Steady Marrs earns best career Iditarod finish — again

WASILLA — Willow's Wade Marrs continued his eerily consistent march up the Iditarod leaderboard on Tuesday, placing fourth by narrowly outracing Bethel's Pete Kaiser to the finish line at 11:22 a.m.

The fourth-place finish again halved Marrs' finishing position from the previous year — the 25-year-old placed eighth last year, 16th in 2014 and 32nd in 2013. Tuesday's run was the fifth career finish in six starts for the veteran, who first ran the race as an 18-year-old in 2009.

Marrs completed the 975-mile race with nine dogs in harness. He was the second Mat-Su musher to cross the finish line, following winner Dallas Seavey of Willow into Nome by about nine hours. Sterling's Mitch Seavey was second and Two Rivers' Aliy Zirkle placed third.

As of Thursday evening, 10 mushers had crossed the finish line, with four others out of Safety. Norways Joar Leifseth Ulsom was sixth and Girdwood's Nicolas Petit finished seventh, Norwegian Ralph Johannessen was eighth, followed by Denali Park's Jeff King in ninth.

Willow's Scott Smith became the third Mat-Su musher to cross the finish line Tuesday, rounding out the top 10 at 4:33 p.m. with 10 dogs in harness. Smith overtook Nenana's Noah Burmeister in the final miles of the race, making the run from Safety 28 minutes faster than the Nenana musher to edge Burmeister by just six minutes.

Fortune shined on Marrs during his final day. He was the fifth musher to reach White Mountain, but moved up a spot when Brent Sass's dogs stalled out and refused to leave camp. Marrs then managed to narrowly hold off a hard-charging Kaiser during a mad dash to Front Street.

Marrs left Safety with an eight-minute lead over Kaiser, and his time was just three minutes slower than the 2:30 it took him to make the trip last year — the fastest Safety-to-Nome run in the 2015 race. But Kaiser never quit, covering the windswept trail in 2:27 to nearly close the gap.

The race for fourth was for more than just bragging rights. Marrs will receive $51,825 for fourth, while Kaiser gets $47,475, a difference of $4,350.

For more information and up-to-date standings, visit iditarod.com.

CORRECTION: A previous version of this story misidentified the Scandanavian country from which Johannessen hails.