DAY 10

Heading for a magical end

Hard-driving Mackey follows family tracks to Nome

By CRAIG MEDRED and KEVIN KLOTT
Anchorage Daily News Daily News staff

Published: March 13, 2007
Last Modified: March 14, 2007 at 06:38 PM

The dog team of Fairbanks musher Lance Mackey was rolling toward Nome on Monday and a place in the history of Alaska sled-dog lore that could put the driver right up there with the likes of Leonhard Seppala, Scotty Allan and Iron Man Johnson.

Less than a month ago, Mackey was in a similar position, racing toward the Fairbanks finish line of the 1,000-mile Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race.

Coming off a hard-earned victory in that demanding race, he and his team weren't given much chance by anybody of winning the 1,100-mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race from Anchorage to Nome.

Mackey heard the talk and ignored it.

As for his dogs, well, they must not have heard it at all because for a couple of days now they have been the dominant force in this race. As other teams have tired and slowed, Mackey's dogs have picked up the pace.

By Monday night, they were making the impossible look probable. By today, they could be well on their way to towing their master to an unprecedented -- some would have said impossible -- first-ever Iditarod victory.

A win would be good for $69,000 and a much-needed new pickup. Mackey has already said he'd be happy to dump his old, beat-up dog truck in favor of the shiny new Dodge quad cab the winner of this race earns.

The dogs were acting as if they wouldn't mind some flashy new wheels either.

They barreled through the small village of Elim on the Bering Sea Coast just after 6 Monday night. Though they had looked to be slowing earlier in the day, their average speed for the 50-mile run tight along the coast from Koyuk was back up to almost 8.5 mph, a respectable speed for an Iditarod frontrunner.

Behind them, the teams of four-time Iditarod champs Martin Buser from Big Lake and Jeff King from Denali Park were down between 6.5 and 7.5 mph. Buser led the race for a good part of the way across the Interior. King led it to the coast.

But Mackey, working with Paul Gebhardt from Kasilof, never let Buser or King, the defending champ, get away.

The real turning point came at Eagle Island on the wind-ravaged Yukon River two days ago. Mackey and Gebhardt cut back slightly on rest for their teams there before launching a drive toward Unalakleet that put the Gang of Four on the Bering Sea Coast at nearly the same time.

King led. Mackey, who caught Buser not far outside the village, followed. Buser was third, with Gebhardt only minutes behind him.

Gebhardt and Mackey clearly had the faster teams coming over the Kaltag Portage from the Yukon.

When Buser and King decided their teams needed to rest to avoid slowing down even more, Gebhardt seized the moment to jump into the lead. Mackey followed, and then started pulling away behind a dog team that has clearly been among the fastest for the last half of the race.

What is amazing about this is that these are the same dogs that won the Quest on Feb. 20. They got a short break after that adventure and then headed for Anchorage only a couple of weeks later.

Though they weren't as fast as some other teams at the start of the Iditarod they clearly had more endurance, and that was showing on the coast. Mackey passed Gebhardt north of Unalakleet, and though Gebhardt managed to stay close for 90 miles to the village of Koyuk -- he left only 13 minutes behind Mackey but with only a 10 minute stop compared with Mackey's three hours -- a 2 1/2 -hour gap opened between the two teams over the 50-mile leg from Koyuk to Elim.

"It's not chance; it's Lance,'' King joked to videographers for the Iditarod Insider Web cast as his team rested in Shaktoolik.

As far back as Unalakleet, where Wells Fargo Bank handed King $2,500 in gold nuggets as the first musher to the coast, the defending champ had hinted he thought Mackey was in position to make a run for victory.

"I very much want to win this,'' King said, "but if I don't, I hope Lance does because it's a real magical story.''

King wasn't giving up. Tired teams have been known to falter on the 80-mile stretch drive to Nome after a mandatory eight-hour layover in White Mountain -- a few have even quit -- but that didn't appear likely.

"I'm comfortable,'' Mackey said in Unalakleet. "I've been in the hunt a time or two. Everyone knows what this team is capable of doing.''

He credited dumb dogs.

"Smart dogs are the ones that'll get you in trouble,'' he joked. "My dogs know nothing. We keep it simple'': Eat when hungry. Rest when tired. Stick to the trail. Keep rolling north.

Mackey said he lacked the sort of fancy lead dogs one could gee-haw through a maze, but his dogs know how to follow a trail and set a strong, steady pace.

They just kept motoring as all around them began to sputter.

At Koyuk, Buser confessed his dogs were "just about out of gas. Just like their owner." The Big Lake musher came into this Iditarod with a strong team only to be plagued by problems including the loss of a key leader to injuries in a dogfight on the way into Eagle Island.

