Mush! Gearing Up For Saturday’s Iditarod Start

The ceremonial start is set for Saturday in downtown Anchorage. Check out the starting musher order here. And here’s a look at the race details courtesy of the Iditarod:

As a health-conscious organization, the Iditarod is implementing many COVID-19 mitigation protocols to ensure the safety of the teams, volunteers, and communities where the race travels. The musher start order drawing took place virtually as one more way to ensure musher health and safety leading up to this year’s race.

The 50th anniversary race includes 17 women and 32 men, made up of 13 rookies and 36 veterans. The field comes from five different countries, and five former Iditarod champions are in the race to compete to cross the burled arch first in Nome.

Sisters Anna and Kristy Berington, whom we featured in 2014, will start ninth and 24th, respectively. Our 2015 cover story subject, five-time champion Dallas Seavey, will wear bib No. 20 for the start.

Here’s a little more on this year’s race – Covid had a major impact on how the 2021 race was run – from the Anchorage Daily News:

The Iditarod’s governing body implemented measures to reduce the spread of the virus in 2020, 2021 and this year. The race requires all participants — from mushers to veterinarians to volunteers — be fully vaccinated.

Last year, for the first time in the race’s history, mushers did not run to Nome, rerouting instead along an out-and-back trail that looped around the historic Iditarod mining district and terminated back on the road system at Deshka Landing.

Unlike in 2021, this year’s Iditarod will start on the streets of downtown Anchorage on Saturday, March 5, with a ceremonial send-off as mushers parade through a loop that starts on Fourth Avenue. For casual spectators, the event will be similar to its pre-pandemic format, with teams lined out on side streets before heading out every few minutes starting at 10 a.m. The areas where mushers and their dogs stage before departing, however, will be completely closed to the public and anyone not inside the “Iditarod bubble.”

And Covid is still having an effect on the event. Talented musher Nicolas Petit reportedly tested positive and will not be able to participate.