I just wanted to thank all of the Disney Deads, and especially Holly, for
making my WDW half-marathon experience especially wonderful! My friend
Julia and I really enjoyed meeting all of you at the Friday evening
get-together and the Alternative Pasta Dinner, and we will wear our
Disney Dead singlets with pride!
This was going to be a slow one for me because of a lack of training. It
turned out to be a PW in terms of time but a PB in terms of fun. My
friend Julia, on the other hand, was on a PR pace until she entered the
Magic Kingdom, where she wisely decided to have her picture taken with
each and every character she met. The temperatures on race day were just
about perfect for this northern bird. I was appropriately chilly before
the start, wearing shorts, short-sleeve Cool-Max T, long-sleeved cotton
throw-away, gloves and a plastic poncho. And my pink Penguin hat, which
worked well in the last corral of the Red start. All the pink hats sort
of coalesced into one large group as we waited. The music, the Sorcerer
Mickey on the cherry-picker, and the fireworks on the bridge were a nice
way to start. It took over 7 minutes to cross the Start line. It was
clear that I would not be last in this race, as I continuously passed
runners and walkers; this continued throughout the course. I shed the
poncho at 2 miles and the long-sleeved shirt at 4 miles, and was able to
stay comfortable by taking off or putting on the gloves. The porta-potty
line at 2 miles was too long, but shortly thereafter I found a nice set
of utility boxes to hide behind. At 3 miles, however, we went through
Epcot where there were real perma-potties with apparently no waiting
lines. It was still dark at this point, and we ran over lights in the
pavement and through some beautiful lighted archways, then back to the
highway. The Blue course had an even nicer run through the World
Showcase. Back out on the roadway, at around mile 6, the course took a
loop over and then under an overpass, and we were able to cheer the other
stream of runners at both passings. The cheering was quite impressive
until I realized that it had been augmented by "canned" cheering from
loudspeakers set up at that intersection. But it was still energizing.
I maintained a 12:30-13:00 pace until 7 miles, when I had to stop to take
care of a big toe blister. A little patch of Compeed and I had no
further foot problems. Mile 9 was in the Transportation Center, where
there were crowds of spectators and a lot of enthusiastic Disney staff.
Also real restrooms! Another highway stretch, and then at mile 10 we
entered the Magic Kingdom, first running through some back lots where
Disney staff handed out bags of character cookies. We then had a
wonderful foot tour of the Magic Kingdom, running down Main Street, then
to Tomorrowland, around and through Cinderella's Castle and out through
Frontierland. All along this segment, there were costumed Disney
characters waving and dancing, each accompanied by an obliging Disney
staffer who would take your camera, take a picture of you with the
character, and then hand the camera back as you ran on to the next
character. At this point, no one was racing anymore - running was simply
how you got from one point of interest to the next. Runners were dancing
with the characters, taking pictures of the scenery, and generally having
fun. Leaving the park, there were inflated balloon characters from Peter
Pan along the road with music from the movie. When I went through, the
song was something about "unfortunate people" or something like that,
that I thought must have been aimed at the full marathoners. The final
stretch of highway was just a slog, partly running and partly walking,
but still making about 14 mpm and passing lots of people. Most of the
runners around me were TNT, Team Diabetes or other charity group runners,
and they would get big cheers from their supporters. A lot of the
charity supporters also cheered on the other runners as well, which was
nice, as they were the only spectators for long stretches on the highway.
Finally the 13 mile marker was in sight, and I mustered up the energy to
run to the turn in to the finish. The last 0.1M was lined by bleachers
with spectators who did a great job of cheering in the finishers, and I
ran through the finish line really feeling great. My chip time was
3:09:42, over 9 minutes slower than my previous PW, but good enough for
132nd out of 201 in my AG. After picking up a generous supply of edibles
and drinkables, I walked back to the Polynesian to meet up with Julia.
After showering and changing, Julia and I went to the marathon finish
area at Epcot, but of course couldn't get near the finish area, so we
went into Epcot and sat on benches at England, where the marathoners were
entering the Park. These were now the 6.5 to 7 hour finishers, who still
had another mile to go. Most were walking, but most seemed to still be
able to smile and sometimes wave as we cheered them on. A few were
really struggling in what was becoming a warm day, probably about 65-70
degrees at that point. But they were going to finish, and I am always in
awe of those who can make it through 26.2 miles. Although Disney
technically has a 7 hour limit, friends who stayed at that site reported
that the gate did not close until around 1:30 PM, which with over a mile
left made for probably an almost 8 hour time for the last marathon
finisher. There was a cut-off at the half-marathon point, and those who
were too slow at that point were directed to the half-marathon finish and
were given half-marathon medals.
We didn't make it to the Post-Race Bragathon because at that time, Julia
and I were hunkered over a couple of 20 oz. steaks at the restaurant in
Canada. I hope that you all had great runs, time-wise and/or fun-wise,
at Disney. Julia and I plan to be back in a couple of years to get
Mickeys to go with our Donalds, and we hope to see some of you at the
DRSWC in Albuquerque in May.
Harriet, the Kangaroo
Hartsdale, New York
