White Mountain 3-13-23 9:41am

Elim 3-13-23-9:41am

Elim 3-13-23-9:41am

Elim 3-13-23-9:41am

Elim 3-13-23-9:41am

Good Morning again Team Kaiser!!

On the previous post I mentioned that Ryan Redington was in the decision pressure cooker. What to do? What to do?

A former champion on your heels. Do you stay or do you go?

It’s like playing cards and in this case Ryan had to show his hand. Pete then made a decision based on what he saw as well as what his Team is needing.

In this case, Ryan took the gamble to go and Pete is taking the safe bet and taking a break. Better to rest and recharge. In past races, a couple hour break in Elim with warm water and a place to warm the musher is a good option. Granted, there is an 8 hour rest awaiting in White Mountain, but if Pete is taking a break, it’s because the Team needs it. This is a beautiful dog team and they rely on Pete to make the best decision for them. No musher ever wants to break that special bond of trust.

Generally before making taking the trail to White Mountain without stopping in Elim, Teams will take about a 5 hour break in Koyuk knowing they have 84 miles in front of them. Last night Pete and Ryan took about 3 1/2 hours. With Pete stopping, he is going to gather a couple more hours of rest before heading on to White Mountain.

If Ryan is able to hold it together and run into White Mountain without a break, that may be the run that wins the race. It’s just really hard to say at this point. We have seen Teams that, once in White Mountain, even after the 8 hours, just don’t want to go. We have also seen Teams that are really super and this kind of move is what pushes them into that special category of Iditarod Champion.

For Team Kaiser, it’s a waiting and watching game. This is Iditarod and ANYTHING can happen!!

Go Team Kaiser!!

Good Morning Race Fans!

As hard as it is to get up this morning, consider Pete and the Team earlier in the night rising to take the trail after a bit over 3 hour break in Koyuk!

Pete and the Team were out of Koyuk at 2:43am this morning leaving 2 dogs at the checkpoint. The 8 dog Team is something that is pretty consistent with many Teams over the years from Koyuk on the trail to Nome. 8 dogs makes it easier to care for, but also trims out any slower dogs to keep up the speed that Pete needs to try to catch Ryan Redington, who left 26 minutes earlier than Pete, at 2:27am with 10 dogs.

Almost the entire trail from Shaktoolik to Koyuk, Pete was about 6 miles behind Redington. In fact that interval has remained pretty much since Unalakleet.

Arriving 35 minutes after Redington into Koyuk, Pete trimmed 10 minutes with rest, but the two Teams seem almost equally matched. On the trail since Koyuk this morning, the interval has remained 3 miles almost the entire time. It is an epic battle, but I can almost hear Pete telling us, “There is only so much you can do. The dogs need rest and food, so you do what you can, but it is what it is…”

The story of the morning here is whether the Teams will take a break in Elim or not. It is 84 miles from Koyuk to White Mountain. In the past, Pete has skipped Elim and made the entire run to White Mountain, but that is generally after a longer break in Koyuk. I’d venture to guess that it will really be decided by what Ryan Redington does. Ryan is leading the race, but the pressure is really on him instead of Pete to make the decision. At 3 miles in the clear, calm early morning, Ryan may be able to see Pete in the distance and that may spook him into making the run to White Mountain whether he wants to or not.

This is one of the most epic battles we have seen for the Championship in many years. Very exciting and so much action on the trail. Also, remember that often discounted is the trail from White Mountain to Nome that has reared it’s head to be very challenging in some years. Weather forecast for later today and tomorrow aren’t great with snow, blowing snow, and wind. All of the factors that can change a race.

We will know soon about Elim and what lies ahead!

What a great battle by two great Teams!

Stay Tuned! Go Team Kaiser!!

Elim Weather:
Temp 1, Calm Winds, Clear Skies.

Nome Weather:
Temp 6, Light Wind, Light Snow Fog/Mist

Forecast:
Today Snow, mainly after 10am. Areas of blowing snow. Patchy freezing fog after 1pm. High near 9. South wind 10 to 15 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. Total daytime snow accumulation of less than one inch possible.
Tonight- Snow, mainly before 10pm. Areas of blowing snow. Patchy freezing fog before 10pm. Low around -5. North wind 5 to 15 mph. Chance of precipitation is 80%. New snow accumulation of less than a half inch possible.

Pete and the Team made up about 10 minutes over the 50 mile trail in from Shaktoolik and WOW WOW WOW What a Dog Team! Tails wagging, lunging to go, these fine animals are a beauty to behold!!

Pete arrived into Koyuk at 23:21 with 10 dogs and now the games begin! Both men are extremely tired and sleep deprived at this point in the race. Pete has a decision to make soon as there really aren’t enough miles to slowly reel in Team Redington. Commentators still believe that Pete and his Team are the strongest, but just by a bit. The real question is whether Ryan can or will make a move in some way.

