NOME – Jessie Holmes raced into Nome early Friday, winning his first Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race on the longest trail ever.
The 43-year-old musher and his team of 10 dogs were escorted by a convoy of police cars down Front Street in Nome. The team, led by Polar and Hercules, ran under the arch at 2:55 a.m. in temperatures hovering around zero degrees, to hundreds of cheering fans.
“It’s hard to put into words, but it’s a magical feeling,” Holmes said.
He’s been waiting for this moment for years.
“I have nothing to stop smiling about,” he said. “I have everything going for me. And you know, I shouldn’t ever feel a down moment in my life. If I died tomorrow, I’d just die the happiest man.”
Holmes went down his line of dogs, petting them and giving them steaks. He jumped into the crowd to hug fans and shake hands. He praised his team.
“I’m really proud of these dogs. I love them,” he said. “And they did it. They deserve all the credit.”
Race officials presented Holmes with a check for $57,200.
Longest Iditarod trail ever
Holmes, who’s originally from Alabama, lives in Interior Alaska, where he says he works as a carpenter. He starred on the reality TV show “Life Below Zero.”
This is Holmes’ eighth Iditarod race. He has placed in the top 10 nearly every year, as high as third, and won Rookie of the Year in 2018.
He notched his first Iditarod victory in 10 days, 14 hours and 55 minutes — the longest time it’s taken a winner to finish the race in over two decades.
“Those are 10 quality days, I got my money’s worth,” Holmes said at the finish, laughing.
This year’s mushers were racing on the longest Iditarod trail in history, at an estimated 1,128 miles. The route is normally closer to a thousand miles, but scarce snow in Southcentral Alaska forced race officials to move the trail north at the last minute. It’s the fourth time the race has started in Fairbanks, and it’s a change that climate specialist Rick Thoman expects will likely have to happen more often in a warming climate.
Holmes said he soaked in every minute of this year’s race — “the lows, the highs, the in-betweens.”
“It’s not about this moment now,” he said at the finish line, “it’s about all those moments along the trail, you know, being up in the Blueberry Hills, and the most amazing sunset you could ever imagine, moon shimmering on the glazed snow and the northern lights.”
Jessie Holmes jumped over a guardrail to greet fans soon after his 10-dog team raced into Nome in first place on Friday, March 14, 2025.
‘My life hasn’t been a dream run’
Holmes said he also thought about prior Iditarod champions as his team traveled across Alaska, including the late Jerry Riley, his mentor, and late four-time winner Lance Mackey.
“Just wanted to join that club with them,” he said. “And, you know, I’ve wanted that for a long time. It’s unreal.”
He spoke to a crowded room at the race headquarters in Nome about his struggles as a young man.
“My life hasn’t been a dream run,” Holmes said.
Holmes said his love for animals, along with help from Riley, turned his life around. A win, he said, motivates him to give back to communities and young people.
“If I could do anything in this world, it would be to be able to give all of you some of this joy that I feel,” he said. “And, you know, people that are struggling, especially.”
Rob Urbach, Iditarod’s CEO, said that Holmes has an especially strong bond with his team. In White Mountain, Holmes laid with his dogs in a bed of straw — what he calls a “cuddle puddle.”
“He found he was born to do this,” Urbach said. “His relationship with his dogs is a very special thing to see.”
A banner year for Interior mushers
This year’s race was a game of leapfrog between Holmes, Matt Hall and Paige Drobny, who were all chasing their first Iditarod win.
“They’re awesome competitors,” Holmes said. “And, you know, I never once thought I had this thing until we made it over Cape Nome.”
All three mushers live not too far from one another in the Interior and all three have come close to winning before — Drobny placing as high as fifth in her prior Iditarods and Hall was last year’s runner-up.
Holmes said he and Hall have been friends for decades. The two met in Eagle, a village on the Yukon River, where they worked at Hall’s father’s trapline.
At one point when they saw each other on the trail this year, Holmes said, he yelled out.
