Hello Iditarod Race Fans, as the sun is going down Mushers are out in the dog yard getting another meal into their teams. It is going to get busy here half an hour past midnight, when Jessie Royer is slated to leave, followed shortly by Richie Diehl. Watching Richie feed, his dogs were eating like Wolfes. 

In the meantime a few more teams are getting into the checkpoint. Laura Neese’s team was screaming up a storm coming in. They looked like they were ready to continue, yet Laura declared her 24 hr layover. When teasing here about that she should keep going, Laura said that this is the first time that she felt her dogs were looking good and getting into the groove. They should come very nicely out of their long break. Fabio Berlusconi’s team also looked very nice and well rested coming in here. Fabio is still carrying his big boat anchor.

The next team we expect in here is John Schandelmeier. It looks like he is getting that team together nicely, with doing a long run all the way from Nikolai. He likely will look forward to getting some spare cloths here. Once John gets here, we have 24 teams taking their 24 hour layover here, of 57 teams. 

Up front, Brent Sass is closing in fast on Cripple with pulling off a long nonstop run from Ophir.  About 20 miles behind him are Lance Mackey, Michelle Phillips, Paige Drobny and Mitch Seavey. All 4 of those teams stopped along the way through the warmest part of the day and are traveling in the 7.5 mph range. It will have taken Mitch Seavey and Paige Drobny 8 runs to reach the halfway point in Cripple, in comparison to 10 runs for Lance Mackey, Michelle Phillips or 7 runs for Brent Sass.