Editor’s note: Richland Source is posting daily updates on Mansfield native Matthew Failor’s efforts at the 2024 Iditarod Sled Dog Race, which began March 3. Updates post daily at 8 a.m. and may be updated during the day.
(UPDATE: Matthew Failor left the Kaltag checkpoint Sunday at 4:27 a.m. Alaskan time after a rest stop of four hours and 36 minutes. As of 9 a.m., he was racing 13th on the trail to Unalakleet.)
ON THE IDITAROD TRAIL, Alaska — Mansfield native Matthew Failor is celebrating his 42nd birthday on Sunday with 14 of his best friends, all of them doing what they love to do.
Namely, competing in the 52 Iditarod Sled Dog Race, a nearly 1,000-mile journey across his adopted home state of Alaska.
The next step for the veteran sled dog racer, now 346 miles from the finish in Nome, is to get back onto the trail to begin the bone-chilling, 85-mile run to the next checkpoint in Unalakleet, reaching the coast and the gateway to the Bering Sea.
Failor was the 11th competitor to reach the Kaltag checkpoint on Saturday at 10:51 p.m. AKST where actual overnight temperatures were a shuddering 28 degrees below zero with a wind chill of -42.
Failor finished 8th in 2023, his first Top-10 finish in what’s been dubbed “The Last Great Race.” His goal coming into this year’s race was to improve on that in 2024, perhaps even a Top-5 finish for his Alaskan Husky Adventures team.
That goal is still possible as mushers prepare to race along the coast of the Bering Sea where the weather always plays a huge role in the last few legs of the grueling race with wind, bitter cold, snow and more.
All of the leading teams have completed their mandatory 24-hour and eight-hour rest stops at this point.
Matthew Failor on the Iditarod Trail
(Photos below show Matthew Failor and his 17th-Dog team at the Nulato and Kaltag checkpoints on Saturday. The daytime scenes were screen grabs from the Iditarod.Com Insider web feed on Saturday at 2:08 p.m. as Failor arrived at Nulato, 582 miles into the nearly 1,000-mile race. The images in the darkness were obtained the same way Saturday night in Kaltag after he mushed into the checkpoint at 10:51 p.m. and was caring for his dogs.)
Failor arrived at the Nulato checkpoint (582 miles into the race) on Saturday at 2:08 p.m. AKST after a journey of five hours and 58 minutes from Galena.
The 2000 St. Peter’s High School graduate had opted to send one of his dogs home from the Galena checkpoint, heading down the trail with 14 dogs to Nulato.
After a rest of four hours and 33 minutes in Nulato, Failor and his team of 14 dogs left to begin the 47-mile run to Kaltag at 6:41 p.m. He pulled into the checkpoint four hours and 10 minutes later.
(The graphic below shows Matthew Failor’s performance thus far in the 2024 Iditarod, which began last Sunday in Willow, Alaska.)
With a population of 882, Unalakleet is situated on the coast of Norton Sound, just north of the Unalakleet River.
This village is the largest community on the Iditarod Trail between Wasilla and Nome. Two well stocked stores, as well as two restaurants can be found here along with limited lodging by advance booking.
The trail is now entering the gateway to the Bering Sea and from here on the mushers can expect sudden storms and an ample supply of wind. The checkpoint is located behind the post office.
The checkpoint is one of the most “luxurious” on the trail, including a flat-screen monitor mushers can use to check out Iditarod.com Insider GPS tracking on the competition. It also has couches, several bedrooms and breakfast at all hours of the day and night with a refrigerator full of eggs, bacon and more.
There is also a shower facility if the mushers choose and a laundry room, complete with a clothes dryer for assisting with clothing that has gotten wet with snow and frost.
(Below is a graphic offering an analytical look at Matthew Failor’s performance in the 2024 Iditarod, courtesy of Iditarod.com Insider.)
As of Sunday at 2:30 a.m. AKST, there were just seven mushers on the trail beyond Kaltag.
One of those seven was leader and five-time champion Dallas Seavey, who has overcome the two-hour time penalty assessed earlier in the race for not properly gutting a moose he had to kill on Monday when it attacked his team and injured one of his dogs.
