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| Joar Leifseth Ulsom at the Ceremonial Start of Iditarod 46. Anchorage, Alaska, March 3, 2018 |
With the race becoming more and more about speed, with well groomed trails and lack of need for camping and snowshoeing, it feels almost foreign to have the race seemingly stall more than once. A huge storm front blew in early in the race, with most teams getting caught out in it. The three front runners, for the most part, have run ahead of the worst of it, but they too are dealing with a trail that has been snowed and blown over. The chase pack reported blizzard like conditions on their way to the Yukon, with many teams hunkering down in between checkpoints hoping the storm would pass. While it's a race, right now it's more of a camping trip for the teams not in the front.
Because of the weather, the checkpoint of Eagle Island is relegated to a "hospitality stop" - meaning there are no drop bags. Teams must now plan on taking as many supplies and dog food that they need to make the trip from Anvik to Kaltag - 120 miles. Back in the "old days" this is how this race was run. More camping between checkpoints and then again in them. We haven't seen a race like this - that I can remember - since the 90s. This is definitely not the "norm" of the last couple of decades.
As of now the GPS tracker shows Nic back on the move, but it's once again slow going. In most recent races, he'd be in Kaltag by now (but judging by the GPS he's about 50 miles away). He has an eleven mile lead over Seavey and Ulsom. Right now it looks like Petit's to lose, but he has been breaking trail for over two days. That takes a lot of energy out of a team and even the best lead dogs need a mental break when the trail is tough. Nic is known for pushing hard through the whole race, and his team responds fairly well to it, though by the time they hit the coast they have been known to slow significantly... and that's on good trail years. We've yet to really see what Petit's team can do on a thousand mile race where the going got tough for the majority of the trail.
Looking briefly at the analytics (my least favorite thing to do because I'm horrible at reading them, because I never pay attention to Danny Seavey's lessons) Mitch has the "winning team" still on paper. He's taking more rest and he's traveling at faster speeds... but Nic still has almost a two hour lead on the team. Likewise, Joar may have a slower team but he's running right along with Mitch.
Everything in recent memory says that Nic cannot keep his pace and his lead on the other two while continually breaking trail. But, the two following are playing a game of cat and mouse trying to get the other one to break trail. So far, it's been Mitch showing as being the one leading the two teams up the Yukon.
All the while, the chase pack is catching up. They may have gotten caught in the blizzard on their way to the Yukon, but now they're away from that, and someone else broke trail for them. The snow hasn't been as bad on the river, and neither has the wind, since Nic, Mitch and Joar went through which means the teams behind them are not working quite so hard. At this point they aren't in danger of being overtaken, but they can't sit back and relax anymore, either. The chase pack is 10 miles behind them. Their times to rest points are faster.
Expect all teams to take a nice long rest in Kaltag once they make it. Bruce Lee spoke this morning on Insider saying that it would make no sense for Nic to blow through and rest out on the trail again, but there again, we just cannot predict what Petit will do. He is a go with your gut kind of musher. The other teams need to just run their race, not try to catch someone else's race. It's worked many times before... on good trail years... it's the gutsy ones that normally win the bad trail years.
So, is Nic winning the race? Possibly. But SHOULD he be winning at this point? Time will tell how it pays off.
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