Buser is now 49 years old. Mackey is 36, young by Iditarod standards. The top five finishers last year were all over 50.

But there are indications a particularly rough trail this year took a toll on the AARP gang.

Along with getting passed by Mackey, Buser and King, 51, were battling to hold off 33-year-old Zack Steer from Sheep Mountain.

King bridled last year when four-time Iditarod champ Doug Swingley from Lincoln, Mont., observed that no one over 50 had ever won the race. And he responded to that challenge by becoming the oldest ever to win.

A year later, he was confessing just how hard it is to win four times.

"It's tough as hell ... as opposed to someone who's not supposed to have won it, who wants it that bad, who has a magical run.

"OK, there's a fairy tale ending for you,'' he said.

King wasn't expecting to have much of a role in that ending. He was even sounding a bit like a man who just wanted the race to be over.

"I'm very anxious to see my mom down in Palm Springs (Calif.) when I'm done with this,'' he said. "She's now very old and frail. It reminds me of that children's book. You know that children's book? 'I'll love you forever; I'll love you always.'

"She's one tough old bird. Now she's more old than she is tough. But I know I got (the Iditarod drive) from her. My dad is a good-natured guy. My mom's reasonably good-natured over the years, but she's more tough than good-natured.''

King is tough too. So is Buser.

Pantywaists don't do well in the Iditarod. More people have made it to the summit of Mount Everest than have made it from Anchorage to Nome in this race, and in 34 previous races, only 17 different mushers have passed first under the burled arch that marks the finish line in Nome.

Two of them were named Mackey -- Lance's father, Dick, in the Iditarod's only photo-finish in 1978, and Lance's half-brother, Rick, in 1983, both wearing bib No. 13, the same number Lance drew this year.

With Lance and his team bearing down on White Mountain Monday night, it looked like another Mackey might be getting ready to join the select group of Iditarod champs.

Daily News Outdoor editor Craig Medred can be reached at cmedred@adn.com.

When will 35th Iditarod Trail Sled Dog race end?

Leader Lance Mackey of Fairbanks checked into Elim at 5:55 p.m. and left at 6:01 p.m. Monday.

Last year, champion Jeff King arrived in Elim at 10:15 p.m. Monday and left at 10:23.

That puts this year's leader more than four hours ahead of last year's pace when King crossed the finish line shortly after midnight early Wednesday morning. If Mackey's pace holds up, this year's race should finish before 7 p.m.

During the last five Iditarods, average time from Elim to White Mountain was 6:17 -- the slowest, 7:17. If Mackey matches the average, it will put him in White Mountain at 12:18 a.m. today.

There he will take a mandatory eight-hour rest, putting him back on the trail around 8:20 a.m. The average time over the last five years of the final stretch run from White Mountain to the finish line was 10:18 (the fastest was 8:57, the slowest, 11:47).

If Mackey matches the average -- and the other assumptions hold true -- he'll cross under the burled arch before 7 p.m.

Iditarod 35 has its first dead dog

A dog in the team of veteran Iditarod musher Karen Ramstead of Perryvale, Alberta, died at the Grayling checkpoint on Monday, Iditarod officials said. It was the first dog to perish in this year's race.

The dog was part of Ramstead's team of purebred Siberian Huskies. Ramstead, 41, is the first musher to compete in and complete the Iditarod with a team of Canadian Kennel Club (CKC) registered Siberians. Behind those dogs, she finished the 2001, 2004 and 2006 races.

When the dogs aren't racing or training for Iditarod, Ramstead sometimes competes with them in dog shows.

She was so shaken by the death of one of them that she scratched from the race. She told race officials she wanted to be with her family to grieve the loss. She could not be reached for comment.

Ramstead is widely known for her love of classic huskies, which she breeds at her kennel in Alberta.

Last year, four dogs died during the Iditarod, the same number as in 2005.

Ramstead was 46th among the 63 teams left in the race when the dog perished. The dogs that died last year were also concentrated among teams in the middle to the back of the Iditarod pack. Race veterinarians have no firm idea of why.

An examination of Ramstead's dog is scheduled to determine a cause of death.

More

Ekran is Iditarod rookie of the year

Light Table Mackey

Brooks disqualified from Iditarod

Iditarod dog death under investigation

Mackey makes history with Iditarod win

‹ With final surge, Steer nails down 3rd place

‹ Gebhardt chases Mackey to Nome; four rest in White Mountain

‹ Mushing's 1st family Mackeys pile on the victories

‹ Photos: The Iditarod

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