Good Morning Stage Stop Race Fans,
We had a great welcome dinner here in Big Piney-Marbleton. 4 Junior Mushers came on stage and talked about their experience of riding the sled during the Ceremonial Start in Jackson on Friday night. The Dutch oven desserts are a huge hit!
Here is what Jerry Bath had to say about yesterday:
What a race! Plenty of adversity with Mother Nature wielding her bag of tricks with snow and WIND! The 30-mph kind causing the average musher’s mph to lessen drastically. Perfectly normal.
While Anny keeps steadily creeping away from the rest of the field, Lena is playing a smart game in solid second but is 15 minutes back. Cathy Rivest a solid 3rd. Dave Torgerson, running Streeper’s B-team, advanced greatly in the overall from 11th to 4th; 17-time competitor JR is steady in 5th; and 4-time champ Hans Gatt advanced from 9th to 6th.
Seventeen-time consecutive competitor Magnusson advanced from 12th to 8th; Rachel Courtney exploded from 14th to an impressive 9th and is on the move. Second year competitor Ryan Beaber advanced from 15th to 12th.
Tomorrow we may see a widening of the field to determine several races within the race. Most mushers mainly race 3-day races, this is where the pool of dogs starts to really come into play. As strategy goes, who’s sticking to their game plan, who’s rolling the dice. Who has all 14 dogs still in the rotation, most do by the way. The pre-race planned rotation of dogs may start to change a bit due to several factors. This is where it really gets fun for mushers and fans alike.
Tomorrow’s game plan for Stage 4 — Big Piney/Marbleton:
Middle Piney parking lot is in the Wyoming Range and it has its share of hills along with a little open country making it a really fun 35-mile course and may have the greatest overall average elevation yet. Partly cloudy and cold is predicted in the forecast.
Here a few videos from yesterday’s stage:
