It should be no surprise that the top three are out of the Meier's Lake checkpoint within a couple of miles of each other. Brent Sass was first to leave at just before 7pm, Nicolas Petit followed twenty eight minutes later. Even though Matt Hall was second into the checkpoint, he was third out nearly an hour later.
While there is an hour difference between second and third, Hall has the most rest banked out of the top three. He is running as fast as the top two and only needs two more hours of mandatory rest. Petit needs two and half hours, and Sass three.
The chase pack is starting to leave the checkpoint now, with Hedda Mosleth leading that charge. Hedda is running a team from Dallas' Seavey's kennel, and it does not appear that she is running conservatively. She's keeping up "with the big boys" and may play a spoiler.
Five teams have scratched on the run between Lake Louise and Meier's Lake. Trail reports from those that made the difficult decision to scratch said that the deep snow and "moose tracks" created conditions that gave many teams minor injuries - causing mushers to either run the second half of the race with a small team, or call it a day. All teams report no major injuries, but they want to keep it that way.
Moose tracks in deep snow can cause a problem for dogs as the holes the moose make in the trail are much deeper than the dogs can step in causing falls and pulled muscles. This type of post holing is not just physically dangerous it's also mentally demanding of the dogs and at the end of the day if they dogs aren't loving it - you're in it for the wrong reasons.
The five teams who've scratched so far are:
Jeff Deeter
Cody Strathe
Vickie Justice
Riley Dyche
Richie Beattie
Not every team that's scratched has "checked in" with followers to give their exact reasons, but the top teams that pulled out earlier have.
With just over 100 miles left to go for the frontrunners, do not expect a winner until late morning (at the earliest) finish on Monday. As stated, they still have three to four hours of rest they have to take on top of keeping up top speeds to make a morning finish even possible - it's more likely afternoon or evening on Monday for teams to show up back in Glen Allen. We'll have a better picture come Monday morning.
