Feb. 10--Polaris Dragon snowmobile racers Todd Minnick and Nick Olstad were in a familiar place Tuesday -- first to Nome in the 26th running of the Tesoro Iron Dog.

Behind them by 36 minutes were Ski-Doo riders Tyler Aklestad from Palmer and Tyson Johnson from Eagle River.

It all looked like an instant replay of last year.

That's when Minnick, 29, and Olstad, 26, led Aklestad, 23, and Johnson, 29, by 44 minutes at the halfway point of the nearly 2,000-mile Iron Dog.

The lead got cut to 24 minutes after race officials imposed a 20 minute penalty on the Wasilla-based leaders for allegedly getting some help on their sleds in McGrath from Minnick's old teammate, retired seven-time Iron Dog champ John Faeo. But the penalty had little effect.

After the standard, 42-hour layover in Nome that includes a big banquet, Minnick and Olstad roared out of the City of the Golden Sands and headed down the Bering Sea Coast on their way to the Fairbanks finish line.

Over the next 360 miles to where the race turns inland toward the Interior, they restored the lead they'd earned on the 1,100-mile run to Nome.

They held it all the way across the Kaltag Portage to the Yukon River as Aklestad and Johnson, slowed by mechanical problems, fell back.

Other racers couldn't seem to cut the gap -- and then everything turned topsy-turvy.

In wind and blowing snow on the Yukon, a half-dozen teams got lost.

By the time racers reached the Galena checkpoint, Marc McKenna from Anchorage and Eric Quam from Eagle River were in front, though they had never challenged for the lead previously. Arctic Cat racers Dwayne Drake from Fairbanks and Andy George from Wasilla, the 2007 winners, had moved into second. Minnick and Olstad were way back in sixth.

And seven-time race champ Scott Davis -- a man tied with Faeo for the title of winningest Iron Dog competitor -- was rushing partner Todd Palin to the local clinic after a crash broke his arm.

Palin and Davis, who had been closing fast on the leaders, were knocked out of contention and would eventually finish fourth behind McKenna and Quam, Drake and George, and young Tyler Huntington, 23 from Galena, and his old racing partner, Pete Demoski, 50 from Fairbanks.

Demoski isn't in the race this year. McKenna and Quam are, but each with new partners.

Other than that, though, 2009 looks a lot like 2008:

The same leaders are in Nome with much the same pack of chasers behind.

McKenna, 34, and new partner Dusty Van Meter, 39, from Kasilof, got into Nome third. Behind them on the trail were Quam, 38, and new parter Bradley Helwig, 35, from Anchorage. Huntington and new partner Mike Morgan, 23, from Anchorage, were just behind them.

The only thing that seems to have changed slightly is that Palin, 44, and Davis, 49, have fallen farther back on the run north than in years past. Quam has suggested this might be the year the ruling powers in the Iron Dog change and the young racers take over.

For getting to Nome first, Minnick and Olstad collect a halfway prize of $2,500. A much bigger payday -- at least $25,000 -- awaits the race winners in Fairbanks on Saturday.

Veteran racer Corey Cronquist of CC Ski-Doo in Willow said he's optimistic Aklestad and Johnson can make a serious run at the leaders this year. That duo stands to collect another $6,000 in bonus money from the Canadian manufacturer of their snowmachines if they get to the line first.

An Aklestad-Johnson sponsor, Cronquist has been in regular contact with the riders, and he said they have yet to report a problem with their Rev XP machines.

"The sleds have been holding together," he said.

The racers, he added, are reluctant to talk to the press about how things have been going because of fears of "getting jinxed."

After what happened last year, that might be somewhat understandable. Aklestad and Johnson were eventually forced to drop out of the 2008 race altogether.

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