Video Snippets

[flowerpower]

OMG! You were trailering a horse when you were hit? How scary, I'm glad all the critters (and you of course) are OK. If understandably POed.

[fladogfan]

Would be wonderful if that hit and run driver is caught. Thank goodness you and the 4-footers weren't hurt. Sure messed up your weekend but we are enjoying the snippets. Even tho I watch them I enjoy what you say about them.

[Di*]

That's terrible Elsie, it's nervewracking enough trailering horses (for me at least ) let alone have someone broadside you on the highway!!! Sure hope they can find the person responsible glad no one hurt or injured!

[Jan]

Yikes! how scary - sure hope they catch the driver. Glad you & horse & dogs are OK

[libby the lab]

Yikes LC glad you are OK!!!

[elsietee]

Thanks guys. I was glad it wasn't worse (and that the horse I had in the trailer is a pretty mellow guy who isn't fazed by much. I spent the day pricing out mirrors, fenders, wheels, welding, etc. My deductible is $1,000, so it looks like I'll be doing the repairs

* * *

Bruce and Heister in Kaltag:
Still windy in Kaltag. Bruce says Brent has the advantage being in front, but the disadvantage that He has no idea what's going on behind him with regard to who's rested and for how long. Dallas, OTOH, can tell by looking at the signs in the snow as he goes past, to see how long Brent rested. Bruce says if he was just looking at teams, he thinks Dallas has the advantage - he's pulled that team together by taking meticulous care of them, they look a little stronger. But that it's not a totally fair analogy because they had taken an 8 hour rest and were just getting up and getting going. But he likes how hydrated and the weight that was on Dallas' dogs. It's up to Brent to manage his team going up the coast - and this thing isn't over.

Heister, OTOH, says that he was impressed because he's been to Kaltag a number of years and sometimes seen the eventual winner of the race's team not look as good as Brent's dogs did there.

Because of how/when they're resting, it's hard to tell how much lead Brent actually has, but when Dallas came through his team were "powered up and in 4-wheel drive, and digging for the coast, it was an impressive scene".

Bruce agreed about past teams - that both Brent and Dallas' teams looked remarkably stronger than past winning teams have in Kaltag and leaving climbing the hill leaving there.

Bruce is speculating that although Brent could do the run all the way from Kaltag to UNK [thinking Bruce wasn't the one interviewing Brent, when he specifically said he would break the run up and stop half-way], Dallas is very unlikely to do that - he's much more patient to gradually catch up - very like Mitch, coming from behind. Bruce says at this point, Brent has more rest in the bank.

Heister then talks about how Dallas' dogs were sick earlier in the race, but that when they came into Ruby they'd turned a corner.

They talk about Jessie Holmes being in a nice position, but with lots of good teams behind him ("vultures", they called them). Bruce says being in that "rest of the top ten" pack is harder on mushers than being at the front. At the front, you can just do your own thing. In the rest of the top ten, you'll be in a check point and there'll be 7 mushers there... if one musher gets up and grabs and cup of coffee and says they're going to go and look at their dogs, *everybody* else gets up and goes out. It gets so you can't lay down and sleep because they might sneak out on you, it can be really really a grind, and they get less sleep than those up front.

Heister goes on to say the front of the race is an absolute dream. Dallas Seavey, a 5 time champion and a possessed human when it comes to being great at this. And then you've got Brent, who has put so much energy into this, is as tough as they come, a real woodsman, kind of a reflection of what the ID was in the 70s, 80s, and early 90s. Extremely impressive what's going on up front and he hopes that they stay competitive right up to the final miles, so we get a really great finish in Nome some time early on Tuesday.

They are moving the rear comms teams over to UNK, but the wind is blowing 40 mph on the coast, so it has been difficult to get planes in or out of UNK. At the time of the interview, they have two planes flying over there, trying to get in to UNK. If they are successful, they plan to come back and get Bruce and Kevin Bodie. Heister will stay in KAL with the livestream, and there'll be another livestream in UNK. Then early in the morning they're going to move the KAL livestream up trail to KOYUK. The wind is playing havoc on their logistics. They also have snowmachiners to catch up with Brent and Dallas on the trail.

In summation, Bruce says Brent and Dallas are more than just tough, they are also highly skilled at outdoors and their knowledge of dogs. The best compliment a musher can have is that you're a 'good dog man' (and that includes women) - and those guys are both good dog men.

Heister says he's looking forwards to seeing Brent and Dallas running to Nome - both great athletes. Brent is down 15 lbs from a year ago, he's been running and is in incredible shape; while Dallas is a relentless competitor and will battle right to the final mile on Front Street in Nome.

[elsietee]

Aaron is playing cat and mouse. He went through Kaltag (into 3rd place), but in reality is camped out three miles past there.

His dogs look perky - he has "Dudley" in sole lead. He says he's not great in the checkpoints because he's scared of people, but Aaron put him in sole lead because he says if there are two dogs up there, they crash into each other if there's a snow drift and they each try to go around a different way, so it's easier just to have one up there, with only one dog making decisions. Dogs are chowing down on slices of salmon.

He says he doesn't think he can catch the leaders, but is going to try and shake things up if he can.

* * *

Ryan arriving in Kaltag in the wind "It's starting to look like the ID!".

There's a sharp turn just after the tracker where they turn to go towards the dog yard. They give them their drop bags and balance them on the sled and both Ryan and Jessie lost theirs going around the turn.

[elsietee]

Jessie and Ryan's dogs curled up sleeping, protected from the wind by bales of straw. What you can't tell in this screen shot is how the wind is continuously buffeting in the background.

[braider]

"It gets so you can't lay down and sleep because they might sneak out on you" <old story... watch for anybody going to sleep with their boots on ...pretty much won Lance a race.

[Breeze]

LCT, I'm deeply grateful that you and the critters are OK. I guess we both had a bad weekend--you for rolling stock and me for This Old House. We both will get to the other side, it just IS NOT any kind of fun.

One thing that occupies my mind, is that we know a lot about Brent and his dogs, both from other racing venues and his FB presence telling us about his expeditions and his training, taking his team to Pam Redington's, resting after dinner, then taking all night to get home. We have good reason to know Brent and his team can go LOONNNGGG, get rest, and do it again with the distance. It is just how they live.

Maybe I'm not running in the right internet circles, but Dallas seems, at least me, to NOT let anyone know how or where he trains, how far he takes his team in training, what he does with his team that isn't the Iditarod. I just get a black hole. Dallas doesn't race other than this one 1,000 mile, not YQ , not Kusko, not Copper Basin, not any of the " regional" mid-distances where even Jeff King shows his face. Dallas is a 5 time ID champ, so his training obviously works, I'm not questioning that at all. Just sayin' that I'm not seeing the back-story to HOW he gets there. Maybe I'm just not connected to the right places. If you are going to find the chink in Dallas Seavey's game to beat him, you need to have some of that story.