Ryan ran his Team all the way across the portage into Unalakleet from Kaltag, while Pete rested earlier and broke the run to Shaktoolik into two smaller runs. At this point the question is whether each Team will make the 84 mile run to White Mountain and the mandatory 8 hour rest in one run. Pete has done it several times and with this Team he undoubtedly will do it again. The big question is whether Ryan’s Team has it in the tank to do that long run as well.

Pete’s move may be to run with Ryan and short rest slightly after feeding and resting the Team. If Pete leaves with Ryan, that may be the move he has to make to pull away from him. Ryan had the faster Team before the long run to Unalakleet. Will it recharge and remain fast after the mandatory 8 hour layover? That is the $50,ooo question!!

For us, OMG it’s going to be a few long runs as well! Haha! Glued to the tracker as we wonder what will happen next!

Tomorrow the Kaiser Pit Crew will head up to Nome to prepare for the arrival. No sleep Tuesday has turned into No sleep Monday!

Go Team Kaiser!

It’s getting exciting!

After 3 1/2 hours of rest both Ryan and Pete are back on the trail to Koyuk. Pete dropped 1 dog and left with 10 in harness.

Ryan is not quite 45 minutes ahead, but he will looking back all night for that orange and black parka hot on his tail. This can be a tough long stretch was Koyuk seems to just sit there hour by hour.

This run reminds me each year of the year Team Kaiser passed Mitch Seavey in the middle of the night completely asleep at the wheel. Nothing like great lead dogs!

The interval is 6 miles and I am thinking we will see this play out for the foreseeable future. This is Iditarod racing at it’s finest. A good fast Team followed by another good fast Team. Anything can happen and both of these competitors have lived, dreamed, and planned for just this occasion.

For Ryan, this is the family business. The dream that of his grandfather, Joe Redington, to revitalize dog sled mushing and keep it alive is actually flowing through his veins. A Redington has never won this race, though not for the lack of trying on behalf of brothers, uncles, and cousins. Ryan is on the coast and this is the closest any of them has been.

For Pete, this is also the culmination of a dream spawned on the kitchen table with his mom and dad, and now his life and that of his own family. Already a champion, Pete lives for this competition. This is what all the rest of the 355 days of the year revolve around.

It is going to come down to consistency and also to luck of what lies ahead. Anything can happen in the next 200 miles of trail.

We should see these guys into Koyuk between 9 and 10pm this evening, depending on trail and wind.

Go Team Kaiser! Please consider stopping by the Team Kaiser Facebook Page and giving us a like! No matter what happens, we want a great welcome for him online!!

I have been contemplating the Team lately and am truly amazed by the breeding and endurance of this great animal. After doing a little research I found that dogs were being selectively bred over 9500 years ago in the arctic!! Read below to learn some cool details about this breed and what makes it so amazing:

From the New York Times- https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/25/science/arctic-sled-dogs-genetics.html

Sled dogs have well-known roots in human prehistory. A 12,500-year-old tool found at one Arctic site hints at its possible use on sleds. And archaeological investigations at a well-known site on Zhokov Island in the Siberian Sea uncovered dog bones and sled technology indicating that the dogs may have been the first canines bred for a specific task.

Dr. Sinding and colleagues dug deep into the DNA of one of those dogs, using a jawbone from the site dating to 9,500 years ago. They also sequenced the genomes of a Siberian wolf dating to 33,000 years ago and 10 modern Greenland sled dogs. They relied on other canine genomes archived in databases as well.

They found that the Zhokov dog was closest to modern-day sled dogs, particularly to the Greenland sled dogs, which are a “land race,” bred for a task and sharing a look and behavior but not the sort of breed for which studbooks and records are kept.

The Zhokov dog was not a direct ancestor of modern sled dogs, but it shared a common ancestor with modern sled dogs that was probably about 12,000 years old. This evidence suggested that the sled-dog type, bred for hauling loads in brutal winters, was already established 9,500 years ago.

The researchers also found that sled dogs, ancient and modern, did not show interbreeding with wolves, even though other modern dog breeds do, and dog-wolf matings were known in Greenland in historic times. The results suggest hybrids may not have been much use in pulling sleds.

Then the researchers started looking for genes that were different in sled dogs from both wolves and other dog breeds. They found several that made sense. One is involved in a variety of physiological functions including calcium transport and temperature sensitivity. They don’t know what exactly it does in sled dogs, but they do know that several similar genes are different in mammoths, creatures of the cold, and elephants, animals of more temperate climates, suggesting some kind of adaptation to arctic life.

Another gene that distinguished sled dogs from other dogs is involved in coping with low oxygen conditions. It is also found in a group of humans, sea nomads, who have been diving for thousands of years. It could, Dr. Sinding said, contribute to fitness for the extreme demands of long sled-hauling trips.

