Zoya Denure scratched Monday morning at the Tanana checkpoint. The media release lists "personal reasons" as her reason to scratch. I'll try to find out more and let you know what I hear.
Fans of Brent Sass are still reeling from his disqualification earlier in the day. The Alaska Daily News has a nice article about the events that lead up to the DQ. He is taking the DQ with real class and sportsmanship, saying in an interview with the ADN "I'm an idiot, basically, is what it boils down to." and "I definitely broke the rule, so I suffer the consequences." In this day and age when we hear so much about poor behavior by professional athletes, it is refreshing to have one own up to a stupid mistake and take the punishment. I'm still really sad for him. Things were looking so promising for him to win the Yukon Quest and the Iditarod in the same year.
Here's the news from overnight in Alaska.
Mitch Seavey was the first musher to reach the Ruby checkpoint at 6:13 p.m. last night. Mitch is the recipient of the PenAir Spirit of Alaska Award, which consists of a an original "Spirit Mask," especially created for this event by Bristol Bay artist Orville Lind, and a $500 credit on PenAir towards travel or freight shipments. Mitch confessed he doesn't like being in the lead this early in the race.
Jeff King arrived at the Galena checkpoint this morning at 4:37 am, making him the first musher to the Yukon, and putting him in first place. His prize is a gourmet five-course meal that includes Alaska halibut and coconut cream soup, Cajun Kodiak scallops, Caesar salad with salmon caviar, filet mignon stuffed with Bering Sea red king crab and bananas foster flambé (and wine pairings for each course). He also gets a bottle of Dom Perignon and a cash prize of $3,500.
Jeff won the First Musher to the Yukon award during the 2014 race as well.
Jeff was followed into Galena by Aliy Zirkle and Aaron Burmeister. Aaron didn't stay in Galena, but moved out towards Huslia. Jeff has already taken his mandatory 8-hour layover, while Aaron & Aliy have yet to take that break.
Martin Buser, Jesse Royer, Hugh Neff, Dallas Seavey, Wade Marrs, Thomas Waener (a rookie) and Ken Anderson round out the current top 10.
On the other end of the trail is the current Red Lantern holder, Ellen Halverson. Ellen is the only two-time Red Lantern Award winner in race history, and she is on track to win it for a third time. Ellen, a 54-year old psychiatrist from Wasilla, Alaska, has entered the race five times, finishing last in her two successful attempts. Although finishing last in the Iditarod comes with some measure of notoriety and an award, Ellen admits she doesn't take finishing the race for granted, but doesn't want to finish in last place again.
Mushers are now about a third of the way through the race (despite some misleading headlines touting they are at the halfway mark). In even years, the trail would take them from Galena to Koyukuk, but this year they are making a turn to the northeast to the tiny city of Huslia (population 275 and the real halfway point), then a turn back southwest to Koyukuk. Here is a nice video of Huslia preparing for the influx of mushers. This is the first year this city has hosted the Iditarod and it looks like they are pretty excited.
It's looking pretty cold at about -25 degrees. Brrr!
No comments:
Post a Comment