It’s 7.45am Alaska time.

Good morning! As I catch up with what’s been going on overnight the first thing is that we are aware that Allen as dropped a dog from his team at Rohn. The same thing applies here as yesterday: we have no way to know what dog or why and we will bring you that information as soon as we can. We’re anxious to know but with fewer pictures and videos of the teams further from the front we can’t even take a guess at this point so we will have to be patient!

Aliy and the Red Team have just arrived in to Nikolai! Their run time from Rohn was 14 hours, 12 minutes. You will notice this is 2.5-3.5 hours longer than those ahead of her but from the analytics section of the tracker I can figure she stopped and camped for around 4.5-5 hours somewhere between Rohn and Nikolai. As I mentioned yesterday, both Aliy and Allen enjoy camping on the trail so this stop would have been planned. Seeing the videos from the others who arrived in to Nikolai before her it sounds like the trail was rough so we look forward to hearing from Aliy about that section.

Meanwhile Allen and the Black team are between Rohn and Nikolai. They left Rohn at 2.43am this morning after a just over six hour rest there. You can see now that Aliy and Allen are on different schedules as Aliy didn’t stop in Rohn; with more rookies and inexperienced dogs Allen will be slowing the pace and resting longer.

With all this talk about the GPS trackers I thought you’d be interested in these pics I took on Sunday. Each musher is carrying two trackers, one fixed at the bottom of the sled, the other up near the handlebar. These trackers work together (somehow, please don’t ask me how) to bring us the information we see on the screen. Here is some information from the Iditarod website about the trackers.


L-R: Ray helps officials attach the trackers to Aliy’s sled; the trackers ready to go!

8 Responses

  • Oh thank you! I'm having withdrawal symptoms between blogs. My computer screen if filled with open websites from the Iditarod tracker, standings, SPK, Facebook… and work. I'm so addicted!

  • Aliy knows what she's doing. If she wanted to rest the pups, then so be it!!!
    Looking forward to find out who was the dog that Allen dropped in Rohn! I know you will let us know as soon as you find out and, that the pup will receive a ton of TLC when he/she gets home as well as in route!
    Thank you so much for the great update, and your dedication to the SP Kennel! 🙂 🙂 🙂

  • thanks for the updates! I am liking the YQ even more nowadays because of the more people contact and team support. Did I see new booties on the doggies?
    Hike on my friends.
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  • Thank you so much for the updates on Aliy and Allen…am anxious as well to hear about how Aliy felt that section was. Have been looking on Iditarod.com and the others are saying how rough that section is…

  • Lol…Leana's comment made me smile….Im not the only one who is as obsessed about this race! My smart phone and computer are all IditaCrazy too! Now Im eagerly awaiting Aliys report of her wild ride through the snowless Alaska Wilderness! Keeping my fingers crossed for healthy dogs, musher and a intact sled!

  • Well I am glad I am not the only obsessed fan–SPK is certainly the best keeping us updated. I agree the tracker is hard to figure out. Looking forward to Aliy's take on the trail– we can be sure she always puts the dogs welfare first. Like the others I am anxious to hear which dog Allen dropped. Thanks for keeping us updated.

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