Sitka, yep. Way more going on than meets the eye. If you have access to live gps tracker, you'll see more of strategy playing out in a more updated form than the race standings. This year, standard race standings have been very late and inaccurate by hours at times.
Things get tricky, even in checkpoints. Remember 2008? Two titans Lance Mackey in 1st, Jeff King in 2nd. Jeff pulls into Elim, sees Lance feeding his dogs and is confused. They both head inside to rest. Lance can't shake Jeff's team, his dogs are faster. It was like this the entire race, within spitting distance. Jeff, getting old,falls fast asleep snoring. Lance had one eye open the entire time. Bounces up, rushes outside calls up his dogs and blasts out in the night. Jeff woke up PISSED that no one let him know. Lance cut rest yet again out on the trail, only giving Jeff a glimpse of 1st place. Even with a faster team, Jeff never caught up. Lance pulled into Nome like a rock star.
Buser stayed back helping his rookie son for the first half of the race. Then because of his highly calibrated check point efficiency with his chores, he blasted by 20 teams and almost caught up to the top 3, finishing in 5th place.
Efficiency with chores and tasks is a big part as well. Hard to do with sleep deprivation. On mandatory 8 hour or 24 hr rests he leaves on the minute, while other mushers leave 20 minutes to an hour over. After 5 days,timely efficiency will put you dozens of miles ahead of your competitors.
In last year's race Pete woke Joar up to tell him he was leaving Elim, IIRC, and did not want him to think he cheated him. Of course Sneaky Pete has a reputation to live down!
