Mark Pruden's Staging Area

I think this will turn out to be one of my favorites.

The race was well managed from registration through finish, and the race director was thoroughly communicative and responsive. The directions on the course were clear, and the volunteers friendly and accommodating. The race is also spectator-friendly — very easy to navigate.

Scenery was beautiful — I thoroughly enjoyed running through and beneath the live oak trees with the Spanish moss hanging from them, as well as the ocean views.

The pre-race meal, while just a bit pricey, was the best I’ve ever had. And the finisher’s medal is very nice — a surprise from a smaller marathon!

I highly recommend this race!

I want to be fair …

So, first, the good parts: Law enforcement officers were cordial, friendly, and professional. Most of the volunteers were friendly and very helpful. Most of the first half of the race was beautiful — it was really nice to run in the woods. The medal is very attractive! And, you get to run on parts of the Hugh S. Branyon Backcountry Trail, named by USA Today as the best recreational trail in the country for 2023.

Then, the other parts: The race name is for the locale, not the view! If you want to see the beach and the gulf, rent a motel room on the beach front, or go down the coast and run the Mississippi Gulf Coast Marathon in December. The only time you see the Gulf and the beach on this marathon course is at the very start, and during the final 1/4 mile of the course.

Navigating the course became a huge problem. At the water stop before Mile 4, there was a sharp left turn in the course but, unfortunately, the darlin’s manning the water stop were dancing around in front of the turn arrows, blocking the arrows from our view; therefore, at least five of us (maybe more, I don’t know) missed the turn and ran straight ahead to the next arrow we could see (it was actually a further-along part of the course). Nobody at the water stop stopped us or redirected us — they just let us go on the wrong way! A mile down the path, a woman angel on a bicycle who must have realized what had happened caught up with at least three groups of us and told us we’d missed the turn. We had to turn around and go back, adding an extra two miles to our course, and turning it into an inadvertent Ultra. Then later, in Mile 24, on the boardwalk over the wetlands, there was a very confusing junction — we knew we had to go over a wooden pedestrian bridge, of which we knew there were two. Was this the one, or was our bridge further along? There had been a cardboard directional sign — we could see that the wind had blown it down into the wetlands, face down. Three of us spent four or five minutes standing there scratching our heads trying to figure it out, until finally a person came along who happened to be carrying a map. We studied it, took our best guess, and the guess turned out to be correct.

And, the race is not spectator friendly for anyone unfamiliar with the area. We managed to find a map that indicated spectator zones, but the map didn’t indicate how to get to most of them, nor where the course actually was even if one could get there. My wife (my cheering section) could only find the actual course trail twice out of multiple attempts.

At the post-race party, I handed the bartender my beer ticket, asking him for “something malty.” He dug into his cooler, pulled out the beer, opened it and handed it to me — an IPA. Oh well, I’d finished the course and got the medal (again, a very attractive one).

I can’t say enough positive things about this marathon; indeed, the whole weekend in Elizabeth City. From the website, the communications, the expo, the organization, the Friday night Chief Warrant Officers Association Spaghetti Dinner, the C-130 and helicopter flyover, the race itself, the course, the best-ever medal, the post-race party, the Coast Guard rescue demonstration, the Whole Hog Roast/Shrimp/Catfish Fry at Seven Sounds Brewing, and perhaps most of all the friendliness of the staff, volunteers, police officers, deputy sheriffs, restaurants, and townspeople, the entire area rolled out the red carpet for the runners. Thoroughly enjoyed!