We’ve reached day nine of the 2022 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race. The lead mushers have reached the coast and are racing along the rim of Norton Sound to Nome.
That front pack includes Aniak musher Richie Diehl. The Iditarod GPS tracker is ranking Diehl in seventh position. That’s a drop from last night’s standings, when he was ranked fourth. Diehl left the Shaktoolik checkpoint around 7:02 a.m. on March 14 after spending about 11 hours there. Diehl is at about mile 790. That leaves him with about 180 miles left to go in the race to Nome. He has 11 dogs with him.
Two positions behind Diehl, in ninth position, is Bethel’s Pete Kaiser, the other Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta musher competing in this year’s Iditarod. He’s about 7 miles behind Diehl and has nine dogs in harness, according to the Iditarod GPS tracker. Kaiser left the Shaktoolik checkpoint at 8:04 a.m. on March 14 after spending six hours there. Kaiser won the race in 2019.
Both Diehl and Kaiser are heading to the Koyuk checkpoint. Racing between the two is musher Jessie Holmes, currently in eighth position.
Leading this year’s Iditarod in first position, with a significant lead, is Eureka musher Brent Sass. Sass arrived in the White Mountain checkpoint at 11:05 a.m. with 12 dogs. He’s held the lead for most of the race, and is seeking his first Iditarod title after placing third last year. He’s about 100 miles ahead of the rest of the field, except for second position musher and defending champion Dallas Seavey.
Seavey is about 16 miles behind Sass and is seeking a historic sixth win, something that’s never been done before. Seavey is about a dozen miles outside White Mountain. All mushers are required to take an 8-hour rest at the checkpoint before racing the final 77 miles to the finish line in Nome.
