'Unbeatable' Basinger does it again

But Wednesday night, McGrath schoolteacher Peter Basinger pedaled into town to win the 350-mile Iditarod Trail Invitational, an ultra race between winter bikers, skiers and runners. A crowd of fans in the town of 350 near the Takotna River turned out to cheer him home.

Basinger finished in 3 days, 6 hours, 30 minutes to narrowly miss -- by just 51 minutes -- breaking his own course record. But his fifth victory in the 350-mile race from Knik made Basinger the winningest rider in race history, breaking a tie with John Stamstead.

"This is Pete's race," said Kathi Merchant, organizer of the race with her husband, Bill. "He's almost unbeatable out there."

Basinger, 30, a longtime Anchorage resident and 11-time Invitational racer who has never scratched, teaches at the 50-student McGrath School.

In some ways, pedaling to McGrath in nearly ideal winter conditions may have been easier that getting to the race start on Sunday. Basinger's flight from McGrath to Anchorage was cancelled both Thursday and Friday. He finally made the connection late Saturday afternoon.

Fairbanks cyclist Jeff Oatley, the Invitational's 2009 champion, left McGrath at 12:20 Wednesday afternoon, nearly three hours behind Basinger. Anchorage bike shop owner Greg Matyas followed, three hours behind Oatley.

In the women's race, physical therapist Louise Kobin of Los Gatos, Calif., was looking to emphatically put back-to-back second-place finishes behind her.

Kobin, riding a new fat-tire bike, arrived in Nikolai at 6:45 p.m. Wednesday Bwith about a 20-hour cushion over defending champion Tracey Petervary of Idaho, who left the previous checkpoint of Rohn at 5:30 p.m.

Between the two checkpoints is 80 miles of trail across the notorious Farewell Burn. Some racers may stop at the Bear Creek cabin, one mile off the main trail, to break up the crossing or perhaps at a hunting tent camp called the Bison Camp midway across the Burn.

Basinger's pace across the rugged Farewell Burn was only a couple of hours slower than the slowest Iditarod mushers last year, who benefitted from the pulling power of more than a dozen dogs. But he slowed on the 48-mile ride from Nikolai to McGrath, needing about 11 hours to cover the final stretch.

Three other racers -- Anchorage bike shop owner Bill Fleming, Erik Warkentin and Jay Petervary -- were into Nikolai Wednesday night

For Petervary, who plans to pedal all the way to Nome, the Iditarod Invitational is just the beginning of a 7,000-mile journey that will include the 3,000-mile Race Across America (RAAM) road bike race in June and, two months after that, the 2,745-mile Great Divide Time Trail from Banff, Alberta, to Antelope Wells, N.M., near the Mexican border.

Four years ago, Petervary set a Great Divide course record of 15 days, 4 hours.

The clear winter days of this Invitational -- without snowfall or much wind -- should get Petervary's journey off on the right foot.

"Phenomenal, phenomenal," raved Merchant about trail conditions. "Usually there's a storm in Rainy Pass, but this is just a phenomenal year. It's not even terribly cold."

Reach reporter Mike Campbell at mcampbell@adn.com or 257-4329.