Richmond Marathon 2025 Race Recap

After 16 weeks of training, the Richmond Marathon has now come and gone. I went into this training cycle unsure of how it would go. My husband and I were both training for this race and have been busier than ever. But we managed to make it happen and both completed 26.2 miles on November 15th!

Richmond Marathon 2025 Race Recap

Race Goals

I worked with Laura as my coach again for this race and we started out the training cycle trying 8:40-8:50 as my goal marathon pace. Most of my MP miles ended up being slightly faster than that, in the 8:30s. A few weeks before the race Laura suggested I aim for the mid 8:30s as my race pace. While that sounded a bit daunting, I knew my training showed I could do it.

I wanted to ease into the race and finish strong, rather than go out too fast and hit the wall. I was willing to sacrifice a few minutes for this strategy because I have learned from past experiences how defeating it is to crash and burn by mile 20.

Race Week

After a good 10 mile long run the Saturday before the race, the taper crazies started to hit hard. I slept horribly Sunday night (and a few others) due to feeling anxious. Then the rest of the week my daughter was up almost every night. My runs all week felt hard. I was out of breath just walking across the room. Was I getting sick? There were no other signs of illness, so I chalked it up to the taper and poor sleep.

Richmond Marathon Race Weekend

I was feeling a little better on Friday which gave me some optimism. I worked in the morning and left for Richmond around 12. There was alot of traffic and I didn’t get in until around 4:30. Rob was already there because he took the train from work on Thursday night.

We headed out for an early dinner which would top off my carb load. (Starting Wednesday I hit my goal of 480 g of carbs per day). We got back to the room, got organized for the race, and headed to bed early. This was my first night ever being away from my kids (they stayed with my parents). It was weird to not have a monitor next to bed with sound machines playing all night!

Race Morning

I slept fairly well and woke up at 5 am feeling pretty refreshed. I ate some food, got ready, and we headed to the start line around 6:25.

Our hotel was the Commonwealth which was just a few blocks from the starting area.

After finding the marathon start I wanted to use the bathroom one more time. The portopotty lines were long and disorganized, but I managed to get through the line with about 4 minutes to spare. However. I couldn’t get to the correct corral so I ended up starting back around the 4 hour corral. I figured since I planned to start out slow this shouldn’t be a huge deal. I didn’t get to warm up (although I did in the room, but that was like 40 minutes before the race started).

Richmond Marathon Miles 1-5

Laura had suggested breaking the race into 5 mile chunks, so that is how I will write this recap. During the first mile, my legs felt like they didn’t know what they were doing. I was able to just enjoy the race energy and all the spectators and told myself that I’d feel better once I warmed up more.

While I didn’t care much about my pace for the first mile, I did hope to get to around 8:50 by mile 2. As I increased my pace slightly I was worried that if felt harder than it should. I just reminded myself that this was a long race with plenty of time to get to goal pace.

This section had a few rolling hills and a very gradual incline throughout, so maybe I was feeling that. I also passed Rob around mile 3 so we took a quick picture.

9:18, 8:57, 8:50, 9:04, 8:54

Richmond Marathon Miles 6-10

There were some hills early in this section (a couple steeper rolling hills followed be a nice long downhill) and then it evened out for a bit. We got onto a trail along the river which was a great place to run. Unfortunately I managed to get boxed in behind the 4 hour pace group. The trail was more narrow than the road had been and there was no way to get around them. I think I was stuck for about a mile feeling like I could easily be going faster.

Once I passed them and we got off the trail there was a steep uphill. This knocked the wind out of me. How was I SO out of breath from one hill at mile 10? I ran so many hills during my training cycle that I should have been prepared for this.

This was also a fun section because they had a table offering bacon and another sign for “alien abductions to the finish” (or something like that).

8:56, 8:39, 8:53, 9:04, 9:05

Richmond Marathon Miles 11-15

This is where the doubts really started to creep in. I was still behind goal pace and my average pace was around 9 mins/mile. There were a couple more hills at miles 11/12 that felt so hard. I kept questioning what was going on with my breathing. Just like throughout the week, I was getting winded so easily.

At the halfway point I passed a timing mat which sent a notification to my phone that my official time at the half was 1:58. I told myself ok, stay on this pace for a 3:56 which would be faster than last year’s marathon time of 3:59. I really hoped I would feel better after some of the hills and be able to run a faster second half, but I knew alot could happen over 13 more miles.

8:54, 9:17, 8:59, 8:53, 8:49

Richmond Marathon Miles 16-20

This was where I just started focusing on one mile at a time and running the pace that I could during each mile. I had to shift to running by effort because my body would just not run the planned paces. I started to feel my right piriformis getting tight. This happens in almost every race. I tried to focus on good form, high cadence so I wasn’t overstriding and focusing on the crowds. It was manageable and I just hoped it wouldn’t get worse.

Miles 16-18 were a gradual uphill before it evened out. I just kept focusing on getting to mile 20.

9:18, 9:10, 9:15, 9:01, 9:07

Richmond Marathon Miles 21-25

I managed to get to this section without hitting the wall. My paces were still not where I wanted them but they weren’t much slower than early on.

Unfortunately that tight piriformis was getting worse. It was making my right leg feel harder to control. Running slower wasn’t going to help so it was all mental at this point, using every mental strategy I’d worked on in training and leading up to the race. As much as I tried to run faster my leg would just not allow it. Mentally, I was feeling better knowing that I was in the final miles and could finish faster than last year if I held on.

9:11, 9:09, 9:18, 9:11, 9:14

Richmond Marathon Mile 26

There was crowd support throughout the whole race, but it was really amazing during the last mile. The cheers carried me through and I was able to pick up the pace a bit. There is a fairly steep downhill to the finish, which was nice, but also surprising with just how steep it was. I pushed hard down that hill until I crossed the finish line.

8:44, 7:43 to the finish

Official Results: 3:57:51

Post Race

The finishing area was so crowded. I wanted to try to watch Rob finish but there was no way to get back to the finish line without being in the way of other runners finishing. So I made my way to the celebration area which took a while to get through. I got my finisher’s blanket and hat and then got a beer, which tasted so good.

Once Rob finished we met up but had to started heading back to the hotel because it was 11:35 and checkout was at 12. We got back at 11:50, took the fastest showers ever, threw our stuff in a bag and got out the door by 12:15.

Race Reflections

Surprisingly, I have felt really good about this race even though I was so far off from my goal. I think it’s because I know that I truly gave everything I had and made appropriate adjustments that allowed me to finish strong.

I’ve also focused on the progress over the last couple of years. My PR is 3:41 from 2015. My next marathon wasn’t until 2021 and I ran a 4:09, and then last year a 3:59. So I am slowly making progress and I am 10 years older than I was when I ran my PR, now with 2 kids and a much different life.

I would love to figure out how to get my piriformis to not act up during all my races. I’ve been working with my current PT for over a year and we just aren’t sure what the reason is for this since it is manageable during training.

I was less sore after this marathon than most, maybe because I ran slower than what I was trained for. I also think my fueling helped. I’m taking at least 1 full week off from running, maybe 2, before doing some easy runs for a few weeks.

Not sure what’s next, but I am already itching for a redemption race. While I am happy with this outcome, I know I can run faster on the right day.

Have you ever just felt “off” on race day or leading up to a race?

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