King finished early Wednesday, nearly three hours ahead of runner-up and four-time winner Doug Swingley. With the victory, King, 50, becomes the oldest musher to win the world's longest sled dog race.

King, who joins Swingley, Martin Buser and Susan Butcher as four-time winners, credited "the best sled dog team ever" with helping him win. Only Rick Swenson has won the race five times.

For winning the Iditarod, King receives $69,000 and a new truck. His previous wins came in 1993, 1996, and 1998. The race commemorates a 1925 dogsled relay that carried serum almost 1,100 kilometers (from Nenana) to Nome to stop a diphtheria outbreak.