NEWRY – They lost last year by a fraction of a second. This year, they took the gold … uh, the beer.

A New Hampshire team returned to Sunday River Ski Resort on Saturday to win the ninth annual North American Wife-Carrying Championship.

Ri Fahnestock and Sarah Silverberg, friends from Dover, N.H., were awarded Silverberg’s weight in beer: five cases. They also won $610 (five times Silverberg’s weight) and qualified for the World Wife-Carrying Championship in Finland.

“It was a close finish last year,” Fahnestock said. “It was close enough that we thought we had to come back and make amends.”

“It feels great to come back and take first this year,” Silverberg said.

In last year’s competition, the couple ran a time of 1 minute, 2.60 seconds, but were defeated by Massachusetts couple Keith Cardoza and Julia Stoner, who ran the course in 1 minute, 2.26 seconds.

Cardoza and Stoner competed again this year but did not finish after taking a tumble during their qualifying run. Cardoza was treated for a shoulder injury.

Forty-three teams signed up to run the 278-yard course, which featured a 39-inch-high wooden hurdle, a long pit of waist-deep water, and a mound of earth. Teams consist of one man and one woman, both of whom must be at least 21 years old, but marriage is not required; women may also carry men if they so choose.

Most teams choose the “Estonian carry,” in which the woman hangs down the man’s back and wraps her arms around his waist. Other styles, including piggyback and the firemen’s carry (carrying a person over both shoulders), are also allowed.

Fahnestock and Silverberg ran this year’s qualifying course in 55.74 seconds to compete in the final race against Austin Stonebraker of Dover, N.H., and his friend, Cary Girod of Cambridge, Mass. Stonebraker and Girod ran their qualifying heat in 51.26 seconds.

In the final race, Stonebraker and Girod pulled ahead on the gradual incline which starts the course. However, a fall in the water pit allowed Fahnestock and Silverberg to pass and finish in 56.74 seconds, while Stonebraker and Girod crossed the finish line in 57.5 seconds.

Stonebraker and Girod, who were running the race for the first time, received four cases of beer and one case of peanut butter cups. They said they attended graduate school at the University of New Hampshire with the winning team.

“The funny thing is we all came up in the same car,” Stonebraker said.

“They deserved the win,” Girod said. “They had the hotly contested second last year.”

Matt and Sarah Martin of Poland, who have been married for three years, were running the race for the first time. Matt said they won a wife-carrying contest at the End of Summer Hoorah held in Farmington.

“That wasn’t much competition, though,” Matt Martin said. “There was only one other couple.”

According to the Sunday River Web site, the competition is derived from 19th century Finland, where Rankainen the Robber tested men for his band by having them complete a grueling course with heavy sacks on their backs. Stealing women from nearby villages was also not unheard of.

Jaime Knudsen and Tom Devine, a couple from Boston, Mass., had perhaps the closest ties to the olden days. Knudsen said they were competing for the first time after her Finnish best friend told her about the world competition. Devine said his training for the event included running with 50 pounds of concrete in a backpack.

Alex Asen, of Larchmont, N.Y., and Yael Klein, of Efrat, Israel, returned for a second year. The couple have been dating for three years.

“We trained a lot more last year,” Klein said. “This year, we procrastinated a lot until this morning.”

Cathy and Peter Kovago, of Boylston, Mass., who have been married for 18 years, said they entered the race for fun and planned to run it without any training or strategy.

“Are you kidding?” Cathy said with a laugh. “All he wants to do is drop me in the mud.”