Iditarod 42 (starts March 1)

[ManyCairns]

I think I have a new favorite to root for -- Abbie West! Rookie to the Iditarod but an experienced musher overall, including completing the Yukon Quest I believe. Go, Abbie for Rookie of the Year!

 

[Tonichelle]

I've been bad and haven't updated, but the race has just gone so freaking fast. The leaders are on the coast! Should everything go well we're going to see John Baker's record finish time get SMASHED.

 

[ManyCairns]

Toni, is Danny Seavey as likeable and simply darned capable as he sounds? I really noticed how well written his blog posts were last year, and this year his interviews, his stopping to check on Janssen, etc. -- he just seems like a smart, steady kinda guy. Oh, and of course Conway writes some great stuff, too, I'm not trying to leave anyone out! I just had more chance to see Danny this year on some of the Insider vids and such.

 

[ManyCairns]

Another great race for the Seaveys! Congrats!

I have to be a bit gutted for what happened to King, though. Wish he had not had to scratch at the last minute like that.

TONI, question -- I was surprised that Burmeister, a Nome native familiar with the finish area, was apparently allowed to go up the coast above Golovin with no penalty? He got himself out of the wind and off that sheet ice, and I would think that was an advantage. I thought you had to follow the trail, not just pick your own route between checkpoints. ??? The next cluster of mushers, Redington et al., went slowly on the correct trail, but not as slowly as Sonny, Joar, and Martin, who were just ahead of Burmeister.

 

[Olympia]

Congrats to the winner! I see an article on the CNN site that says it was the second-closest finish in Iditarod history.

Toni, tell Dallas that the figure skating division of his fan club sends him a cheer.

 

[Tonichelle]

Toni, is Danny Seavey as likeable and simply darned capable as he sounds? I really noticed how well written his blog posts were last year, and this year his interviews, his stopping to check on Janssen, etc. -- he just seems like a smart, steady kinda guy. Oh, and of course Conway writes some great stuff, too, I'm not trying to leave anyone out! I just had more chance to see Danny this year on some of the Insider vids and such.

Yes, his wife really did marry a Prince Charming. He has an ego, don't get me wrong, and he's far from perfect... but he really is just as he seems on the videos and in the stories people are talking about. He's known as the "white knight" in his family because he's always there at the right time to help/bail out someone in need (whether he knows them or not). He has one very proud wife to come home to this coming week.


As for Burmeister - with the winds as bad as they were the markers were gone. Mitch even said as much when he came in this morning - there were no markers. Aliy said the run from White Mountain to Safety she was "lost the whole time". Plus, Mitch tried to do the same thing as Aaron, but the dogs didn't want to run on the coast any more than they wanted to run on the ice, so back they went.


At the point that Mitch Seavey came into Nome three (four? I can't remember) hours after his son, I'd been up for a solid 26-27 hours. In the last 3 days I've had about 8 hours sleep (planned on sleeping the day away today but dad's dog went psycho a little while ago and tried to eat through my door, no idea why). Dallas was not supposed to have ANY chance of winning. He'd waited "too long" to try and overtake the leader. King had a consistent lead over Zirkle, who had a consistent lead over Seavey Younger, who had a consistent lead over Seavey Older. When the runs began out of White Mountain I was still hopeful that Dallas could run down Aliy and come in second, but there was "no way" that he had enough mileage between White Mountain and Nome to run down Jeff.

It literally took an "act of God" to make it possible. Jeff's team was blown - literally - off course three miles from the checkpoing of Safety. He was 25 miles from the finish and the dogs basically told him to take a flying leap, they weren't going anywhere. But with the winds and cold it was unsafe for him and the team to stay out in it all curled up, so he went and got help. His race ended 25 miles from the finish (after travelling nearly 1,000).

Aliy kept a nice cushion between herself and Dallas. He made up *maybe* 10 minutes on her over two days. He was racing to keep third place and maybe get close enough to make a move on second. Aliy made it to the final checkpoint, with 65-75mph windgusts going on outside, she talked to some snowmachiners who told her not to go back out. It was going to get worse. Aliy stayed for 2.5 hours. She gave up her entire cushion. There was no power in Safety, there was no way to know where Dallas was or when he would be coming into the check point.

