Iditarod
If you haven’t heard, Takotna checkpoint is famous for their pies every year. Nell is the one in charge of running the kitchen (and almost everything else around the checkpoint!), and she has a crew of schoolkids all day, every day, helping her keep the mushers, volunteers, and villagers fed and happy. The first mushers …
Jessie Royer has made McGrath. Royer’s first run to Nome was in 2001. With 16 starts, she’s had 16 finishes. Her best finish was fourth and she’s been in the top ten 6 times. Royer is fresh off the Yukon Quest trail. Musher and dogs will easily fall back into the trail routine. The canine athletes …
Defending Champion Joar, Leifseth Ulsom is second into McGrath. Joar check in at 16:45 with 13 dogs. He headed on to Takotna at 16:49 with the same number of dogs. Prior to 2019, Joar has started and completed 6 Iditarod runs. The defending Champion has 6 top-ten finishes. Growing up in Norway, Joar started his …
At 15:17 Tuesday afternoon, Nicolas Petit made the McGrath Checkpoint. On hand to greet Petit and present the inaugural Alaska Air Transit Spirit of Iditarod Award was Marshal Carter, AAT Flight Operations Manager and Jennifer Vanderpool of Hotel McGrath. Nic received a pair of beaver mitts handcrafted by McGrath resident Loretta Maillelle, as well as …
As part of his vision for the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, Joe Redington, Sr. wanted to celebrate the indigenous people of Alaska who had dog teams as a way of life. On the race route, Nikolai is the first native Alaskan village. An Athabascan community, Nikolai is rich in history and long in family …
It’s fascinating how much work has to happen to make the Iditarod happen every year. I’ve been in Takotna for about 24 hours, and it’s been eye opening to see how much work is going into getting the checkpoint all set up and prepared for the mushers to arrive sometime this evening. We’ve got 6 …
Nicolas Petit is setting a blistering pace as he approaches McGrath. GPS Tracker says he’s moving at 8.6 miles per hour. Looking at races of the past twenty years, it would seem that Nic will set a record for the earliest time into McGrath. In 2014, Aliy Zirkle arrived at McGrath checkpoint at 16:53 with …
Sharing out some of Jeff Schultz’s photos of activity at Puntilla Lake and teams heading up into the Alaska Range. Enjoy the story his photos tell of all that goes on in the race and view the grandness of the Last Frontier. Thanks Jeff for your awesome work!
With the first teams in Nikolai, folks in McGrath are excited. Likely the front-runners will be here early evening. Why, there may even be enough daylight for some nice photos. Village people will turn out to welcome the first teams to climb off the river into the checkpoint. Of course news media will be here to …
After rookies left the starting line Sunday it should have hit them that they were finally racing in the Iditarod – leaving the starting line is a surreal experience when you’ve spent at least a couple years preparing for this moment. Once you leave the start line, you get to high five people through the …
