Mount Marathon: What to expect in Seward on Fourth of July

SEWARD, Alaska (KTUU) - The vaunted Mount Marathon race every July 4 is not the only event that draws crowds to the coastal town of Seward, but it is the feature attraction.

The 3,022-foot mountain overlooking the town becomes the starring attraction each year on Independence Day as hundreds of runners are cheered on by thousands of onlookers, both on the streets and the trails.

This year is celebrating the 97th running of the race, one of the oldest footraces in the nation. On Friday, the junior race opens the day at 9 a.m., followed by the women’s race at 11:05 a.m. and the men’s race at 2:05 p.m.

The race traces its origins to 1915 when two sourdoughs placed a bar bet on whether or not a man could climb to the top and run down to the bottom in less than one hour.

The runner, James Walters, came up short by two minutes, but the tradition had been started. The next year, Alec Bolan broke the hour barrier when he scaled the peak and returned in just over 55 minutes.

Since then, the race record has been broken 13 times.

Eight-time men’s champion Bill Spencer held the course record for the longest time — 32 years, starting in 1981 when he ran a time of 43 minutes, 21 seconds.

While some men came close throughout the years to breaking Spencer’s record, the mark finally came down in 2013, when Eric Strabel lowered it to 42:55.

In 2015, the record was broken again, this time by Spanish pro runner Kilian Jornet, who lowered the mark to 41:48.

Since then, the men’s race has been owned by Fairbanks product Davis Norris, who has won it five times in the last eight years, including two record performances. Last year, Norris broke his own record in a time of 40:37, and the Alaskan athlete has never lost in five attempts.

The all-time record for most wins resides in the women’s race, which has been won nine times by former Olympic skier Nina Kemppel, who collected her victories from 1994 to 2003.

In recent years, there has been no steady winner, as each of the last four years have been won by different women. In 2024, Anchorage’s Klaire Rhodes captured her first Mount Marathon victory in a speedy time of 49:49, becoming only the fourth female runner to break the 50-minute mark.

The current women’s race record belongs to Colorado pro runner Allie McLaughlin, who ran the fastest female time of 47:09 in 2022, taking down the previous best of 47:48 set by Swedish pro runner Emelie Forsberg in 2015. Forsberg’s record time that year erased a 25-year-old mark set in 1990 by Anchorage’s Nancy Pease (50:30).

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