Nikolai - McGrath - Takotna - Ophir - Iditarod

[Luna]

Hah! Joar is going for it! Left Ophir, on his way to Iditarod.

And congratz to braider 4 picking him in furthest to 24

[libby the lab]

Maximer just smoked the trail from McGrath to Takotna in 1 hr 50 mins? A full hour faster than Aliy?

[mira]

That sound a bit too fast... Need to check this on the tracker..

[mira]

Hugh stopped in Ophir, Reitan is a couple of miles inbound Ophir.

[mira]

Joar is moving again

[Eggs]

March 7 - 10:40 a.m. Idita-cast: Snow, high winds moving in

The front-runners, who are headed out of Ophir and into Iditarod, are running into a storm.

A Winter Weather Advisory is in effect for the Lower Yukon Valley, including Iditarod, from noon today through 6 a.m. Thursday. This area will see 1-3" of snow along with wind gusts to 40 mph, causing drifting snow and poor visibility.

Further east -- Takotna, Ophir and McGrath will see temperatures in the mid to upper 20s during the day and into the teens overnight. Light snow is likely tonight and tomorrow with winds out of the SE of 5-10 mph.
http://www.ktva.com/story/37596792/idit ... -race-blog

Cross fingers for Joar.

[elsietee]

I keep checking Joar's progress at regular intervals - he's travelling in the high 6 mph to high 7 mphs - currently 7.4 mph.

He's got 16 dogs, so power shouldn't be a problem - it just depends how much the trail blows over and how it is for the teams behind him. I can't help worrying about the idea that he's using up his team breaking trail (the way Ryan did), but he has to get ahead of Mitch sometime, and he might as well gamble on the weather closing in behind him.

[mira]

At the moment he is doing 7mph. I wondered if Joar hoped to be in front of that little storm, making it worse for chasers behind him. elsietee was faster than me.. but I totally agree.

I looked at Joars running schedule. It has been pretty close to 6.5 hours running, 3 hours rest. Except for the two last legs, 7 hours from Nikolai to McGraht and 8 hours from McGrath to rest on trail two hours after Ophir, still taking 3 hours rest. If my math is correct he has run for 43 hours, rested for 23 hours. I haven't had time to compute for Mitch, Aliy and Nicolas.. that will be tomorrow

[elsietee]

I was just looking at the same thing, Mira.

I think he cut his rest a small amount the last two rests. By my calculations, he has about 45 miles to go to ID - at 7.5 mph, that's 6 hours ... at 6.5 mph nearly 7 hours. He's been moving since 10 this morning, so three hours already. It's going to be at least a 9-10 hour run for him, following two short rests. <gulp>

[Eggs]

Meanwhile, I'd like to be a fly on the wall at Ophir. It's striking me as an odd/unlikely combination of folks there already, with Jeff, Monsen and Anna Berington about to arrive. Or am I just dimwitted....