NOME — Jeff King, one of only four Iditarod mushers to win this Last Great Race at least four times, came within tantalizing grasp of win number five, but could not overcome the relentless pressure, endless drive and a little trickery of Lance Mackey, who claimed his second win in as many years.
King’s large dog team trotted under Nome’s burld arch at 4:05 a.m. Tuesday, after 9 days, 13 hours and 5 minutes on the trail, one hour and 20 minutes behind Mackey.
“It was pretty much a two man race from Ruby on,” he said at the finish line. “I had advantages and Lance had advantages. He was hungrier than me.”
Both King’s and Mackey’s dogs looked excellent coming down the street in Nome, and they were playful and relaxed at the finish line. Both teams were exceptionally well managed.
Throughout the race, King was determined to keep his team at a steady pace, saying at one point early on, “We’re just puttin’ along.” Between his steady approach and no-neckline harness system, King maintained one of the largest dog teams ever to compete for first place. He had all 16 dogs in harness by White Mountain, dropping just two for his final dash to Nome.
The large team wasn’t a goal, but merely a consequence of King’s immaculate dog care. It also helped that the trail was soft and slow, and warm, which tended to favor more large dog teams than usual.
The legendary musher, 52, appeared to have the team to beat as the race heated up on the Bering Sea coast, but Mackey was able to get the zip back in his team, and he pulled a fast one on King in the wee hours of March 10 when they got to Elim. Mackey snuck out of the checkpoint while King slept, only another 30 minutes, but by the time King got on the trail again, he was a full hour behind Mackey. He never made that time back up.
The pair actually used each other at various times. King trailed after Mackey for days, allowing Mackey’s dogs to break trail through soft trail. He slept at Koyuk with his feet atop Mackey’s boots, knowing Mackey couldn’t leave without them. Sure enough, he felt some sneaky fingers trying to slip the boots away from him, sa King feined that he was still asleep. Then Mackey trumped King by slipping out of Elim. “I’m pretty sure he baited me into it,” King said. “It never dawned on me. It should have. So, turnaround is fair play. It’s been fun.
King described Mackey as “a heck of a good dog driver and very fun to race.”
King is known as an innovator. He’s scrapped mushing institutions such as traditional sled design and tried to make things that work better. He has reinvented the hardware side of the sport to improve the performance of his dogs. He revolutionized dog harness design about several years ago, in the process changing the way some towlines are made. He developed the now popularMo tail-dragger sled, which puts the musher on the middle of the runners with most of the gear behind him, creating a built-in seat.
More than that, he understands his dogs, he likes his dogs and they like him. He gets inside their heads and teaches them in a way they understand. The way he ran this race is an example of his dog skills. He trains them to pace themselves by running fast, but not too fast.
King and Mackey will face each other again, very soon. The All-Alaska Sweepstakes starts right here in Nome on March 26, and both are entered in that 400-mile race, with a winner-take-all $100,000 purse on the line. King said he was already looking forward to it as he saw the lights and celebration of Mackey’s victory while he was still on the trail, viewing the city from Cape Nome.
“It just dawned on me that I don’t think there’s anything I could do to better prepare a Sweepstakes team than what I just did coming from Anchorage,” King said after the race. “Now I know. These dogs are going the right speed, they’re already psychologically at the pace they need to be to do long runs. If they could just start at 8 mph and be there the whole time and not touch the drag or anything, I don’t think you could prepare them better…
“I’m going to win that one.”