Mackey was first into White Mountain, beating King by 57 minutes. That’s a substantial lead for the last 77 miles. Incredible. Many of us race watchers thought King would eat away at Mackey’s lead prior to reaching this vital checkpoint. But King may not be holding the cards after all.
Mackey only had a three minute lead on King in Elim, 46 miles back from here. But Mackey left the checkpoint 50 minutes ahead. Mackey says he snuck out of the checkpoint–his dogs were bedded down on straw, it looked like they would stick around… but Mackey took off:
“Grabbed my stuff, slowly made it outside, trying to sneak out, the next thing I know there’s 10 different people, cameras, snowmachines, nothing sneaky about it. But it was so cool, grabbed front dogs, took off down road, nobody knew nothing. People running down road after me, ‘ya leavin?’”
King says he found out soon that the rabbit had sprung head, but he rested a while longer.
People are recalling the crazy race of Dick Mackey, Lance’s dad, and his race down Front Street in Nome against Rick Swenson. Dick won by a dog’s nose — literally.
More to come later — I’m at White Mountain checkpoint and watched both teams come in this morning. Few reporters here.
Mackey arrived at 8:53 this morning with a fast-moving team. We all counted the minutes until King arrived. Lance said every minute without Jeff there gave him an advantage, since they have to take a mandatory 8 hour rest here. The time distance between them coming in will be the same going out for the last power stretch of 77 miles through Safety to Nome.
Mackey works on his dogs’ paws. He ran them without booties into White Mountain.
Jeff King says Mackey’s able to call up his dogs and put them into a reserve power-gear when he needs to.
King’s dogs arrive in White Mountain.
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