Fracture in viscoelastic materials of Maxwell type, with a short term elastic and long term viscous response, raises challenges as the material response depends on the deformation history. Assuming the crack driving energy to be only elastic, crack evolution thus depends on the deformation history. To quantify this effect, spin-up simulations are conducted, where the Maxwell material is modeled over a certain time period to generate a well developed initial field for the phase field simulation. This contribution is motivated by the scientific challenge of modeling calving, the break off of icebergs from the lateral margin of ice sheets, glaciers and ice shelves. Calving can have a strong influence on glacier dynamics and ice sheet stability but at the same time it is a poorly understood process as it occurs on different time and size scales. Furthermore, the failure occurs due to different fracture mechanisms depending on the location within the ice. This study aims to model fracture by means of the phase field method in the vicinity of the calving front, the lateral margin of an ice shelf, where the ice is partially grounded due to an ice rise. Besides the viscoelastic nature of glacier ice, the ice rheology is governed by Glen’s flow law, which describes the stress dependency of the viscosity. To describe the mechanical response correctly for longer simulation times, finite strain theory is exploited. Spin-up simulations are conducted on a three-dimensional modeling domain, taken from satellite imagery of the 79°N glacier in Greenland. The influence of spin-up duration, nonlinear viscosity due to Glen’s flow law and different compression-tension splits in the phase field method are analyzed and highlights the ability of the phase field method to model complex fracture processes emerging in nature.