The Parade Went On
The Susan Butcher Day parade of teams that marks the ceremonial beginning of the Iditarod started at 10AM AKST [1PM CST] in light snow.
There is plenty of snow at the start, with up to two feet reported on the trail, but it is powder. It will be fast for the front, but the trail can break down, and the wind can move it around and create white-out conditions. You can’t make snowballs or snowmen out of powder snow, it doesn’t pack.
The real racing starts tomorrow from Willow with the re-start. I expect the experienced teams will move quickly to the front to avoid the trail breakdown.
There are four winners of the only the Yukon Quest, and four winners of only the Iditarod, as well as two, Lance Mackey and Jeff King who have won both.
Lance is in a rebuilding phase, with younger dogs, but he will probably add some more veterans to his Iditarod team than he used on the Quest team he just ran.
John Baker is back and there is no reason to think he will change his strategy of ‘cruise control’ that won last year. Velvet and Snickers will set the pace and John’s team will move along at their trot – the most efficient use of their energy. This is a distance team, not sprinters, and they can keep it up seemingly forever. Warm weather is the only thing that will really bother these dogs. They set the overall record time for the race on the tougher Southern trail: 8 days, 19 hours, 46 minutes, 39 seconds.
The Mushers List is after the fold
1 Ray Redington Jr (2)
2 Jim Lanier (3)
3 William Pinkham (4)
4 Tom Thurston (5)
5 Jodi Bailey (6)
6 Wade Marrs (7)
7 Cim Smyth (8)
8 Nicolas Petit (9)
9 Jeff King (10)
10 John Baker (11)
11 Kelly Maixner (12)
12 Michael Suprenant (13)
13 Aliy Zirkle (14)
14 Pat Moon (15)R
15 Trent Herbst (16)
16 DeeDee Jonrowe (17)
17 Lance Mackey (18)
18 Travis Cooper(19)R
19 Kelley Griffin (20)
20 Ramey Smyth (21)
21 Mike Santos (22)R
22 Gerry Willomitzer (23)
23 Sigrid Ekran (24)
24 Paul Gebhardt (25)
25 Michelle Phillips (26)
26 Hugh Neff (27)
27 Peter Kaiser (28)
28 Jake Berkowitz (29)
29 Jaimee Kinzer (30)R
30 Kristy Berington (31)
31 Anjanette Steer (32)R
32 Anna Berington (33)R
33 Dallas Seavey (34)
34 Mitch Seavey (35)
35 Bruce Linton (36)
36 Scott Janssen (37)
37 Justin Savidis (38)
38 Ken Anderson (39)
39 Jan Steves (40)R
40 Martin Buser (41)
41 Colleen Robertia (42)
42 Karin Hendrickson (43)
43 Aaron Burmeister (44)
44 Ed Stielstra (45)
45 Ryne Olson (46)R
46 Kirk Barnum (47)
47 Hank Debruin (48)Q
48 Bob Chlupach (49)
49 Brent Sass (50)Q
50 Michael Williams Jr (51)
51 Matt Giblin (52)
52 Zoya DeNure (53)
53 Silvia Furtwдngler (54)R
54 Josh Cadzow (55)Q
55 Karen Ramstead (56)
56 Matt Failor (57)R
57 Gerald Sousa (58)
58 Sonny Lindner (59)
59 Rick Swenson (60)
60 Curt Perano (61)R
61 Rohn Buser (62)
62 Braxton Peterson (63)R
63 Art Church Jr (64)
64 Dan Seavey (65)
65 Lachlan Clarke (66)
66 Ryan Redington (67)
- The Mushers in bold are former winners of the Iditarod, while italics indicates Yukon Quest winners. The numbers in parentheses are their Bib numbers. The small “R” indicates a total rookie, while the small “Q” indicates an Iditarod rookie who has completed a Yukon Quest.
- These are the official standings. That means they are official, not that they are correct. Things jump around a lot as people decide to update the standings. This problem is especially bad in the back of the pack, as no one bothers to update those standings when the lead is changing.
- This post will be updated during the day, and the map changed on all posts to reflect the current situation.
- All posts on the Iditarod can be seen by selecting “Iditarod” from the Category box on the right sidebar.
