The 2022 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race begins this weekend. Two Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta mushers will be competing in the nearly 1,000-mile race across Alaska’s Western wilderness from Willow to Nome. Both local mushers, Pete Kaiser of Bethel and Richie Diehl of Aniak, are competitive veterans of the race.
Kaiser won the Iditarod in 2019. He’s completed 11 Iditarods, and has finished in the top 10 six times. In 2021, he scratched from the race after his dogs became sick.
Diehl has competed in eight Iditarods, and has finished in the top 10 twice. His highest finishing position was in 2018 when he placed sixth. Last year, he finished the Iditarod in ninth place.
Both mushers have had successful seasons leading up to the race. Each competed in this year’s Kuskokwim 300 Sled Dog Race in Bethel. Kaiser earned his sixth championship title; Diehl finished third, after winning the race for the first time in 2021. Three weeks after this year’s K300, Kaiser went on to also win Bethel’s Bogus Creek 150 sled dog race. He said that snowy trail conditions allowed him to use the race as a long training run leading up to the Iditarod.
Both Kaiser and Diehl will face fierce competition on the Iditarod trail. Multiple past champions and high-placing finishers are also returning to this year’s race. The most notable are five-time winner Dallas Seavey and his father, three-time winner Mitch Seavey. Also competing for first place is 2018 champion and consistent top-10 finisher Joar Leifseth Ulsom, as well as last year’s second place finisher Aaron Burmeiser. Last year’s third-place finisher, and reigning Yukon Quest champion, Brent Sass will be competing as well.
Two other past Iditarod champions, Jeff King and Martin Buser, are also racing, but have said in recent years that they’re no longer competing for top positions. Both have won the race four times.
The 2022 Iditarod ceremonial start is March 5 in Anchorage. The restart is March 6 in Willow.
