Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby mira » Tue Mar 06, 2018 9:04 am

I don't have time to read loads of articles everywhere so I follow mostly using tracker and you :D

Anyhow, Ryan is into Nikolai, with Nicolas and Mitch not far behind (3-4) miles.

Joar, Wade and Ray is five miles behind Mitch.
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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby fladogfan » Tue Mar 06, 2018 10:01 am

A little late, found this at ITC about a volunteer.
http://iditarod.com/volunteer-spirit-ru ... heckpoint/
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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby JeanieB » Tue Mar 06, 2018 10:34 am

Moose, I changed my mind and signed up for Insider, too, last night. My thinking was how much I enjoy all of it, and can't be there, and especially on the the trip from Unalakleet to Nome is often not covered by anyone else. If Aliy and Jessie are racing for the win up there, I do NOT want to miss a minute. I'm supporting the good, hard working community, not the idiots :geek:

Oh, and I have noticed an improvement in their interviewing in the last year.
"When women reach a certain age, they begin to collect dogs. This is known as "Many - Paws""
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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby Moose » Tue Mar 06, 2018 11:16 am

I signed up this morning. ;) With snowstorms expected Wednesday/Thursday and another Monday, what's a Moose to do? Netflix is great, but interacting with friends is even better.
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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby Moose » Tue Mar 06, 2018 12:23 pm

Looks like DeeDee is still sitting in Rainy Pass. What a heartbreak. :cry:
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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby fladogfan » Tue Mar 06, 2018 1:23 pm

Poor Dee Dee. I hope she can wait out the problems and that ITC lets her.
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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby Alphashe » Tue Mar 06, 2018 1:27 pm

Dee Dee has schrathed from the race. So sorry for her.
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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby fladogfan » Tue Mar 06, 2018 3:27 pm

NO NOT FAIR
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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby elsietee » Tue Mar 06, 2018 3:33 pm

Videos from Nikolai:

Ryan:

Q: You're leading ID! Is this the first time you've been in first?

No, I led into a couple of other check points... It feels good - we're learning a lot. This is a young dog team - my wife Erin and I have 30 dogs that are all 3 or younger. Was hoping for a faster trail, ... a lot of tough trail today. Trail was perfect at Egypt Mtn [just as they leave the AK Range], then from Tin Creek on it seemed like the wind picked up last night, and the trail was blowing in, and there was times there wasn't no trail. We were the first team to go through it, and it was tough. But I have a single leader up there, Rum <I think?> , she's just an incredible dog - in single lead, never missed a beat up there. It was fun to watch. She's 4.

Q: Any overflow?

Yes, there is some overflow, I got my right foot a little wet... I'm excited to go up there and change some socks soon. <laughs> It's fun. We won an award here [for first to Nik] - a quilt and some beaver mitts, that's pretty neat - I'm excited about that. Happy to be here.



Nic:

The trail was really good...until about 20 miles from here there wasn't really a trail, much. I could tell that Ryan's dogs were having to do a lot of work - his dogs had to find the trail in spots, so they broke it up for me, so I didn't have to - so thanks Ryan. But I just sat there and didn't bother helping because they already had a job to do.


Mitch:

Q about lead-dog Pilot, that you had to drop, but you've got other leaders, right?

Mitch: I've got 8 that would come here in single lead, they've all been up there some. I don't rely on anyone completely. As soon as Pilot became a stand-out, I kind of quit using him. I don't want to rely on anybody cos it's just one dog - it's got to be a population,... But he's special, for sure, and towards the end of the race, I won't have 8, there's always one better than the rest... but right now I've got lots of good leaders, I'm not worried.



Wade:

Q: how's your back?

Pretty good. Better if I move around. I took a nap in Rohn and when I tried to get back up, it was brutal. It's one of those types of things you can work out of it, but as soon as you start to relax it stiffens right up. It's interesting.

Q: How was the trail?

I camped 4 hours in Rohn and 1.5 hours at Buffalo Camp, ...getting to BC was really nice - and the last little bit into here was soft...soggy...slow. Not very fun <laughs> trail.

Q: But you had a trail from following the others?

Yeah, my dogs knew where to go... Sometimes it's better to be in front of that, because if you've got a good leader they'll find the hardest spots - while whoever's in front might not have the best leader, so they might find softer stuff. Kind of goes back and forth if it's better to be up front or not... it is what it is.

Q: about where to take your 24 in this weather.

I had it set up to do it here, McGrath and Iditarod, but we'll see how the trail is over to McGrath... if it's anything like that [what they just did], I'll 24 in McGrath and wait it out. And then everyone will be in front of me and can pack it down and it'll be all set up for me, hopefully. See what tomorrow brings. But if it's pretty nice, I'll go over to Ophir. But I don't think it'll be a good idea to go all the way to ID - not if it's like this. That would be an incredibly bad idea because you'd waste a lot of time. So most likely I'll be taking it in McGrath. I've taken my 24 past McGrath once in my life and I scratched, <laughs> so I'm not worried about taking it there. My farthest run so far on the race has been 41 miles, so this'll be the furthest getting over to McGrath - 54.



Aliy:


I camped at Tin Creek and I thought the trail was good to there.

It didn't start snowing until... [gets distracted by a dull knife]... I didn't think the trail was any more challenging than an Iditarod trail should be and it didn't start snowing until a little ways away... but you have to be happy when your feet don't get wet - and you *know* everyone else got wet feet. <looks over> Did Ritchie's feet get wet? Oooh, looks like ... a little bit.

There was no where to go - there was the trail, as wide as your sled, and the willows on either side, and then two foot deep of water .... water.... water... like where a snow machine had gone "wooo - woooo- woooo" <motions with hand and laughs>. I can't believe I didn't get wet!?

Q: are there advantages to being up front? with this snowy trail... following somebody...?

Well, you're trying to win, that requires you to be up front. You're taking a gamble when you saw the forecast was for snow, that you're going to use up your team a little bit... but you're trying to win. I don't have a team that has the speed of some of these front teams.... I probably would have tried to be up front, but I actually don't have the speed... right now. That was the whole long-term plan - rest them a little more, so they keep their little 8.5-9 mph.
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Re: Rainy Pass-Rohn-Nikolai

Postby elsietee » Tue Mar 06, 2018 3:47 pm

Mitch in Nikolai:

The best snow conditions I've ever seen leaving Rohn, really all the way through the Burn, then coming over here it got to be too much snow. Pretty slow going.

My dilemma is they won't go slow, so I'm afraid they're overstressing a little bit. They're just trained for what to do, and they just keep pounding and pounding. Maybe they'll settle down.

Q: They looked pretty powerful coming in here...

They're rolling. I'm going to probably lose a couple more, ... the rigors of the trail.

Q: Overflow?

There was half a mile, maybe a mile of just wet sloppy snow on top of the trail - water oozing through. And somewhere or other a big snowmachine broke through the creek, so we got a foot of water, two different times. Not much to do but just keep going. It was less than a team length, so the dogs got their feet wet and I held mine up when I went through <laughs>.
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