Boston Athletic Association officials and three out of four Boston Marathon champions gathered in the Fairmont Copley Plaza Tuesday morning to reflect on the momentous 2014 Boston Marathon and the effect it had not just on Boston or the running world, but all corners of the globe. Tatyana McFadden, Rita Jeptoo and Meb Keflezighi – all sore and in the process of nursing their bodies – reaffirmed the significance of this year’s race in the wake of last year’s tragedy.

The only person missing was men’s rim push wheelchair victor, ten-time Boston Marathon champion Ernst Van Dyk, who was already on his way back to his native South Africa.

Dave McGillvary, race director of the B.A.A. Boston Marathon, spoke first about this year’s course logistics and the overwhelming support race organizers received from volunteers and the general public. Security measures were abided by the roughly 1 million spectators without question, and every single one of them contributed to an astounding 99 percent finish rate by more than 36,000 Marathon participants.

“As far as the statics, just two come to mind,” noted McGillvary. “One is the finishing percentage. If you add on the few hundred that finished after we shut the clock down there’s 32,144 which is a 99 percent finishing rate. Ninety nine percent of the people who toed the line in Hopkinton crossed the finish line in Boston… Around the world over 900,000 athlete alerts went out.”

Due to heightened security, the B.A.A. prohibited unofficial runners from tacking on at the tail end of the race. Only those who were properly registered and accredited were allowed to pound the pavement for 26.2-miles and all spectators were barred from entering the course. Exemplifying just how much people respected the rule changes this year, and taking into account the massive field, only 15 unofficial runners showed up at the Hopkinton start line.

As one might expect, it was a bittersweet day for everyone, including the champs, who typically compete with steadfast determination allowing no room for distractions. Women’s rim push wheelchair winner Tatyana McFadden, who boasts three 2012 London Paralympic Games gold medals, is still trying to wrap her head around every facet of yesterday’s annual event.

“Today I woke up and I just thought ‘Wow, what a day it was yesterday’ and I just reflected on the whole morning, just the whole weekend,” said McFadden. “The weekend started out right when I met the Richard family… The last words that the family said were ‘Please run for Martin and the community’ and I said I promise that I will.”

Eight-year old Martin Richard was standing on Boylston Street last year and was tragically caught in the line of fire of one of the two pressure cooker bombs that combusted.

On Monday, McFadden posted a time of 1:35:06.

The men’s champion and international running icon Meb Keflezighi (2:08:37) became the first American to win the Boston Marathon since 1983. Chants of “U-S-A!” helped propel him through Boston – and helped him refrain from keeling and vomiting around mile 24.

Like McFadden, Keflezighi recognized the weight of this year’s race given the devastation subjected to us all last year. Inspired by the crowd, which was in turn inspired by the tremendous strides Boston made in its healing process since April 15, 2013, Keflezighi acknowledged that “the crowd was phenomenal… I used them to drive me to the next level.”

Rita Jeptoo set a new course record, taking the women’s running division with a time of 2:18:57. Awarded one of those absurdly large commemorative checks, her well-deserved $150,000 purse was crossed out in favor of $175,000 to accommodate her bonus for setting the record. Surely exhausted, Jeptoo managed to rouse the ranks of Boston’s media and elicit applause for uttering, simply yet significantly, “I just want to say, I love Boston. Thank you all.”

Speculating on the 2015 Boston Marathon, McGillvary posited that “Next year, at least we don’t have to recover, we don’t necessarily have to heal, we don’t necessarily have to process. We can get right at it. We can get right at what 2015 can be.”