Yes, we finally came home after a splendid vacation in Florida. We came
home yesterday morning but I needed to recover from the horrible jet lag
before I could write this race report.
Short version : Finishing in 3 Hr 37 minutes, ranking 470th overall
Long version ( and it is long, sorry about that)
I went to the Friday morning run to meet Kris Kozuch and some of our
Disney Deads Friends. It was a very good idea actually and I enjoyed a
short morning session, just 30 minutes of easy running. In the afternoon
we went to the Expo to get ur stuff. I also bought "The Stick" there
since I still had problems with my inflammation in my right leg. Friday
evening we went to the Evening Encounter at Dixie Landings and we had a
great time to see everybody again. The McDonough Family really did a
great job to host this encounter.
Saturday morning Isabelle, my wife, ran the 5K Fun run. While she was
running I was waiting and met the McDonough's, Farol, Jerry, Bob Larson,
Dave Lawrence and the Coogan's. It was great to see them all. Andy has
become a good friend of our family actually and it is always fun to see
him again. It was nice to see his family, his daughter is such a cute
little girl.
Saturday evening Jogn Biggenwald took us to the APD, thanks again John !
The food was as usual very good. I saw Jackson and Craig there with the
T-shirts and stuff. They look very well this time, again.
Race day :
I got up around 3 AM, Kurt had been sleeping very well and I was very
happy with that. I took a shower to wake up and got dressed, at 3.45 Hr
we went out to the bus. We also took Kurt with us, he could sleep in his
stroller. Once at the Epcot parking lot we saw Kris Kozuch again. She is
just a great person. It was good to see somebody I knew to talk to and
pass the time. At this moment I was a little nervous since I had so many
problems during my training. The Stick I bought was really good actually
and the pain in my leg was almost gone. We went together to the start
and we ran into Bob CHAPMAN. It was good to see him again so we all
stayed together until Kris had to go for the Half Marathon Start and we
had to go for the full. I was in the A Corral and moved to the front,
was this a wrong decision, yes it was. Once at 6 Am, we were gone and I
was somewhere at the 3 row I think, going out way to fast. I don't have
all my times but I know I came at the 10 mile point in 1 Hr 09 minutes.
I managed to get to Magic Kingdom without any problems, Isabelle and
Kurt were there to cheer me on. It was great to see them on Main Street.
After this park I started feeling sore, not sure what happened but I
think I burned out after the fast start. After the resorts we had to
turn right to go to the Animal Kingdom part of the race. There was a
water stop and I decided to grab some powerAde and walk for a while. I
had a hard time getting myself to running again and by the time we left
Animal Kingdom I was feeling pretty bad. I knew the worst part still had
to come, going from Animal Kingdom to Wide World of Sports. I managed to
get through this part of the race by running and walking. I had cramps
in my legs and calfs, really bad actually and had to stretch several
times. The ramp to MGM was a killer for me, I walked a part of it and
started to run again. At MGM I was running again, but really at a low
pace. It was hurting so much. Once I came back to Epcot the wind was
blowing very hard and it started raining, really bad. I was so glad I
was close to the finish line. I was soaked by the time I came close to
Spaceship Earth again. I was so happy to see the finsih line. Isabelle
was there again to cheer me on. I saw 3Hr 37 minutes on the clock when I
passed. That is only 6 minutes slower than last year. I knew I couldn't
go for a PR this time due to the problems I had. I wasn't able to run
for several weeks etc... but I did it and I was really happy with that.
It was funny because I was feeling so much pain I didn't feel the pain
of the inflammation. When I came back to the Family meeting point I was
feeling happy and emotional. We went straight back to the hotel to get a
shower. I was feeling so cold I stayed in bed for one hour. After this
we went to Magic Kingdom to see the parade. We even saw Tom and Colleen
LAUX there. I was happy to see them since they didn't come to the
meetings. We talked for a while before the parade started. We went to
the bragathon for just one hour because we wanted to see the Osborne
Lights in MGM and it was the last day. We said goodbye to all our
friends there and we took off. After a few days in Disney we left for
the East Coast. We stayed there until Friday the 18th. We had a great
time, we saw dolphins, a little shark, we went boating etc... We went
over to Bob and Jan CHAPMAN to have diner together. Whil we were there
we saw a rocket launch, etc.. so many things to talk about. We even went
swimming in the ocean while people from Florida thought is was freezing.
We had a great time. Thanks to you guys, you are great.
We are sad because we won't be able to come to Florida next January. We
have bought a house and a lot of our money will go to this project. But
I will stay on this list, I enjoyed it so much and I made a lot of new
friends, friends who helped me with this project, called Marathon
running. I will go on, running a few marathons this year I hope. I will
first get some rest, make sure the inflammation is gone completely
before I start over again.
Thanks for everything, I have been rading a lot of race reports and you
are the best, congratulations with the results, good job to the newbies.
I told you, you could do it. Be proud of what you have done and share
these moment with everybody. Thanks to Holly also for keeping the site
up to date, it was sad she wasn't there with us. We hope to see you
again there one day.
Greetings from Belgium and keep the messages coming.
Bart, Isabelle and Kurt
