IditaProject Forum

Thanks for that info, MGFB. Fun!


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More video of Nic in Koyuk:

Q: People watching, they want to know how you found the trail and how you navigated around finding the trail. That's all I want to ask you.

N: To get back to the trail? Gee and haw... that's what fries their brains. GPS ... we want to go east... gee... when I got to the line where that overland trail's supposed to be, there weren't nothing there. Just punchy snow. So I did a couple of loops to make sure I didn't miss it.

Q: And then you just headed back on the sea ice to re-cross the trail?

N: yeah, .. I'm looking, I'm looking... and finally I saw waaaay off in the distance - you could only see one on one side and not one on the other, that's how far apart the trail markers were. <wry laugh> It was challenging. But I'm glad we found the good [correct?] one. Happy to be here.

Q: whatever was asked is clipped from the video starting and stopping - I'm guessing they are editing these things to be a short as possible to get them uploaded. I assume they asked Nic something about Joar, but I'm not sure what from Nic's response.

N: Well, he doesn't have as many as me, but he's been *trying* to win for years. This is the first year I'm trying.

...Nobody's won, but he's in good shape. <something inaudible> It depends how long he leaves in front of me, maybe he's making me a trail and I'll follow the same trail.

Q: He thought he was following you. He didn't know he was first.

N: He knows I took a wrong turn on the trail by now.

...Fun stuff.

Not a happy fellow, but also doing a good job of keeping it to himself.

What's interesting is I'm not sure Nic understands where he went wrong. It sounds like he thinks he was following a trail which should have continued on the "overland trail" when he got to the shore, but it wasn't marked and there was just punchy snow there. I think with little visual reference, it's very easy to get turned around out there and not really know what you did.

Ok, with Mitch now in to Koyuk and a quick bit of GPS re-running.

It looks like he stayed at the shelter cabin 3.5 hours (I like regular mushers, it makes the math so much easier )(assuming I could even do basic math).

So total travel time:

Joar: 8:13 hrs
Nic: 13:01 - minus his 1.5 detour - minus his 3.5 hour rest in the shelter cabin = 8:00 hrs
Mitch: 12:12 - minus his 3.5 hour rest at the shelter cabin = 8:42 hours

(someone please check my math, I'm abysmal).

So even with messing up, Nic still has marginally more speed than Joar. Edited to add - but Joar said he had to change leaders about five times, so if the trail is easier on his dogs, and he doesn't have to swap out the leaders, maybe his speed is comparable?

Although from the video, it sounds like Nic thinks getting lost took a lot out of his team trying to re-find the trail.

(Mitch's team looked pretty peppy coming in and one in particular was barking to keep going. They weren't fast, but steady trotting.)

Mitch in Koyuk:

Q: Was it pretty consistent the whole way across, or did it get worse coming here or...?

M: It actually got better at one spot in the middle, sort of around where the jumble ice was. But the jumble ice all blew in, drifted full, and then past there, again it got <inaudible>

Q: How did that single leader do? It must have been a lot of gee-ing and haw-ing?

M: He was doing really good. He got a little...[tired?] I changed some leaders around...

The problem is, he's always looking for a better trail - if there's nothing firm, he's always zigzagging around.

All three mushers look the tiredest I've seen them in the race. Lots of stopping to pause - not because they're tired and can't form their thoughts, so much as just being too tired to get words out.

Wade in Unk:

So I'd planned on going through.
And I was supposed to go through.
And I didn't go through.

...but I've kind of got another idea. I'd given time to Ray and Pete on the river, and I caught it back up, I would've just been ahead of them if I went through, so I figured I'd give it back one more time and hopefully I can get back at them before Nome.

I kind of gave up on trying to catch the three front guys. I think that I *could* catch them, but I don't think I'd have anything left once I caught them, so it'd probably be a bad idea <laughs>

So I'm just going to relax back here a little more and see if we can catch back up to Pete and Ray a little later.

Q: Crazy trail conditions?

Oh my goodness, they've been off and on, but 90% horrible <laughs> Soft and slow, and not very good. Not my forte. <laughs>

(while he's telling this, they are showing a close up of his dog eating some kind of disgusting looking stew with unidentified objects in it (could be dumplings, could be aliens...). The dog's eating great, though

Hard to tell because with the different trail across the Sound, the GPS isn't showing the correct mileage for the mushers (they are all at "804"/"805", regardless as to where they are), but I estimate Wade to be approx 20 miles behind Ray and Pete (currently travelling with Travis and Ramey Smyth). They are going <6 mph, so conditions haven't improved. Considering Ray and Pete both took more rest at Shak, we'll have to see what the relative speeds are along this stretch.

Parade across the Sound (I left Nic's detour on there for interest):

Nice close ROTY race. Just 14 min appart in Koyuk

Luna wrote:Nice close ROTY race. Just 14 min appart in Koyuk

yes, that was very surprising to me, i thought jessie were a bit behind..

Great info and stories here. Thank you! This is the first I've heard of Sorlie being on the scene. Very cool.

I picked Jessie as my ROTY because I like watching him on Life Below Zero. Run, Jessie, Run-Matt is right behind you!

flowerpower wrote:I picked Jessie as my ROTY because I like watching him on Life Below Zero. Run, Jessie, Run-Matt is right behind you!

RunMattRun
I picked Matt because of his good runs in the Quest