Jake Berkowitz: As the Iditarod reaches the Yukon River, Petit’s strategy is perplexing

UPDATE, 5:30 p.m. Friday:

When Nicolas Petit pulled into Grayling on Friday morning at 11:48 a.m., after a short run of less than 3 hours from Anvik coming off of a 4.5-hour rest, no one could have predicted Petit’s next move. Every musher in the race, all the way down to the casual fan watching from their computers, had no doubt that Petit would blow through Grayling and continue his trek up the Yukon River, but Petit has pulled over in Grayling to rest.

For how long, we don’t know, but Bruce Lee — who is on the trail reporting for Iditarod — reported that Petit has declared his 8-hour rest and is planning on staying put.

Petit has essentially given up the lead he built from leaving Ophir and putting together two massive runs to Anvik. I know the five-course meal given to the first musher to the Yukon River is exceptional and the $3,500 is enticing, but was Petit really racing everyone to Anvik?

At this point, one can only wonder. With Petit dropping down to 12 dogs leaving Anvik, combined with a very short run and long rest that he is currently in the middle of, we could be seeing chinks in his armor.

We are also getting reports that the Iditarod Trail Committee is having difficulty getting drop bags (the mushers’ supplies) into the remote camp at Eagle Island, just as they did last year when teams had to carry all their provisions for the run from Grayling to Kaltag. Petit could be waiting for those supplies to get to Eagle Island, but that seems unlikely that he would give away his entire lead for this. Or he could be giving back some of the lead he built, and will let Ulsom lead the race up the Yukon River, banking on a better trail and more rest now will lead to a stronger team for the final push to Nome.

So what does this mean for Ulsom and the chase pack? Ulsom pulled into Grayling at 1:45 p.m. but has already taken his mandatory 8-hour rest back in Shageluk. Ulsom is now beginning to post much faster times than Petit, who traveled the 18-mile stretch nearly 30 minutes faster than Petit.

If Ulsom rests a standard 4-hour rest in Grayling and Petit does take his 8 hours, that will give Ulsom a 2-plus-hour lead out of Grayling. When Ulsom pulled into Grayling, it was the first time in this race that Ulsom and Petit have been in the same checkpoint, something Ulsom was not expecting to happen when he blew through Anvik. He likely assumed that Petit would be running straight to Eagle Island and bypassing Grayling.

The next 150 miles on the Yukon River will be a major deciding factor in who arrives in Nome first — especially the run from Eagle Island to Kaltag, which many mushers consider to be the hardest run in Iditarod. Stay tuned.

Original analysis:

Nic Petit is in the driver’s seat of the 2019 Iditarod, with last year’s champion, Joar Leifseth Ulsom, nipping at his heels.

Petit’s run up to this point is unprecedented. For years, there were two philosophies on how to race the Iditarod. The first: run long and rest short (a strategy that got Robert Sorlie two Iditarod wins). The second: run fast and take substantial rest to keep your team’s speed up (the strategy that gave Martin Buser the Iditarod record for many years, a record that is now held by Mitch Seavey with his incredible 8-day, 3-hour race in 2017).

Petit has fused these two philosophies. Up to now, he’s been pulling off incredibly long back-to-back runs while keeping his rests and his team’s speed very similar to those of Leifseth Ulsom, his nearest competitor.

Petit arrived into the Iditarod checkpoint just 30 minutes ahead of Leifseth Ulsom. In classic Petit fashion, he loaded his sled and left the checkpoint immediately, venturing 10 miles down the trail to set up his camp and cap an impressive 11.5-hour run. While blowing through a checkpoint is something that has become commonplace, attempting it after doing a 10-hour run is something that will become folklore — if he pulls it off.

[Petit is first to the Yukon as Leifseth Ulsom rests in Shageluk]

Leifseth Ulsom has run a much more textbook-style race up to this point. Coming off his 24-hour rest in Takotna, he blew through Ophir and past a resting Petit, who was waiting out the clock on his mandatory 24-hour rest. Leifseth Ulsom then continued down the trail, took a 3-hour rest and then continued into Iditarod, where he shut it down for just over four hours.

Leifseth Ulsom’s run time was more than 30 minutes slower than Petit’s between Ophir and Iditarod. That might seem insignificant, but the fact that Petit can be pulling off 11-hour-plus runs at speeds slightly faster or similar to Leifseth Ulsom’s 8-hour runs might just be the deciding factor in the 2019 Iditarod.

We are now on Day 5 of the race. It’s far from over, but Leifseth Ulsom will need to make a bold move (something he has been known to do on the Bering Sea coast) to overtake the surging and unpredictable leader.

Petit may just have a little more dog power in the bag. As of Friday morning, Petit was still running with an impressive full string of 14 dogs, compared to Leifseth Ulsom’s 11. In 2018, Leifseth Ulsom arrived in Shageluk (where he sat Friday morning) with 15 dogs. He arrived into White Mountain, just 80 miles from the finish, with 12 dogs and went on to win in Nome with eight dogs on the line. We will need to keep an eye on how aggressive Leifseth Ulsom will be going up the Yukon River with only 11 dogs in front of him and 400 miles left to race. Keep in mind that the Iditarod this year changed the rule for the number of dogs that could start the race, from 16 to 14. The new rule is beginning to have an effect on teams like Leifseth Ulsom and Mitch Seavey, who are down to 11. In past years that could have been 13.

[The Iditarod leaders spent hours grinding across a tussock-studded trail with not much snow]

Petit and Leifseth Ulsom’s chase pack seems to have conceded that unless a major storm rolls in or one of the two leaders makes a mistake, one of the two will most likely be the winner of the 2019 Iditarod. The chase pack in Shageluk Friday morning was led by Jessie Royer, who was just 2.5 hours off the pace in Takotna but is now 4 hours behind Leifseth Ulsom. Royer, who was a sitting solely in a third-place spot, has been joined by Pete Kaiser, Mitch Seavey, and Richie Diehl, all of whom are traveling faster than Royer and within 75 minutes of her. The chase pack is full of top teams capable of pulling off incredible runs, they are setting us up for a real show down the Yukon River.

The big question is how the next 150-plus miles down the Yukon will play out. Petit, who was now resting in Anvik after winning the First to the Yukon award, is 25 miles farther up the trail than everyone else. Petit is sitting in the best spot to make a big push to Kaltag and break the Yukon River into two even runs with one rest in the middle. Logic would say that Petit would take a break at Eagle Island, a checkpoint made up of nothing more than a few Arctic Oven tents on the side of the river. However, Petit is a master at reading his team and the trail situation. If he gets out on the wide-open river and the trail is not set up the way he needs, he may pull over and rest and let Leifseth Ulsom forge ahead.

Leifseth Ulsom (and his chase pack), on the other hand, have fewer options than Petit does. They are all looking at making the run from Shageluk to Kaltag in three runs and two rests.

[Current standings and full ADN coverage of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race]

If all goes according to plan, look for Petit to arrive in Kaltag with an hour-plus lead over Leifseth Ulsom. The one major curveball to everyone’s plans, however, is the weather. With a forecast of snow and temperatures of 30-degrees-plus, we could see lots of mushers not utilizing the checkpoints, resting out on the river and eventually blowing through Kaltag, something rarely done on the southern route, where the wind is constantly blowing right at your face.

Get ready for a great race down the Yukon River!