way to Cripple, he’d said he couldn’t hear what Backen told him — other than one word, “Hawaii” — because he had his “earphones” on. Today, Backen said it was so hot that he’d taken off his jacket and hat, kicked back, spread his arms and soaked up the sun like it was Hawaii. That clarifies that comment.

But earphones? Backen said the reason King couldn’t hear him was because he had two small speakers strung around his shoulders with “disco” music blaring away while he sung along at the top of his lungs. Mackey, parked farther up the trail, recalled hearing country singer Toby Keith. “You could hear him coming from a mile away,” he said, adding that the Denali Park musher let out a “yee haw” as he went by.