Hey guys, I just made it back home after a really wild and bumpy flight
home. Now I can be very short on this one, how to see 6 WDW themeparks
and several resorts in 1 day? Well, just run the WDW Marathon and
afterwards go with Stan and Sheila to the Bragathon. You never know
where you are going to end up. I'm just kidding. I had a great time with
all you guys in WDW.

My race report will be long, so many things happened that weekend. First
my result : ending up 299th with a time of 3 hrs 26 minutes.

Long : after going to Animal Kingdom with Stan and Sheila on Friday
(thanks friends for taking me along)  we went to the Friday evening
encounter. It was great to see you all again, Bill and family, the
famous Druckenmillers, Dave Lawrence and his family, Stan and Sheila,
Adam with his family, Yvonne. We had a great time. On Saturday I stayed
in the room for a while, it was way too cold. At noon I went to the expo
to listen to some seminars, very interesting. At 3.30 PM I met Yvonne
Foo at the Pop Century Resort to check that one out. It is a cool but
very big resort and it isn't even finished. At 4.15 PM we met Kurt
JENSEN and his wife. He was so kind to take us to the APD. It was great
to see some friends again I haven't seen in a while, Jackson, Kent, Bob,
Craig and to meet some new friends like Heather and her husband (thanks
for the ride back to the resort !).

I went to bed early that evening, I wasn't nervous at all, due to my bad
training I was just ready to get the medal, no matter what time I
needed. 

Race day :

On Sunday morning at 3 AM I woke up, got all my stuff ready and jumped
on the bus at 03.30 AM. It was very cold. I was standing there in a
short, a race singlet, a throw a way sweater and a jacket. The wind was
horrible. Some nice lady offered me a plastic bag to keep warm, hmm, by
that time I might have seen blue from the cold. I met some Disney Dead
friends at the D-tent but it was just too cold to stay there. At 5 AM I
started walking over to the A.corral. After the great American National
Anthem and the encouraging words from Mickey and Minnie we took off. I
decided to run my own pace, not looking at the other runners in the
A-corral. Epcot was beautiful, like every year. I had no problems
leaving Epcot and getting together with the marathon runners. I took
of my sweater just before entering Main street in Magic Kingdom, that is
were the pictures are taken so I wanted them to see my race number.
Since it was still pretty cold to run in a singlet I didn't want to
throw away the sweater yet. I was feeling great and kept on running, I
had my camelback with me so I didn't have to stop at the waterstops. The
road to Animal Kingdom was long but I was able to run all the way. I
remember I had to walk there last time. It seems like they changed a
little on the course in Animal Kingdom too, running longer through Asia
and not through Dinoland anymore. After leaving Animal Kingdom I decided
it was time to take a short break, walk for a while on the long road
from this park to Wide World of Sports. I ate a powerbar and drank some
water. My legs were getting tired but when I saw the people at the
bridge at the All Star Resorts I started running again. It was getting
hard and I had to take several walking breaks. I ran on the small bridge
to MGM, feeling the cramps coming up. The course in MGM was a lot
better, running through the costume department, on the New York street
there and so back to the entrance. The Boardwalk was ok, running at a
slow painful pace. When entering Epcot I had some problems with the
small bridges. I had cramps in my legs, my knees were hurting but I was
so close to the finish. When I saw the finish line the clock said 3 hr
25 minutes and I was almost there, amazing. I gave Goofey a high five
and ran over the finish, feeling really happy and almost ready to cry.
They took my chip of, gave me the medal, took pictures with the Brother
bear characters and I took off, ready to get a shower and take a nap at
the hotel. I did it, I got a Personal Best in Disney

In the afternoon, I met Stan and Sheila again and we went together to
the Bragathon. It was great to hear all those friends again, talking
about their experience on race day. Stan, Sheila, Yvonne and I decided
to get to Coronado Springs to eat something. To get there we decided to
take the bus at the Wilderness lodge, dropping us off at the TTC. Weird
enough there are no busses going to Coronado from the TTC so we had to
go to a park first. The monorail to Magic Kingdom wasn't working, either
we had to take the boat or the monorail to Epcot. We took the monorail
to Epcot and hopped on a bus to Coronado there. We had a great meal
there with a nice Mexican beer.

Of course we had to get back to the All Star Resorts. Walking was an
option, but not on race day. We jumped back on the bus to Epcot, we were
the only ones. The driver must have heard us talking about the All Star
resorts and he drove to Blizzard Beach instead of Epcot. We asked to get
off so we could walk to out resorts. The driver asked us why we didn't
ask to drop us off at the All Stars. He changed his bus ride from Epcot
to SPECIAL and dropped us off at the All Star Sports. Really nice. We
were so tired. I fell asleep at 8.00 PM.

On Monday I went to the Boardwalk to see some friends for the last time
before I would leave Disney. After a walk around the lake I drove back
to the hotel, took a shower and took off for Universal Island of
Adventure. 

That is it, I had a great weekend, thanks to you all guys. Keep up the
postings, keep up the fantastic race reports. I enjoy reading them and I
am looking forward to be there again next year. I will register soon. My
wife Isabelle also let me know she wants to do the marathon next year.
(I think she just won't let me fly to Florida alone anymore :-))

Take care friends, it was great !

Bart Ooms from a cold, windy, rainy Belgium