Dallas showed right on time. He’d battled the winds too, but his dogs kept going. They were trained for adverse conditions. They believed in their musher and trusted him. He signed in and out of the checkpoint in three minutes. He saw Aliy’s name, but in his hazy state he thought she was gone. He didn’t see Jeff King’s name and figured his name was on a different piece of paper. He was running for third. He told his team of seven to hike up and out into the winds they went. Joe Runyan had blogged just a few minutes before that any musher who dared to venture out from Safety that night was “foolhardy”. They could get injured, they could get frostbite, they wouldn’t make the 22 miles to Nome.

Fifteen minutes of going back and forth deciding what to do, Aliy Zirkle gave chase. Her indecisiveness meant she would be the 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] place finisher for a third straight year. Aliy had the faster run time from Safety to Nome. She ran it fifteen minutes faster than Dallas. If she’d left just after he did instead of sitting there weighing the options, she’d be champion.
When Dallas came across the finish line with 6 dogs on the line and one in the sled – he was completely confused with the crowd, and the fuss. He came in third, why all the pomp and circumstance?! It took him a good minute or two for it to sink in. The whole time he ran with a light following him to Nome he believed his Dad had caught up and was running him down. He truly believed he was outrunning Mitch Seavey. Dallas dazed and confused asked Race Marshall Mark Nordman, “Where’s Jeff?! Where’s Aliy?!” Two minutes after Dallas came under the Burled Arch, Aliy Zirkle finished her race.

This is the second closest race finish in the history of the sport (the fastest less than a minute separated 1[SUP]st[/SUP] and 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] place and was decided by the nose of the first dog. Dick Mackey beat Rick Swenson in 1978 for that one). It SMASHED the previous fastest time finish so much so that the next 3 teams also finished faster than the previous record.

Dallas came into Nome in 8 days, 13 hours, 4 minutes, and 19 seconds. Over five hours faster than John Baker’s record setting pace in 2011. It was 3 hours slower, though, than what had been predicted for Jeff King.
This race will be one for the history books. Little to no snow on much of the trail, the farewell burn that destroyed sleds and mushers alike. Monster run times. Happy healthy dogs in what appears to be record number. And in the final leg of the race, when it should’ve been smooth sailing, hurricane force windstorms blow the leaders away.
In the words of Hobo Jim: “This is the country where legends are born.”

 

[Olympia]

Way to go, Dallas!

 

[ManyCairns]

Thanks for the great overview, Toni. Incredible race and another incredible performance by the amazing Seavey team -- all of you!

As for Burmeister -- bear with me because I was staring at my computer for hours on end. Really, this appears to have been a planned move, especially since that's his home turf. Watching the GPS in real time, and then the tracker replay -- well, all the mushers before and after him managed to follow the trail exactly enough that no deviations to show on the tracker. (The point where Mitch zigged a bit, in a way that the trackers picked up, was much later in the trail.) Burmeister left the trail below Golovin, went to the coast, cut west a bit through the community of Golovin, then followed the coast around the bay. His speed went from 1.x and even as low as .5 to 5.x or near 6.x. I think he used his knowledge of the area to gain an unfair advantage. I remember, was it in the Quest?, Neff went off the trail for only a few hundred yards for some film footage and got a significant penalty.

If you watch the GPS tracker replay, it is so clear Burmeister made a deliberate move and his speed zoomed way up. The only unsureness that showed was when he tried to cross the bay near the northernmost point, right across from the trail, and had to turn back to the coast and follow it around some more, but this wasn't zigging and zagging from being lost. He followed the coast too closely for that. I agree the conditions were insane, and yet no one else did what he did. Maixner was stopped for hours and then scratched right at the point where Burmeister cut off the trail just south of Golovin. Neff was stuck on the ice much farther north/west.

