History was just made.  For the first time ever someone has won four Iditarods in a row.  On top of that Lance also won two Yukon Quests & Iditarods in the same year.  We may never see a run like this again. Someone winning six out of eight thousand mile races in four years.

In Nome Lance reflected on this year’s race and told us a little about this team.  For the first three days of the race things didn’t come together with the team. According to Lance, they didn’t become a solid unit . They were all good dogs but they just weren’t that cohesive unit one needs to compete at the front. They first came together for him on the run from Cripple to Ruby and that was the first time he saw an opportunity to win.  His team has a huge bottom end and  as he says “they will walk to the end of the earth for him”.  One thing for sure, they were great eaters in the last half of the race packing down every calorie and drinking everything he put in front of them.  Good eating habits are a major attribute Lance looks for in his racing dogs.  He said that eating well effects everything else about a dogs performance.

One issue Lance had to deal with this year was that a large number of his food drops bags had thawed out and the red meat was spoiled.  That didn’t allow him to feed the way he normally would during parts of the race.  Red meat is a big part of a racing dog’s diet so he was limited in the meals he could feed them.

Lance said that he knew from the beginning that if he was going to win this race the one team he had to beat was Jeff King’s.  He did his long run from Nulato to Unalakleet not so much to win but ” to shake up the competition around him”.  It also was a way to make up the lead that Jeff had on him,  stay in the top five and to win the first to the coast award.  According to Lance he couldn’t have done that run if it wasn’t the right time of day and the right section of trail with the dogs eating well.

He also said on this race he was as cold as he’d ever been.  His hands were often so cold he could barely use them.  His feet hurt and at Koyuk he questioned how many more years he can do this.

Lance always finds a way to enjoy himself on the trail none the less.  When heading into the finish line in Nome he came upon a set of caribou antlers buried in the snow and took the time to dig them out and mount them on his sled.  If you see the videos of him coming into Nome you can see them on his sled.

Lance said he didn’t get into sled dogs or racing to break records.  He’s just happy to find something that he’s good at and enjoys doing.  None the less he has made history in the sled dog world.