KALTAG — There’s more than one race within this race, and earlier today I neglected to mention a fun matchup worth watching. It could arguably be called the race between some of the most beautiful teams ever to run the Iditarod: The Siberian huskies.
Right now, it’s the husband and wife team of Blake and Jennifer Freking of Finland, Minn., leading the race of the purebred huskies. They were out of the Cripple checkpoint at 3:22 a.m. Saturday, and Karen Ramstead of Perryvale, Alberta, had checked in at Cripple at 5 p.m Friday, but wasn’t reported out as I wrote this. She’s closely followed by Wayne Curtis of Wasilla, Alaska, also parked at the remote tent camp called Cripple.
Are those Sibe teams competing? Ramstead cracked a big grin when she heard the question while snacking her dogs at Takotna a couple of days ago. “Well,” she said, “We don’t wish anything bad for the other teams, but, you bet, of course we all want to be first.”
Mushers inside the checkpoint who drive the common Alaskan huskies, which cruise faster and win the Iditarod, still marvel at the Siberian teams. Those dogs are tough, well-insulated and, interestingly, rarely need booties. Ramstead said she only had one dog with slightly delicate feet, which needed a couple of cloth booties for protection.
Jonrowe happy as a clam at Ruby
Not all the top 20 taking their eight-hour layovers at Ruby were as cheerful, talkative and just happy as Lance Mackey and Jeff King or Kjetil Backen or Mitch Seavey. Some were pretty downcast — their hopes and hard work looked like it wasn’t panning out. Most of the teams in the top 20 this year had an arguable chance to win, and when the magic isn’t there, it takes a while to process the information, especially when you’re tired and worn out.
Some were so tired their eyelids hung at half mast. But one or two stood out for looking remarkably fresh, and DeeDee Jonrowe was the brightest. She was downright bubbly as she grabbed a bowl of moose stew and waited out her eight-hour layover. She looked me in the eye and said, as she’s told me all race, she’s only concerned with her team, not anyone else’s.
Jonrowe has had issues with that in the past, and she’s determined to keep her team as strong as possible for a powerful run up the Bering Sea coast. As veteran mushers will tell you, racing the Iditarod is like building a house of playing cards. One false move in any part of the process, and the house comes tumbling down.
Keep tabs on Jonrowe to see how she’s doing, if her team stays large and her run times fast as she turns the corner at Unalakleet for the final stretch. She dropped one dog at Galena, and took off again after a four-hour rest with 13 dogs.
The scene on the Yukon River
Right now, mushers are dealing with some very slow conditions. The weather remains warm, about 20 degrees at night and 32 degrees during the day. Heavy, wet snow has fallen at Kaltag for the last 24 hours, but the line of precipitation doesn’t seem to reach as far as Galena.
Trail breakers and people who live along the river say the trail is soft, even wet in places where water is seeping into the snow. That’s why run times are so slow. Seven hours to Galena and seven hours to Nulato is unusual, but not unheard-of. In 2004, when the weather was equally hot and wet, Mitch Seavey’s run times were similar as he was enroute to winning the race.
Maybe he’s having flashbacks as his dogs piston through the soft trail around the meandering Yukon River. Seavey came from behind in 2004 to win. And he’s just joined Mackey and Seavey at Nulato as I write this. Seavey’s dogs thrive in soft trail conditions. He’d been pondering what he should do Friday afternoon at Ruby. He was down on dogs and had a few he had to nurse along. Obviously, he feels there’s enough gas in the tank to run hard from Ruby to Nulato with just a two-hour pit stop at Galena.
I’ve hopped a flight up to Kaltag from Ruby, ready to get a look at the frontrunners when they come off the Yukon some time tonight. It’s tough to predict when they’ll get to Unalakleet from here, but most likely it won’t be until noon Sunday at the earliest.