Hans Gatt has claimed his fourth Yukon Quest title in a convincing, record-smashing run that pitted him against the reigning four-time champion in an epic 450-mile “sprint” to the finish in which his dogs took just over 15 hours of rest in addition to the mandatory eight hours at Braeburn.

Mushers on the trail have said the conditions and competition combined to create what they believe will stand as the fastest-ever Yukon Quest. Hard and fast trail allowed the fleet-footed dogs of Gatt, Lance Mackey and Hugh Neff to pad along without interference. And the front three partially credited Zack Steer for setting a fast pace in the first 400 miles or so; he forced them to keep up early on.

Gatt’s finishing time was 9 days and 26 minutes, a WHOPPING 23 hours and 6 minutes faster than the previous record, set just last year, by Sebastian Schnuelle.

One big point that may not have been mentioned about Gatt is his kennel size. It has shrunk in recent years, and he said he was training just 23 dogs this winter. Obviously, some of his 14 Quest dogs will have to be ready and willing by the time the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race kicks off on March 7. Gatt is one of a half dozen Quest mushers pulling double duty on the world’s only two 1,000-mile sled dog races this year. Mackey, Neff, Steer and Ken Anderson all are signed up for the Last Great Race.

Gatt showed he is at the top of the game when it comes to everything involved with distance dog racing, including the often overlooked art of gamesmanship on the trail.

First, he made the unprecedented move of running nine hours  from Eagle to the Alaska-Canada border, where he took a break of just three hours before setting off on another run that should have been nine more hours. He faced a setback on the way when the trail for several miles beyond Forty Mile was blown in and poorly marked. Breaking trail cost him maybe two hours, but he still arrived at Dawson with a lead of more than two hours over Neff and Mackey.

Then the race was on.

Those two chased him 100 miles nonstop straight to Scroggie Creek, where Gatt dropped two dogs, and it looked from a distance as though he might be in trouble. In hindsight, he probably was cutting out all but his core team for what he knew would be a hard-fought battle all the way to Whitehorse. He knew they’d all be running another 100 miles to Pelly, then all the way to Carmacks, and the 80 miles to Braeburn and the final 100 to the finish.

But Gatt made a nice move before reaching Pelly, pulling over at the Stepping Stone hospitality stop for two hours, which gave his dogs food, water and rest, and put Mackey and Neff in the less favorable position of breaking trail for a few hours. He followed them in to Pelly Crossing by two hours, let them believe he was taking a longer rest, but hopped up and followed them out of that checkpoint. He was down to nine dogs, about the same number as Mackey and Neff.

Gatt kept on Neff and Mackey’s heels all the way to Carmacks, where they all took off together for the final key run to the mandatory eight-hour layover at Braeburn. That run, through the heat of the day, proved that Gatt and his dogs had a little something left over that the other two could not match. He swept into Braeburn 34 minutes ahead of Mackey and an hour ahead of Neff. That size of a gap is nearly insurmountable at this stage of distance racing, when all teams have slowed to a 6 to 7 mph trot.

It appeared that Mackey was cruising in to a second place finish, which may not satisfy a man who’s accustomed to not just winning but generally blowing the competition out of the water. But on the other hand, he said before the race that his team was younger and had a lot of unknowns. Those unknowns have been answered. They performed beautifully in the most aggressive Yukon Quest ever.

Neff will finish a strong third, and he has to like his team’s chances in the Iditarod next month. Neff again proved that his bloodline is among the elite and he, himself, is an amazing example of toughness and calm under pressure.

That leaves us with a pitched battle between Steer and Anderson for fourth place. Anderson cut rest at Carmacks to pull even with Steer, and both had 11-dog strings coming into the final checkpoint of Braeburn.  Anderson will embark at 3:34 p.m. and Steer at 3:35 p.m. Pacific time for what could be an 11 to 12-hour race to Whitehorse.  (It took Gatt 11 hours and 16 minutes to make the final run, which is very good speed for the final leg of the race, also considering the six previous long runs his team made since Eagle.)

I wouldn’t want to be racing either Anderson or Steer in the final stretch of a distance dog race. Both are excellent athletes who also understand well how to race their dogs. Anderson appeared to have a touch more speed in the last 100 miles, but it’s hard to determine what was going on out there just looking at the update and tracker information.

Notes…

• Overheard at the Braeburn checkpoint: Neff was talking about the dogs moving slow through the heat of the day and Mackey said, “yeah, as slow as drool.” All three teams looked perky at Braeburn. Even Hans shook his head about the pace of this race. This observer noted that the mushers seemed as surprised as fans at the pace.
• Quote from Gatt on his Quest web site bio: “Of course I entered this race to win, and I will try to win it. it is a race after all.”

Tags: Hans Gatt, Yukon Quest

This entry was posted on Monday, February 15th, 2010 at 1:23 pm and is filed under Yukon Quest. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.