;
Apr18

Wrightsville Beach Marathon – My 2017 Race Recap

post featured image
The following content may contain affiliate links. When you click and shop the links, we receive a commission.

I’m finally ready to share my Wrightsville Beach Marathon race recap! This is taken me almost a month to get too – oops! After the race, I started focusing on wedding planning to pick a date and a venue and time has flown by. This post was getting super long (ahem, it is still long) so I’m sharing a race recap here and I’ll do a separate post on how I fueled leading up to, during and after the the race since many of you have asked about that. Sounds like a plan? Sweet.

Race highlights:

  • Chip time: 3:28:50
  • Gun time: 3:29:36
  • Age group finish: 2nd
  • Female finish: 15th female
  • Overall finish: 82nd
  • Qualified for Boston! And yes, I am planning on running it next year! (Huge congrats to all those who ran it yesterday, including my bestie Anna!)

wrightsville beach marathon review

The day before the race was actually super stressful. I had taken the whole day off work so it wouldn’t be stressful but we still ended up feeling rushed and hectic. An outline of how the day went is below. I was nervous that I had spent too much time on my feet and was mentally drained, and ideally before a marathon, you should try to relax and stay off your feet. But I reminded myself that I couldn’t do anything about it and I got an extra 3 hours sitting in the car that I normally don’t get!

The Day Before Race Day

  • 7:30 am – sleep in. Thankfully I slept SO well this night!
  • 8 am – eat 1 piece toast + pb
  • 8:30 – leave to take Maizey to the kennel (it’s a 30 minute drive from where I live)
  • 9 am – Drop Maizey at the kennel

riverside kennel advance nc

  • 9:30 am – drive back to Winston for my shakeout run (2.7 miles, 8:30 pace)

shakeout run before a marathon

  • 10:15 am – get home, shower, pack, load the car. (It takes forever to load the car since I live on a high floor of an apartment building and the elevators are soooo slow.)
  • 12:15 – lunch at Mooney’s with Tommy
  • 1 pm – Hit the road and leave Winston! This wasn’t super relaxing since Tommy had work calls almost the entire time we were driving, poor guy!
  • 4 pm – arrive in Wilmington, unload the car
  • 5 pm – drive to race expo for packet pickup (20 minutes from where we were staying)

wrightsville beach marathon packet pickup

  • 5:45 pm – leave expo & drive to race start to know where we’d be headed in the morning
  • 6:15 pm – drive back to our VRBO from race start and stop at grocery store #1
  • 7 pm – Tommy drops me off at the VRBO to start dinner and heads to grocery #2 (the first one, a tiny market, didn’t have what we needed)
  • 7:45 – Tommy gets back but can’t find parking. He had to drive around for 20 minutes to find a spot!
  • 8:15 – eat dinner, clean up, get ready for bed!
  • 10 pm – attempt to go to sleep. Listen to the bar next door play music until about 2 am. UGH.

Race day

  • 4:55 – alarm goes off. Oof. I slept about 2 hours.
  • 5 am – get up, drink a glass of water + make coffee, drink 1 cup coffee
  • 5:10 – get in the shower (I always take a hot shower before races…it’s probably more mental than anything but I feel like it helps warm my muscles up! I usually stretch my calves and quads in the shower too.)
  • 5:15 – get dressed!
  • 5:30 – attempt to eat. I had no appetite since it was so early and I hadn’t slept. But, I choked down some toast, PB and a banana and drank another cup of coffee.
  • 5:45 – leave for race, taking a bottle of Tailwind with me to drink in the car.
  • 6:00 – hit a traffic back-up since a lane is closed (unrelated to the race that we didn’t know about)
  • 6:15 – get to race start, start to freak out that we can’t find parking, finally find a spot, and hustle to porty potty line (at the other side of the park from where our car was)
  • 6:28 – finally get into a porta potty
  • 6:29 – Hand my hoodie to Tommy, give him a kiss, duck between the fence openings into the corral
  • 6:40am – RACE STARTS! It was a little nuts how it all happened at the start line (hence no pictures before the race!) but hey, at least I didn’t have time to get too nervous!

During the Race

  • I started with the 3:35 finish pace group to help me rein in my pace and avoid going out too fast, but ended up leaving them around mile 4.
  • My pacing was pretty consistent throughout the race – every mile was between 7:45 – 8:05 until mile 25 and then OOF things got hard.
  • I got to see Tommy at mile 11, 14 and 15 and knowing that I would see him 3x was a HUGE help. I was teary the first time I saw him since the mile before I had been reflecting on how blessed I was to be running the race in good health, for beautiful weather and that we’d recently gotten engaged. Life just felt so good. He later told me he teared up when he saw me too. 🙂
  • Near mile 20 (I think?) the course starting winding through a neighborhood and then went into another neighborhood that was under construction — it was awful. Tons of winding and turns and no water. It was brutal. I hadn’t seen anyone walking in the race up until now and I started seeing LOTS of people walking.
  • I felt really really good the whole time – i.e. running a very comfortable pace — until about mile 23, and then I felt horrible pretty quickly. ha!
  • Mile 24 and mile 25 were 8:19 and 8:15 minute miles, and it took everything I had not to walk or slow even more.

