Photo by Josh Edge, APRN – Anchorage
John Baker and his team have made the Iditarod run in record time.
Baker is the first musher from Western Alaska to win the race and is only the fourth Alaska Native to beat the field to Nome. His time of 8 days, 18 hours and 46 minutes topped the previous record, which was held by Martin Buser, by four hours.
Willow’s Ramey Smyth pulled into Nome at 10:50am, just over an hour after Baker.
Hans Gatt took third place, crossing the finish line at 3:24pm.
Dallas Seavey, Hugh Neff and Sebastian Schnuelle have all left the Safety checkpoint and are on their way to the final stop.
Photo: (Top) John Baker leaves Willow at the start of the 2011 Iditarod. (Right) Ramey Smyth, of Willow, waves to the crowd at the race restart.
Correction: We initially reported that Baker topped Buser’s record by three hours, when it was actually four hours. Sorry for the inconvenience.