“I go, ‘Man, 16 years ago, in Eagle. Can you believe this?’ Like, here we are, we’re leading the Iditarod and, like, it was a real cool moment between us,” Holmes said.
Holmes came back out to the finish chute Friday morning as Hall and his 10 dogs dashed in right before 6 a.m. to secure second place for the second year in a row. Holmes and Hall shook hands. Dozens of people cheered for Hall, including his wife, Elke.
Musher Matt Hall shares a celebratory kiss with his wife, Elke, after placing second in the 2025 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race on Friday, March 14, 2025.
Hall’s team was led by his dogs Dyea and Qivik, who he called the perfect pair to lead him into Nome. Dyea, he said, is “just this rock star, push-button leader.”
“He’ll do anything,” Hall said. “I can steer him right around, park him wherever we want to. And then for this race, Qivik, the one running next to him up there, was a little speed demon.”
Holmes and Hall were both back at the finish line to congratulate Drobny for her third-place arrival. Veteran Jeff Deeter, another Interior musher who scratched earlier in the race, was there, too, to congratulate all three. Drobny also had a group of family and friends waiting for her.
Drobny’s team, known as the Squids, is known for their themes — last year was disco, this year is tropical. As Drobny and her dogs raced in, her friends and family chanted in hula skirts, wearing flower leis around their necks, while doing a kickline. The crowd chanted along.
“Paige! Paige Drobny! Paige! Paige Drobny!”
Paige Drobny’s family and friends did the can-can dance while they waited for her arrival to the 2025 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race finish line in Nome on Friday, March 14, 2025.
Droby pulled underneath the burled arch just over three hours after Hall, at 8:38 a.m. Friday, led by Ladybug Mecca and Spinderella.
She gave all the credit to her dog team. She said she didn’t sign up for the Iditarod until a few months before it started, persuaded by the skill-level of her team.
“As we saw this year, this dog team is amazing,” she said. “I just really recognized that they deserve to be here and to play in this field.”
Tough trail conditions
It was not only the longer trail that led to this year’s slower race, but also tough trail conditions.
Mushers slogged through sections of soft snow and were even hit by a sandstorm early on. Further up the trail, between Kaltag and Eagle Island, frozen snowmachine tracks made for some of the worst trail conditions Drobny had ever seen, describing it as “70 miles of crap.” Mushers then faced strong headwinds heading up the coast.
Hall was raised on the Yukon River, which much of the trail followed. Still, he said, the trail this year went on for too long. It included a loop on the river that felt endless.
“Oh no, more Yukon, and more and more,” Hall said, laughing as he recounted the trail. “And then we got to go back on it again.”
Musher Matt Hall arrives in Nome Friday morning, March 14, 2025, placing second in the 2025 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race.
Drobny agreed, and said the long river stretch is a lot more complex than it sounds.
“It sounds like it’s just a straight level path, but there’s a lot more to it actually,” she said. “I think that a lot of teams found that out there, that it wasn’t just like an easy trail, it was a pretty difficult trail.”
‘We love all three of them’
As mushers and dogs raced in Friday, fans crowded the finish chute. They came from all over.
Homer resident Denise Jantz and her sister Roberta Deal, who traveled from Indiana, experienced their first Iditarod finish together. They’re huge fans of the top three finishers and were glad to see Holmes take home his first Iditarod win.
“I think he has worked so hard and it’s so well deserved. I love that Paige is his neighbor, and she’s in the frontrunner too. I love it, and we love Matt too. We love all three of them,” Jantz said as Holmes waved to fans.
It’s been a tight race, and Jantz said watching the tracker has been nail-biting.
“It’s been obsessive,” she said. “Three in the morning, it doesn’t matter.”
This year not only had the longest trail, but the starting race field was also tied with the smallest ever with just 33 mushers.
Eight mushers have dropped out of the race, including one musher because his dog died. Two rookies were withdrawn Wednesday because officials said they were going too slow.
By the time Drobny raced into Nome Friday, the remaining 20 mushers were spread across more than 250 miles of trail.