Race Finish

  • As I turned onto the final stretch leading up to the finish (about a quarter mile stretch), I saw some people from our local Fleet Feet and they cheered me on, which helped a lot. And a little later, another woman whom I didn’t know started cheering for me and yelled, “Pink girl, you can break 3:30. GO!” I picked it up a little! (Or at least I tried!)

wrightsville beach marathon results

  • I saw Tommy about 20 feet before I approached the finish line and he was all I could see. It was like tunnel vision. I’m tearing up even thinking about it as I type this – I was so overwhelmed with gratitude to have him at the finish line and to have him in my life!
  • I purchased some of the professional race photos…and they really accurately sum up how I felt at the finish. I was so overwhelmed with emotion and gratitude and SO glad to be done.

Tommy was SO excited when I finished since he knew I qualified for Boston. I told him that I needed to run 3:30 to qualify safely (3:35 is the technical qualifying time but having a buffer helps improve your chances that you’ll actually get in). It hadn’t even registered with me that I qualified until he said it – I was just so focused on wanting to break 3:30 that I’d totally  forgotten about the Boston aspect!

wrightsville beach marathon review

Post-Race

  • Holy moly, at first I thought I would never be able to walk normally again. My legs were dead! We went into the finish area for some water and orange slices, and I ate an RX bar that Tommy had in my finish line bag I’d packed.
  • We found a quiet spot where I could call my mom and sat on the bench together for a bit, before heading back over to the finish line for awards. Tommy was pretty certain I had placed in the top 10 for females which meant I had a shot at an age-group award. I WAS SHOCKED that I placed in my age group and also so excited!

wrightsville beach marathon results

How I felt about the race

Overall, I was SO happy with how it went. The weather was perfect, I enjoyed the race, and I was really happy with my time. I feel like I have a faster marathon in me, but considering this was my first marathon in 7.5 years and I had a relatively short training period, I was thrilled with my results!

One thing that was interesting is that I never got sore from the race. I was tired for a couple days and had some hamstrings cramps that afternoon of the race, but other than that, I honestly felt fine. I felt like I could have fun the next day. And I did Crossfit a week after the race and was 10x more sore from that! We walked around Wilmington for a couple hours after the race and I fueled well leading up to, during and after the race and I think all that really helped with recovery.

Here are my splits, if you’re interested!

wrightsville beach elevation chart

Oy, okay! That’s it for now. Thank you all so much for your support during my training and when I posted my results on Instagram on race day. It was so fun to read all your comments!! It truly meant a lot to me.

 

Shop the Post

 

terilyn signatureterilyn signature

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

    20 responses to “Wrightsville Beach Marathon – My 2017 Race Recap”

    1. Agh! Totally teared up reading your finish. How AMAZING?! Andddd, your race pictures are beautiful. I wish mine looked like that. Congrats lady!! You killed it.

    2. Seeing the joy on your face at the finish line makes me tear up! You worked so hard and rocked it! Congrats on qualifying for Boston. Can’t wait to watch you slay it 🙂

    3. Wow, so impressive, Teri! And I can’t believe you weren’t sore. I usually feel like a tin man the day after a marathon. 🙂 I’m sure crossfit helped you in that realm with all the beating the legs can take in a short workout. And of course, all the years of running you’ve put in! Awesome job!

    4. congrats on BQ! amazing time! you’re so strong! Love the pic too. You look so happy and grateful.

      I’m training for my first marathon on June 3. Could you share your fueling strategy? before, during and after the race? it seems that worked well for you.

    5. Congrats on a great race and BQ’ing! Do you listen to music when running/racing? If so, what earbuds do you have? I’m in the market for anew pair and debating wireless. I need the kind that wrap around my ears otherwise they’re always popping out…

    6. This made me tear up just reading it. Congrats on a great race & BQ!!! SO exciting!

    7. Wow! You are amazing! Thanks for sharing your race experience. I completed my first (and last) marathon in March in 5 hours so your timeand are so impressive to me! I could only dream of a BQ. CONGRATS!

    8. Thoughts:

      1. That really is a flat course!
      2. Your cadence is spot on.
      3. I don’t know how you weren’t sore. I literally hobble around for a good 4-5 days.
      4. If you didn’t really feel that terrible until mile 25, that’s amazing!!
      5. I always take a shower before I race too.

    9. congrats on the race. looks like a flat course to BQ! Maybe i’ll have to come down to boston to cheer you on next year.

    10. I’ve been so excited about this post! You rock! This is incredible and I’m super pumped you are planning to run Boston! Please do more posts about the marathon (fueling, more thoughts on training?, etc.). This post wasn’t long enough! Also maybe a post on getting good races pictures!? Mine are always awful! Haha Tommy and you are so sweet!

    11. Awesome job and such a fun post to read!! You are so inspiring!!! Well done!!!!! I look forward to your fueling post…I def need help in that department lol 🙂

    12. Great recap! Congrats again on the BQ! You did awesome! I’m crossing my fingers that my 3:33 from September gets me in for 2018 (it didn’t for 2017) because the thought of having to train that hard again and run faster makes me want to cry! Haha ? I’d love a breakdown of your fueling and any other nutrtion tips that helped you! Always learning and trying to find what works best!

    13. I love that you can see your cadence as well as your pace. Is that something you can see on your Garmin? Can you see cadence in real time while you are running? Or just after?

    14. Those photos from the end of your race are amazing. The pride and joy is evident, and I totally get why you bought them! Congrats on qualifying for Boston. I figure if I keep running until I’m 85, I might actually have a chance of qualifying (not joking).

    Leave a Reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

    This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.