But in all the amazing turns of events with the three leaders, nothing was noted about Burmeister going off trail to go around the coast. I noticed in his interview he said "crossing Golovin Bay" a couple of times and I'm thinking -- no, you went up the coast, but nice job with the spin.

Maybe everyone should consider that as an alternate route in bad weather -- picking up the coast below the jut of land that Golovin proper is on, and following it up and around.

Anyway, if racers are allowed to deviate from the trail like that for miles with no penalty, I wonder why they even have a trail? It should be like a road rally -- any route goes as long as you hit the checkpoints. Might be useful for other mushers to know and to fall back on if they are questioned -- if you can go miles off the trail in one set of circumstances, the precedent is set.

Wow, what a year!

I am just amazed at how many great folks mushing attracts. Sure, there's plenty of shadier types, too, but by and large everyone seems so gritty and persevering and down to earth.

I think that was Aliy greeting Jessie Royer at the finish? Wow, she already looked amazingly better after a little rest than she did after that wild race and that wild night.

I imagine Dallas is already bounding around -- he seems like he is incredibly fit -- amazing athlete.

 

[Tonichelle]

I can't comment on the Burmeister case because I simply don't know. I'll ask around, but none of the kennels are crying foul on their facebook pages (and believe me a lot of the middle to back of the packers have been doing their fair share of bellyaching and potshots at the leaders - especially a certain couple of leaders in the top three). There are penalties for going off course, but I don't know that Aaron would knowingly cheat.

 

[ManyCairns]

I'm finding it hard to "withdraw" from the race this year. At least the Rookie of the Year race within the race was quite exciting. I was rooting for Abbie West, then Nathan took it at the end by a couple of minutes -- but then gave Abbie a figurative nod in his interview, allowing that the forced stop because of the weather allowed him to catch up to her. Sounds like a great guy.

Sorlie's return was interesting to watch; oh, and Gatt, too -- what a sweet guy. Wonder if he will really stay away this time? I'd say it's in the blood.

I think the Burmeister situation interests me because of the possibilities it opens up for alternate routes in extreme conditions.

 

[Tonichelle]

Mitch Seavey's lead dog Tanner wasn't feeling great towards the end of the race - the wind didn't help. So new super star out of the Pixar litter, Wall-E took the lead to bring Mitch into Nome Tuesday morning. Have to say Wall-E is one of my new favorites in the kennel. Mainly because he's adorable and his fur is so soft!

http://instagram.com/p/ldl72_IOam/
(yes this is one of my photos)

 

[ManyCairns]

Oohh, stunning shot -- and getting all the features of the white dog against the white background -- nice work.

 

[Tonichelle]

Oohh, stunning shot -- and getting all the features of the white dog against the white background -- nice work.

Thank God for Photoshop! It was BRIGHT sunlight while I was there and the dogs don't typically stand still long enough for me to set up a shot in the shade. Wall-E did pretty well, but I still needed a little help in the processing of the photo to make sure he wasn't just a nose and eyes lol

 

[Olympia]

Oohh, stunning shot -- and getting all the features of the white dog against the white background -- nice work.

I agree! Thanks for sharing it. Wall-E...what a great name for a dog who races into the unknown.

 

[Tonichelle]

More Drama coming off the trail. This is definitely not a good year PR wise for the race. all dogs are good, but mushers are bringing a lot of drama to the forefront.

 

[ManyCairns]

The Widow's Lamp is out -- no more mushers on the Iditarod Trail. What a year.

 

[Tonichelle]

Closing Banquet is this afternoon, should be fun to see who got awarded what!

 

[Tonichelle]

Danny Seavey wrote about his experience. I hope this is viewable by all - even if you don't have a Facebook account. If you can't see it let me know! I will get it viewable!

https://www.facebook.com/notes/danny-seavey/there-are-no-words-iditarod-2014-recap/10152304001310990

 

[Olympia]

Thanks, Toni. I have no trouble reading it.

 

[Tonichelle]

Thanks, Toni. I have no trouble reading it.

yay! hope you enjoyed it!