Mackey leads as he heads to Unalakleet

Stephen Nowers photo

Lance Mackey on the Iditarod Trail.

A seven-minute rest before leaving the village of Kaltag and the Yukon River to cut west to Norton Sound has given three-time and reigning Iditarod champion Lance Mackey the lead over Jeff King.

King, a four-time Iditarod champion, pulled into Kaltag at 11:42 Saturday morning, with Mackey 46 minutes behind and Hugh Neff chasing hard four minutes behind Mackey.

Race statistics show Mackey made a quick getaway from Kaltag, leaving at 12:35 p.m. As of 2:17 p.m., GPS tracking showed King still in Kaltag, giving Mackey more than an hour lead over King.

In Ruby, Mackey had said he thought he could get away with less rest than King and would try to use it to his advantage. Historically, King has spent four to six hours in Kaltag before moving on.

Déjà vu?

In 2008, by the time the mushers reached Unalakleet, Mackey trailed King by 90 minutes. As King enjoyed a five-hour rest, Mackey cut sleep and was Shaktoolik-bound nearly 45 minutes ahead of King -- a lead he held, narrowly at times, all the way to the finish line.

Iditarod Trail Committee race archives for 2008 show King and Mackey traveling neck and neck across the frozen coast north to Nome, with King making solid gains. In Elim two years ago, King was 13 minutes behind Mackey; in Koyuk, eight minutes; and by the time the duo hit the village of Elim, they were separated by a mere three minutes.

But in Elim, King rested nearly 50 minutes longer than Mackey, a delay that may well have cost the Denali Park musher a victory. By White Mountain, he trailed by 57 minutes. In Safety, he was running behind Mackey by more than an hour. And his second-place finish came more than two hours behind Mackey's middle-of the-night stroll under the burled victory arch.

Contact Jill Burke at jill(at)alaskadispatch.com

In case you missed it Friday, here's a three-part interview with Mackey when he passed through Ruby.