Seavey takes Iditarod win

NOME -- As the teams began to roll through the checkpoints midway through the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, many in the dog mushing community predicted that the Iditarod title would come down to the wire.

Mitch Seavey had a different idea.

Helped by a strong run on the second half of the trail, Seavey rode into Nome at 10:20 p.m. Tuesday to win the 2004 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race. It was the first Iditarod win for the 11-year veteran and the first win for the Seavey family that boasts three generations of Iditarod mushers.

Seavey finished the course in 9 days, 12 hours and 20 minutes, over an hour and a half ahead of second-place Jeff King.

Though the mushers did not produce a photo finish, such as in 1978 when Rick Mackey edged out Rick Swenson by just a second, several mushers stayed in contention until very late in the race. Seavey, King and Kjetil Backen each held leads on the second half of the trail. This year mushers jockeyed back and forth as they lobbied for the top spot.

Though his team did not start out particularly strong, Seavey and his dogs finished with strength, building a comfortable lead in the latter days and final 200 miles of the race.

"I knew I had 'em a long time ago," Seavey said jokingly as he addressed media and the hundreds of fans lined each side of Front Street to watch the finish in Nome.

King was the first musher to the halfway point in Cripple and Backen led Seavey by just seconds going into Unalakleet. Though he and Backen were neck and neck as they hit the coast, Seavey said he was confident about his team as far back as Kaltag -- the checkpoint which lies 90 trail miles before Unalakleet.

"I had a good feeling there in Kaltag," Seavey said.

Seavey added that a conversation over a cheeseburger with Backen may have fueled his competitive juices.

"We sat down to a cheeseburger and he was pretty sure he was winning the race," Seavey said. "That kind of rubbed me the wrong way. Why don't some of these big-shot guys go after them? No animosity, it's psychological. At that point I thought, 'Why don't I go after him?'"

At that point Seavey got stronger and Backen began to falter. The two mushers were even in Unalakleet, but just outside of the coastal village, the Norwegian musher lost his lead dog. The animal, Takk, who helped fellow countryman Robert Sorlie win the Last Great Race in 2003, died a mile outside of Unalakleet. Gastric problems were the apparent cause of the death.

Seavey led Backen by three minutes, and King by 13 minutes out of Shaktoolik and began to build his lead from there. Seavey led by nearly two hours at Elim and held a 95-minute advantage over King as mushers left White Mountain. King passed Backen on the 46-mile stretch to White Mountain.

"The teams are usually really well rested coming out of White Mountain," Seavey said. "I didn't particularly want to go fast, but wanted to keep the team moving, in case another team had a rocket under their sled."

Seavey called it a win for not just himself, but his family. He represents the second generation, of the three-generation Seavey mushing clan. Seavey's father Dan mushed in the inaugural Iditarod and placed third, and Seavey helped his father raise and train the dogs during the early Iditarod era.

"It's a victory for the whole family," Seavey said. "The Seaveys are a mushing family, first my dad and now my boys since they were old enough to lift the poop shovel."

Seavey and his wife Janine have operated a sled dog tour business for the last 10 years and the couple has four sons -- Danny, Tyrell, Dallas and Conway -- who are all involved in mushing. Danny and Tyrell are both Iditarod veterans and Danny, Dan and Mitch all represented the Seavey family in the 2001 Iditarod, placing 41st, 42nd and 43rd. Dallas is a two-time runner-up in the Junior Iditarod and placed third in the Kuskokwim 200 earlier this year. Dogs from Dallas' Kuskokwim run, the Seavey B-team, ran with his father during the Iditarod.

King, who finished behind both Dallas and Mitch in the Kuskokwim, said the depth of quality dogs in the Seavey kennel was a key factor in the Seavey win in the Iditarod.

"(At the Kuskokwim) the first Seavey team passed me, then Mitch," King said. "Both took off so fast and here I am, thinking that I have the fastest team. I saw that they had two teams moving that fast."

Danny, 20, the oldest of the Seavey siblings, told his father during the race, "Dad, you are just going to have to be a maniac."

Contact Jeremiah Bartz at sports@frontiersman.com.