As of 5 p.m. Feb. 23, the unofficial GPS tracker shows about 60 miles separate the race leaders, team 7 from chasing team 10. Tyler Aklestad and Nick Olstad of team 7 checked out of Kotzebue at 4:09 p.m. while Mike Morgan and Chris Olds have yet to reach Kotzebue.
Olds and Morgan are currently in second position. In third is Shane Barber and Troy Conlon who checked out of Buckland at 3:24 p.m. Behind them is Andrew Gumley and Klinton VanWingerden who checked out of Buckland 15 minutes after Barber and Conlon.
Then rounding out the top five is Tom Davis and Zack Weisz. They left Buckland at 3:54 p.m. this afternoon.
Another team scratched from the race earlier today bringing the total to nine thus far. Team #25 of Geoff Crouse and Trevor Helwig dropped out of the race in White Mountain at 2:30 p.m. on Wednesday.
Even though Brad George and Robbie Schachle won the 2021 iron dog race, right now they’re looking like they have something to prove. George and Schachle are currently in 7th position with a total of 26 layover hours taken.
Most of the top five teams have taken 27 or 28 layover hours at this point in the race. Barber and Conlon have taken the most layover thus far with 29 hours total.
Tune into KNOM tomorrow morning for your next Iron Dog race update at 8 a.m.
Image at top: Tyler Aklestad of Team 7 on top of the snow ramp in Nome. Photo from Davis Hovey, KNOM (2020).
