Mackey pushes Iditarod pace

Perhaps taking a page from his 2007 Iditarod victory, Lance Mackey has pushed his well seasoned dogsled team to the front of the pack as the lead teams begin to take on the second half of the Iditarod race. With the top 14 teams now leading on the trail having completed their mandatory 24 hour layovers, the status of teams becomes much easier to follow, and Mackey arrived at the Ruby checkpoint first at 7:32 this morning.

Ruby is the first checkpoint on the Yukon River, thus Mackey is the recipient of the "First to the Yukon" award. A gourmet seven course meal cooked on a camp stove and a cache of 3500 crisp $1 bills comprise the award, and Mackey has frequently commented that he has hunger for both.

With temperatures hovering just below freezing, the trail which follows the Yukon river now has set up to be fast, but that could change depending on the heat of the day. Mackey will have plenty of company at the front as his competitors are leery of letting him get out of reach based on his past performance. There have been multiple lead changes over the past 48 hours and there will likely be more as teams are required to take at least one 8 hour layover at one of the checkpoints along the Yukon river. Closely pursuing Mackey are Hans Gatt, 4 time Iditarod winner Jeff King, 5 time Iditarod winner Rick Swenson, and Kjetil Backen.