Sled dog teams set out on gruelling trek across Alaska

The winner is expected to drive their sled dog team down Nome’s Front Street to the burled arch finish line in about 10 days

The lead dogs for musher Bailey Vitello of Milan, New Hampshire, run down Fourth Avenue during the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race’s ceremonial start in Anchorage, Alaska (Mark Thiessen/AP)

The race to Nome began for 33 mushers in this year’s Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in Alaska.

Jessie Holmes, an Alabama native living in the Alaska community of Brushkana, was the first musher to leave across a frozen lake about 70 miles north of Anchorage.