Iditarod Update – Race Day 6 Late Night
Current leaders and location [> indicates beyond that checkpoint]:
1 Lance Mackey (6) Ruby>
2 Jeff King (11) Ruby>
3 Kjetil Backen (42) Ruby
4 Mitch Seavey (33) Ruby
5 Hans Gatt (38) Ruby
6 John Baker (67) Ruby
7 Rick Swenson (61) Ruby
8 Jim Lanier (4) Ruby
9 Ramey Smyth (48) Ruby
10 Jessie Royer (3) Ruby
11 Paul Gebhardt (69) Ruby
12 DeeDee Jonrowe (39) Ruby
13 Sigrid Ekran (24) Ruby
14 Martin Buser (13) Ruby
15 Zack Steer (26) Ruby
16 Ed Iten (32) Ruby
17 Aaron Burmeister (14) Cripple>
18 Sebastian Schnuelle (68) Cripple>
19 Gerry Willomitzer (7) Cripple>
20 William Kleedehn (66) Cripple> [rookie]
Currently in 73rd place, Rachael Scdoris (55) has stopped at Ophir.
The last team on the trail, Dries Jacobs (65) appears to be stopped at McGrath for his 24-hour layover.
Only about 2½ hours separate Lance Mackey and Jeff King as they move down the Yukon River toward the former Galena AFS. King still has 16 dogs that reportedly looked really chipper pulling into Ruby.
Back in my days the F-4 Phantoms at Galena and Tin City west of Nome, provided air defense for Alaska, going out to meet the occasional Soviet Tu-95 Bears that would test their responses.
