Sunday saw 49 mushers set their sights on Alaska’s west coast for the 50th Iditarod Trail Dog Race.
The race will see the mushers traverse Alaska’s rugged and unforgiving terrain, which includes two mountain ranges and the unpredictable Bering Sea Ice.
Nine days after the start, the winner will cross the finish line at Nome in western Alaska.
The pandemic prevented the race from finishing in Nome for the first time in 2021. Instead, the race began in Willow, then went to Iditarod, a ghost town, and then returned to Willow.
Dallas Seavey was the winner of the 2021 race. He also tied Rick Swenson for the record with five wins each. Swenson (71), won the Iditarod’s last race in 1991. He has not raced it since 2012.
Seavey hopes to be the first musher ever to hold six titles. Seavey said that he would likely take a break from the race to spend more time with his daughter.
Martin Buser and Jeff King are the two four-time winners of this race. Buser will be running in his 39th Iditarod. King took over the role of musher Nic Petit after Petit posted on Facebook that he had contracted COVID-19. Joar Leifseth Usom, 2018 winner, and Pete Kaiser, 2019, are also participating in the race.
15 mushers signed up, but they withdrew before the race started. Petit was also among them, as was Thomas Waerner, the 2020 winner from Norway. He wasn’t able get travel documents to the U.S.
