Jessie Holmes holds off Kevin Hansen for Kobuk 440 win

Jessie Holmes at the restart of Iditarod 54.
Holmes won the 2026 Kobuk 440 early
Sunday morning in Kotzebue.

Jessie Holmes had a very happy Easter early Sunday as he and his team came first into Kotzebue winning their fifth Kobuk title - the last (now) four consecutively! In true Team Can't Stop fashion, the champion led the race from start to finish. We just may be in the Jessie Holmes era of long distance dog mushing.

Holmes wasn't alone out in front, he battled with Kotzebue's own Kevin Hansen for most of the race. Hansen stayed right on Jessie's heels from day one and came into the finish just twenty-two minutes after the champion. Kevin even ran the final leg one minute faster than Jessie. An impressive second place finish for the up-and-coming star from Kotz.

The rest of the teams are still along the trail. Judging by the official standings it appears Calvin Daugherty's tracker is not working (it has him several checkpoints back from where the leaderboard has him. He is out of the final checkpoint and it took Holmes and Hansen a little over six hours to make the run into the finish to if Calvin is on schedule (he left at 6:19am AKDT Sunday) then he should be finishing somewhere between 12:30pm AKDT and 1:30pm AKDT Sunday.

After Calvin is a really exciting race happening between Larry Daugherty (yup, Calvin's dad) and Kristy Berington. Both are out of the final checkpoint. They should be coming into the finish around 3pm - but they can't take it easy as Sam McLain about fifteen minutes behind them. Whew! Sometimes the race within the race is more exciting than first place!

Red Lantern is currently Jennifer Nelson on the tracker - however it hasn't updated in 40 minutes, leaderboard also has her well behind the next to last team, so it's a good guess she's the red lantern. Teams have until 2pm Monday AKDT to officially finish.