Jeff King and Doug Swingley are into Unalakleet, on the Bering Sea coast, and still almost tied together with string. They took just over 12 hours from Kaltag. Swingley claims he would have been in the lead but for suffering an overturned sled which injured one of his dogs.
Both mushers and their teams struggled through high winds all day. The winds are not forecast to drop until tomorrow.
Dee Dee Jonrowe has just arrived in Kaltag, nearly 3 hours after she was expected to arrive. Since her team normally runs faster than the opposition, she may have stopped out on the trail to rest her dogs. She was only 7 minutes ahead of Aliy Zirkle when they left Kaltag, since Zirkle elected to blow through Kaltag without stopping to rest. It will be interesting to see if Zirkle also stops en route for rest. It is likely that she will, since Kaltag to Unalakleet is a 12 hour run.
Bjornar Andersen has appeared out of nowhere to slot into 6th place in the last 24 hours. He may yet surprise the leaders. The latest report from Unalakleet has a bunch of mushers due to arrive in the evening, include Andersen and Zirkle. Swingley and King will probably head out at the same time that those chasing teams arrive. The open question is whether Jonrowe will head out at the same time, or continue to rest her dogs as she has been doing up to now. With only a little over 200 miles to go to Nome, the time window for bold tactical moves is shrinking.