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CAPE FEAR MEMORIAL BRIDGE CLOSURE: UPDATES, RESOURCES, AND CONTEXT

Participants Honored Before Wilmington Triathlon

More than 1,800 athletes will be competing in the PPD Beach2Battleship Triathlon in Wilmington tomorrow. WHQR’s Michelle Bliss reports that the event includes a 2.4 mile swim, a 112-mile bike ride, and a 26.2 mile run across the Cape Fear Region. 

Among the athletes, PPD chose a handful of competitors to present with “Hero Awards” this week. Recipient Kristen Adelman from Colorado is a four-time non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma survivor. She’s on a mission to let other cancer victims know that PPD’s clinical trials saved her life.

“It wasn’t until I had no other options that this came into my experience. I never even knew what a clinical trial was; I didn’t know anything about cancer or anything of course, until I was the midst of it. And then, once I learned about clinical trials, and especially after my life was saved, it became that much more important to get that message out there.”

Adelman says that clinical trials were a last resort when her insurance company wouldn’t pay for the life-saving operation she needed.

The triathlon will wind through New Hanover, Pender, Sampson, and Bladen Counties, with the finish line at the USS North Carolina Battleship memorial.

Adelman will be competing in the Half Iron Man Distance race. Event proceeds go to the Wilmington YMCA.

PPD is a WHQR supporter and one of its employees serves on WHQR’s board. Beach-to-Battleship event organizers say that delays are likely tomorrow morning at the intersection of Highway 17 and Porter’s Neck Road. There will also be delays all day long on the Isabel Holmes Bridge.

  

After growing up in Woodbridge, Virginia, Michelle attended Virginia Tech before moving to Wilmington to complete her Master in Fine Arts from the University of North Carolina in Wilmington. Her reporting and nonfiction writing have been featured on NPR’s All Things Considered, within the pages of Wrightsville Beach Magazine, and in literary journals like River Teeth and Ninth Letter. Before moving to Wilmington, Michelle served as the general manager for WUVT, a community radio station in Blacksburg, Virginia. She lives with her husband Scott and their pups, Katie, Cooper, and Mosey.