Dallas Seavey still leads the pack and is into White Mountain and a mandatory eight hour layover, he arrived at 14 minutes after midnight.
Aliy Zirkle is holding her own in second, arriving at White Mountain an hour and eleven minutes later at 1:25 am. She managed to shave a little of the lead time off of Seavey last night on the run to the mountain. But, she knows that she cannot catch the leader and has said as much. She is more concerned with losing her second place position to the musher behind her.
The one to watch here is Ramey Smyth, he had great time moving from Elim to the Mountain, he averaged a full mile an hour faster than the leader and about a third of a mile an hour faster than second place Zirkle. Smyth will make the home stretch of this race a blistering one.
Dallas Seavey is due out of White Mountain in a little over two hours as he begins the sprint to the finish line in Nome. The race is his to win and win he will if he can keep his dogs up and doesn’t suffer any unforeseens. The other mushers do not see how they can overtake him at this stage of the game. Of the race thus far, Seavey said, “I felt like I was in control of this race as early as Ruby and maybe even Cripple, but we didn’t even make a move until we were well on our way to Unalakleet.”
Aaron Burmeister pulled into White Mountain at 3:50 this morning and is virtually asured of his fourth place finish, he is hours ahead of any other dogsled behind him. The earliesty he can leave White Mountain is slightly before noon today.
The rest of the pack still pounds the trail. There are seven on the trail heading for White Mountain with Peter Kaiser leading the way. DeeDee Jonrowe trails that group, leaving Elim at 3:47 this morning.
Currently, eight have scratched from the race and one has withdrawn because of injuries.