Good Afternoon Race Fans!

It’s another exciting day on the Iditarod Trail as the top three Teams have checked in to Shaktoolik on Iditarod Sunday.

Ryan Redington checked into the checkpoint at 13:20 with 46 minute lead on Pete and the Team. Pete had a few minutes faster run of 5 hours and 7 minutes which, after looking at the stats for prior years, is pretty much average for the top teams at this point in the race. Richie Diehl just checked in about 3:30 which should put him about 90 minutes behind Team Kaiser.

In Richie’s trail interview he said he was having a tough time figuring out the time change. He took and exactly 5 hour rest instead of 4 at the campsite. I’m hoping he didn’t calculate wrong to put him an hour behind. I love the time change because of the daylight in the evening, but put a sleep deprived musher to figure out what time to leave and hey, it could happen. We will find out later to be sure.

Teams are making their way to catch the top three, but Matt Hall and Kelly Maixner are still 25 miles or so back.

I’m expecting a 4 hour break for Teams here as they have a 50 mile run out over the ice. They and their Teams need to be rested and mentally alert on this run into the wind over the ice. Luckily the forecast is for the winds to subside, which should make it at least palatable. It should be a pretty run in the dusk with the mountains lit up by the sunset.

Go Team Kaiser!!

What a great race!!

I’ve been doing a little stat scouring this morning in the Iditarod Archives to see what time the Winner will arrive in Nome. Team Kaiser Pit crew is feverishly trying to figure when to go. I went back through and checked times out of Unalakleet and Finish Time of the winner. In 2016, though not the record Iditarod time, Dallas Seavey made the run from Unalakleet to the Finish, inclusive of rest, mandatory layover, etc in 45 hours 6 minutes.

Using that data I added that time to Ryan Redington’s Unalakleet out time to get the earliest (at this point) finish time for the Team that wins this race in 2023. Obviously the winner yet to be determined and there are almost 250 miles to go, but it’s almost time to be getting ready for a finish!!

Here’s the data. It’s kind of interesting. Of course the picture will become much clearer as we get further up the trail, but here is a good idea. What is interesting is that this is the second earliest that Teams have checked out of Unalakleet on the trail to Nome. Go Team Kaiser!!

Here are Photos from this morning in Unalakleet. A super quick grab of coffee and snacks for the Team and back on the trail!

Good Morning Race Fans! If it seems early, it is, but with your clocks pushed forward, the evenings will be worth rubbing sleep out of your eyes for a few days.

If you got a chance to see the Live Iditarod Cam in Unalakleet this morning, you saw what I did: An AWESOME looking dog Team!

We are seeing both strategies for Kaltag to Shaktoolik and beyond play out side by side in this race. Ryan Redington was first into Unalakleet this morning 4:20am after doing a 10 hour run direct. Pete and Team Kaiser camped out in the trees 16 miles out of Unalakleet and will make the run to Shaktoolik in two equal runs. Pete and the Team were into Unalakleet at 8:54am.

Leaving Kaltag, Pete was 37 minutes behind Team Redington. Leaving Unalakleet the deficit has risen a bit to 52 minutes.

The gamble is resting 4 hours after a 60 mile run vs resting 3 hours 3o minutes after an 85 mile run. The results of the different strategies won’t play out immediately, but it’s cool to watch and see. The three top Teams with two different strategies. Or does it matter? We shall see!!

The next section of the trail into Shaktoolik is not an easy one and today winds are picking up with Shaktoolik pretty much as it always is– Windy and Cold! The trail through the Blueberry hills has multiple hill climbs and this morning is right into the wind.

I did some quick calculations and it appears we are about 60 hours from the finish of Iditarod 2023. This lasts 60 can be very challenging and finally weather looks to be part of that challenge.

Shaktoolik is reporting Temperatures -6, Winds from the North at 22, and a Windchill of -31.  The forecast is more of the same as they move up towards Koyuk which is reporting warm temperatures and calm wind.

Pete and the Team will move up to Shaktoolik and take a 4 hour break as they prepare for the trail to Koyuk. There were rumors that the sea ice was weak and that the trail was going around, but officially and through the Insider, I haven’t heard anything. That means the trail from “Shak” to Koyuk will be pretty brutal against a constant biting wind. What a way to spend a Sunday afternoon and evening!!

Richie was having difficulty dealing with the time change and I wonder if he overslept. He took an extra hour at his camp spot early this morning. Either that or the dogs just needed a bit more in the tank. Team Real Diehl is about 11 miles behind Pete.

Taking one last look at the tracker, both Ryan and Pete are traveling with very similar speeds. Pete is about 6 miles back. I’m thinking that this is going to be a duel to the finish and that means glued to the tracker! Haha!

Go Team Kaiser!!