NOME -- For about two weeks every March, an old bowling alley in downtown Nome becomes the loud and lively headquarters of the Last Great Race, practically a village of its own, attracting members of the huge family known as the Iditarod.
It opens a few days before the first mushers arrive on Front Street and doesn't close until the widow's lamp has been extinguished -- the ceremonial light that burns as long as someone is on the trail. Like any checkpoint, the Nome headquarters is open 24 hours a day, providing a warm welcome for weary mushers.
The headquarters also is a visitor attraction where Iditarod fans can fill their suitcases with commemorative sweatshirts, teddy bears, key chains, shoulder patches, books, calendars and posters.
Alaska Airlines has a booth where anyone can make reservations. Coffee and hot dogs are available. One of the more popular areas is a set of tables where GCI offers Internet access to journalists, mushers and passersby.
On Thursday, race finishers Ed Iten and Ramy Brooks logged on to one of the computers, while Iditarod staff photographer Jeff Shultz and Cabela's correspondent Jon Little worked side by side a few feet away. Reporters from Norway, Michigan, Kotzebue and Anchorage filed stories and photographs.
The headquarters is packed when the first finisher arrives in Nome. But by Thursday of this week, all the autograph hounds had had their fill. Mitch Seavey and Charlie Boulding chatted and munched popcorn as fans walked past in search of popcorn of their own.
At one table, snowmachiners who had driven from Willow and camped along the trail sipped coffee and pondered their next move. Later in the day, a local guitarist played for the crowd and a thespian in a black top hat and swallow-tail coat recited Robert Service poems.
The headquarters is a place where old Iditarod friends cross paths and volunteer pilots share stories.
Long tables are filled with people in fur and bunny boots, and strangers can always find something to talk about -- Seavey's amazing run or Jeff King's Barkalounger sled.
Every now and again, someone walks through selling $100 raffle tickets for a new Dodge truck.
But in a few days, the trinkets will be packed up and the visitors will all be home, the mushers will return to their kennels and the journalists to their desks, and the Nome headquarters of the Iditarod will shut down for another year.
Closing kick is in the blood for the Smyths
If the 1,100-mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race was a 22-mile sprint from Safety to Nome, the Smyth family would be a dynasty like no other.
Before dawn on Friday, Cim Smyth drove a five-dog team from Safety to Nome in the fastest time every recorded -- 1 hour, 52 minutes. Despite his speedy finish, Smyth was the 43rd musher to Front Street.
Still, the final burst did two things:
• Prevented brother Ramey from recording the fastest Safety-to-Nome time. Ramey blitzed the last stretch in average speed of 9.4 mph, passing both Charlie Boulding and Ed Iten to grab fourth place on Wednesday. Before his brother's finish, Ramey was easily the fastest.
The Nome Kennel Club offers a $500 prize for the fastest Safety-to-Nome time, but only the top-20 finishers are eligible. So Ramey's 2 hour, 20 minute time will win that award for the fourth consecutive year even though Cim beat him by nearly a half-hour. One suspects that fact won't go unnoticed around the Smyth dinner table during holiday get-togethers.
• Established the only known sub- two-hour time in race history. John Cooper holds the Nome Kennel Club Safety-to-Nome record of 1:59:24, set in 1984.
Closing fast seems to be in the Smyth genes. Ramey has won Nome Kennel Club awards an Iditarod-record six times. Cim did it once. And their dad, Bud Smyth, won the award in 1973 and 1974.
Cim's dog team suffered a combination of muscle strains and sickness early in the race. By Nulato, 393 miles from Nome, he had dropped 11 of his 16 starters and was down to a 5-dog team, the smallest allowed by Iditarod rules.
Rear guard keeps on the move in Iditarod
The two racers bringing up the rear didn't make it to Nome for the banquet Sunday night. G.B. Jones, 55, of Wasilla and Perry Solmonson, 45, of Whittier and Plain, Wash., were in White Mountain on Sunday afternoon, locked in a battle for the red lantern that goes to the last-place finisher. Jones arrived at 8:48 a.m. and Solmonson checked in just after noon.
Despite the back-of-the-pack finishes, there were personal victories in the offing for each musher. This will be Solmonson's first finish after scratches in his two previous races.
And Jones was on track for a 12-day-plus finish, which would lop considerable time off his only other finish -- 52nd place (third from last) in 14 days, 1 hours, 11 minutes two years ago.
Faster mushers begin to level playing field
Jon Little reports on Cabelas.com that Iditarod playing field is leveling. One indicator: Only 44 teams finished last year's race, and the final team came in the day after the Sunday banquet. The 44th team to cross the finish line this year, Ryan Redington, did so at 5 a.m. Friday, more than two days before the banquet.
If the 1,100-mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race was a 22-mile sprint from Safety to Nome, the Smyth family would be a dynasty like no other.
Before dawn on Friday, Cim Smyth drove a five-dog team from Safety to Nome in the fastest time every recorded -- 1 hour, 52 minutes. Despite his speedy finish, Smyth was the 43rd musher to Front Street.
The burst did two things:
• Prevented brother Ramey from recording the fastest Safety-to-Nome time. Ramey blitzed the last stretch in average speed of 9.4 mph, passing both Charlie Boulding and Ed Iten to grab fourth place on Wednesday. Before his brother's finish, Ramey was easily the fastest.
The Nome Kennel Club offers a $500 prize for the fastest Safety-to-Nome time, but only the top-20 finishers are eligible. So Ramey's 2 hour, 20 minute time will win that award for the fourth consecutive year even though Cim beat him by nearly a half-hour.
• Established the only known sub- two-hour time in race history. John Cooper holds the Nome Kennel Club Safety-to-Nome record of 1:59:24, set in 1984.
Ramey has won Nome Kennel Club awards an Iditarod-record six times. Cim did it once. And their dad, Bud Smyth, won the award in 1973 and 1974.
Cim's dog team suffered a combination of muscle strains and sickness early in the race. By Nulato, 393 miles from Nome, he had dropped 11 of his 16 starters and was down to a 5-dog team, the smallest allowed by Iditarod rules.
