Hometown hero Hans Gatt of Whitehorse finally ended Lance Mackey's magic in distance dog mushing by holding off the four-time champion to win the Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race in record-shattering fashion on Monday.
By finishing in 9 days, 26 minutes, Gatt crushed the previous Quest record time by 23 hours, lowering the race record more than any previous champion in the Quest's 26 years.
Sebastian Schneulle, also of Whitehorse, set the record just a year ago.
The indomitable Mackey, who finished 63 minutes behind Gatt, had won the only four Quests he'd entered as well as the last three Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Races. Both he and Gatt are entered in this year's Iditarod, which begins March 6 in Anchorage.
"I can't even explain how this feels," Gatt said at the finish line, according to the Quest's Web site. "I'm actually really emotional right now. These nine dogs are incredible. I'm so proud of them."
Hugh Neff of Tok finished third, an hour and 40 minutes behind Mackey.
Kicking, running and using ski poles, the 51-year-old Gatt pulled off a remarkable come-from-behind victory on the home stretch after Mackey and Hugh Neff passed him with about 200 miles to go.
But after dropping three dogs, Gatt regained the lead Sunday night before the final 100-mile charge to the finish line.
"That was the goal -- to win it," he told the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner on Sunday, "and I like to achieve my goals, which I usually do."
Excellent weather and a slick, fast trail combined to help Gatt set a race record that may stand for decades.
"This is the perfect scenario," Mackey told the News-Miner on Sunday. "We've had no overflow yet. It hasn't been cold. ... I don't know if you can get any better than this."
Less rest for the dogs is the only way Monday's record could go lower, Mackey said. And most dogs, he allowed, couldn't handle that.
"Maybe when they become bionic dogs," he told the News-Miner.
Gatt, of Ellbogen, Austria, was the king of the Quest in the early years of the decade, winning three consecutive races.
Then Lance Mackey showed up, taking the next four 1,000-mile ultramarathons before skipping last year's race.
Before this year's race, Gatt trimmed his kennel back to just 24 dogs to focus more attention on his fastest animals.
In less than three weeks, Gatt will try to accomplish what has, in a few short years, gone from impossible to routine -- capture the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race after winning the Quest.
Mackey first accomplished the feat in 2007 and repeated it in 2008. Last year, Mackey sat out the Quest. In his place, Schnuelle earned his first Quest victory and wound up second to Mackey in the Iditarod.
Shattering the race record put Gatt in an elite group of distance racers who recast what many thought impossible with a dominating victory.
The first to provide such a sea change was Emmitt Peters of Ruby, dubbed the Yukon River Fox. In the 1975 Iditarod, Peters shattered the race record by more than six days, winning in 14 days, 14 hours, 44 minutes. Peters' record would stand another five years.
"Peters was ahead of his time in the 1970s with his strategies for resting and running his team and in dog care training," Daily News reporter Scott Heiberger wrote in 1990.
Then, in 1995, Doug Swingley of Montana delivered another race-altering performance, slicing more than 34 hours off the Iditarod record time with his victory in 9 days, 2 hours, 42 minutes.
"Boy, did we get fooled," 1978 champion Dick Mackey said in Nome after Swingley's victory. "He had a dog team trained to run faster than anyone thought it could be done."
Until Monday, the Quest landmarks have been less dramatic. They include:
• Charlie Boulding's 1991 run of 10 days, 21 hours, 12 minutes, the first time a musher had finished in less than 11 days.
• Schnuelle breaking the 10-day barrier last year with a time of 9 days, 23 hours, 20 minutes.
By MIKE CAMPBELL
mcampbell@adn.com