We’ve been tracking our mushers everyday.  My youngest has even been asking me to check on them before he goes to bed each night.  The two guys that my sons had picked are rookies, and they have been running pretty close in the standings with each other.  As we check there standings, there’s been a lot of, “Ha…I’m ahead of you!!” going on, and then they will discuss why it’s possible, backing their arguments up with the number of dogs they have left, and how long of breaks they have taken, weather conditions…(shaking my head…boys!!) 🙂

I have found that I was thinking about the mushers throughout the day, as our weather has been getting warmer, I couldn’t help but think about the cold weather they were experiencing.  As I was going to bed, I would also think of them either actually on the trail, or at their resting spots.  I especially was thinking about Benjamin Harper, being a rookie, and just out of high school, I couldn’t imagine being his mom worrying about him at night.  But overall the experience has been a lot of fun.  The girl I had chosen is a veteran, and even her husband is racing as well.  They have a website you can find here.

She has consistently been in the top five.  It has been fun to visit her website because they have pictures and keep it updated on her and her husband’s progress.

As of today, 4 mushers have made it into Nome, and Aliy Zirkle will be there sometime tonight, hopefully in 5th place.

Here are the top 4 so far:

1.  Dallas Seavey – 8d 18h 13m 6s
2.  Mitch Seavey – 8d 22h 22m 56s
3.  Aaron Burmeister –  8d 23h 47m 31s
4.  Jessie Royer – 9d 1h 51m 9s

Congratulations to them all!!

This is where our other two guys stand:
35.  Seth Barnes is 4 checkpoints out.
39.  Benjamin Harper is 5 checkpoints out.

I would think that they should be in Nome by Thursday, at the latest, Friday.  We will continue to track them until they both cross the finish line.

I checked in on Aliy’s website for her update as she heads to Nome.  Her team is the red team and her husband’s is the black team.  This was at the bottom of her update and it just made me smile:

PS: You’ll see Allen and the Black Team are still resting in Shaktoolik. They may not move from there until after the Red Team has finished. When possible, Allen likes to see her safely home before continuing with his race.

A bonus for me while I was writing this, my daughter’s friend brought over her new puppy!!  Not a husky…but a puppy!!  He’s a 9-week old German Shepherd, so adorable, and I was able to hold him and pet him…so cute!! Just made my day!! 🙂