The Silver Sled sled dog race, now running in its third decade, began Saturday at Bear Creek Lodge about 10 kilometres outside of Haines Junction.

After the mushers left the start chute, they travelled 35 miles to Silver City on the shores of Kluane Lake at the Arctic Research Institute Kluane Lake Research Station, where they stayed the night.

A 35-mile race runs in conjuncture with the longer race.

Once the mushers reached Silver City, they were treated to a nice home-cooked meal before lodging in the cabins.

Word from the trail was the outbound trail was slow. On day one of the race, the sky was overcast and the beautiful mountains around Haines Junction weren’t visible. A slight snow or drizzle hung in the air.

The first nine kilometres, between Bear Creek Lodge and Bear Creek Summit, were especially difficult.

That section had not been travelled due to lots of downed trees and heavy snow loads. The trail crew spent two days opening up that section a week prior.

The mushers’ times reflect the difficulty of the first day. Their first-day runs were consistently longer than day two.

Ed Hopkins proved to be the quickest 70-mile musher on both days.

Hopkins’ day one run took him 3:38:35 and followed that up on Sunday running 3:15.05 - despite leaving with eight dogs. His total run time was 6:53.40.

The runner-up was newcomer Connor McMahon who had a total run time of 7:16.56. He finished just ahead of Nathaniel Hamlyn, 7:23.23.

Nathaniel finished just before his day Paul, whose total run time was 8:12.58. Chrystelle Houdry rounded out the top five mushers.

For Red Lantern finisher Jonathan Alsberghe, this was his first longer race.

He was heard at the finisher barbecue saying: “When I took off and I stayed alone in the dark, in the wind and snow I was like, ‘What am I doing here?’ But what a great experience! First 70 miles race for the Fluffies and we got the Red Lantern yahooooo!”

In all, 12 mushers left the starting chute at Bear Creek Lodge for the 70-mile race. Nine of the 12 finished.

The shorter 35-mile race had two mushers. Jacob Heigers won posting a run time of 4:15.05. He was quick to point out at the barbecue that “I normally don’t win anything.”

Marcelle Fressineau, 5:02.22, placed second.

To be mindful of the COVID-19 pandemic, the race was reverted to its original route along the pipeline and the start moved to minimize the impact on the community of Haines Junction.

In previous years the Silver Sled had been 100 miles, however, race organizers decided to revert to the 70-mile format.