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2007 Goofy's Race and a Half Challenge Report: Jane Clement

I apologize for the length of this report -- and most of it is NRR. So you can stop after the Marathon if you aren't interested in The Rest of the Holiday Story. First I must say that running the half at Disney last weekend has just confirmed to me that neither Heather nor I are hot weather runners. Not that I didn't already know that. For some reason, I seem to bring the hot weather to this event. Last year was cooler, but the year before that when I did the full was one of the hotter race days in recent history. Sports Expo We got there about 4 p.m. on the Thursday afternoon and it was PACKED! We had to stand in line to get our packages, to get our personal timing chip numbers put into the computer (the website said it was fine to wait until we got there), to get the chips activated, and to get our VIP spectators passes for Sunday. By that time, we had only 20 minutes to look around at the vendors before our group van was leaving. If you wanted to buy anything you had to stand in mega line-ups too so we didn't get anything then. Fortunately, we got a chance to go back on Friday afternoon and purchase our souvenirs. The Donald Our training hadn't been great. We weren't terribly motivated, and then with Heather having her laser surgery, me also missing some of our other runs, and the fact that I have had this head congestion throat thing going on for more than a month and was still suffering from it, we were basically there to do just do the run and not worry about our time. It's a good thing, as we ended up with a time of 3:03.29. We were lucky that we didn't have to bus to the race start as we walked from Old Key West again, so we could sleep later than most participants. There were supposed to be 20,000 half marathoners starting -- I am not sure how come there is such a large discrepancy between registrants and finishers. Coming from a town of 17,000 people, this is an overwhelming amount of people. I was happy that we didn't have to get to the start line too early as the music blaring would have given me a headache if we had had to stand in the corral much longer. We had some maintenance people take a photo of our "Tri & Run" team. And a mother/daughter photo: We didn't look this happy for long..... I am not crazy about running in the dark especially with that many people around. Heather found it a little disorienting, and that she had trouble focusing -- maybe because of her laser surgery. We were both worried about losing each other in the crowd. We started out in Wave B and it was so humid! By mile 3 neither of us was feeling very well and we had already told Petra and Cathy to go on without us. I was starting to wonder if we were going to make it to the end. We had gotten some salt pills from Cathy and at that point we each took one. Our friend, Janet, who had stopped for a port-a-potty line up caught up to us. She was running Goofy and wanted to run slowly. She was just there to complete both races and didn't care about her time. She asked if she could stick with us as we always have so much fun -- she had run with us at the Toad and at the Fat Ass. We said, sure, but informed her that if she expected to have FUN on this day, she may be disappointed, as up till that point we were NOT having fun. She did comment afterward that we were strangely quiet compared to normal. However, after a bit, I guess the salt pills kicked in and we felt substantially better. We tried to remember to hydrate. We decided that we were all going to stop and get our photos taken at every opportunity. Here are some of our photos. Beauty and the Beast Mary Poppins We HAD to get one with Donald! Peter Pan and Wendy We walked quite a bit. This caused us to be caught up in mostly walkers by then. And when we did run, we had to continually dodge walkers but we managed. We found once the sun came up, a breeze picked up and made it cooler than it had been. We talked to so many people after the weekend who said that the half was definitely the worst of the two races for the humidity. This is the second time I have run in Disney. I will admit that I am not really a "Disney" person and can't quite get into all the "magic" of Disney. Between the heat and the crowds, it really makes the race more of a chore than fun. Heather and I found that it was a LONG way from the start to the Magic Kingdom and then a LONG way from there to Epcot where we finished. I do not enjoy highway running at the best of times -- and running between the theme parks is almost like running down the 401. There isn't much to look at. So the time in the parks was enjoyable but they didn't seem to make up even a quarter of the race. We had to run along on/off ramps on these highways while we were transitioning from one to another and the slants on those roads were murder on the legs. Eventually we figured out that it was easier to run on the grass along the side where it wasn't slanted. We finally made it to the finish line and we were glad that it was over..... (and that we WEREN'T doing the Goofy!) We were the last of our group in and we got a group photo with the rest who had been waiting for us That evening we met with Tori, Rob, Ian and Kel at the Italian Restaurant in Epcot for a fun meal! It was very enjoyable to meet and discuss the morning's run, RM and everything under the sun with our RM friends! Heather and I spent time at Epcot that day and someone took this photo for us: We thought this sign in the washrooms was funny! The Marathon - Seen through the Eyes of VIP Spectators We bought the VIP spectators package for this event so we could cheer on our friends who were doing Goofy at the finish line. Heather and I actually quite enjoyed sitting in the VIP bleachers, rather than fighting for a spot in the others. We did walk around for quite a while prior to when we thought our friends would be arriving and then spent more than two hours in the stands with our heads trained down the route looking for them. We both got quite a strange sunburn on our necks due to this. However, we did manage to get a photo of each and every one of our friends as they approached the finish line. We have never spent this amount of time standing at a finish line before - other than when we work at the marathon in Picton. It was very interesting to be a spectator. It is fun to watch the number of people coming over the finish line with their kids, although I really would question the practice of placing a baby into the arms of someone who has just run 42.2 kms. We saw many people collapse as soon as they crossed the line. One poor girl hurled about five feet prior to hitting the finish line. I would hate to see her finish line photo! It is strange how many people come in with a very pronounced lean to either one side or the other -- maybe they are having hip problems??? We saw one man who must have cramped up right at the middle of the finish line and who laid on the ground while two medical guys worked on his calf and all the runners tried to get around him without tripping over him. They had to have been there for ten minutes! We saw all sorts of costumes. We saw a Mickey groom carry a Minnie bride over the finish line. We saw LOTS and LOTS of Canadians and we tried to cheer for them all. We saw people who could barely walk who came over the finish line supported by other walks/runners. Don't know if this allowed or not, but it seems that at Disney almost anything goes, as we also saw people being pushed over in wheelchairs. We saw the 100,000 marathon runner come over the line - a girl with Team in Training (not a surprise as it seemed that half the people running were with TNT). She won gold mickey ears (don't know if they were real gold or not), her flight back next year, three nights in the resort and free admission to the Goofy. When she came over the line, we were bombarded with confetti - that was fun! Heather and I really enjoyed our spectator duties! That evening our group went out to the Contemporary for a celebratory supper. Heather and I celebrated by having "glowing drinks" which cost us $9.25 U.S. each!! You only live once, right??? One of the ladies had a hot drink -- a latte maybe? Just proof that EVERYTHING is Disney at Disney! The Non-Running Part of the Trip We spent an extra three days in Florida. Got a rental car (a really nice Impala) and checked out of the Disney resort. Headed to Perkins in Kissimee for brunch. Were having a great time until we came out of the restaurant to see the Sheriff's car in the parking lot. The van next to our car had been broken into and one a couple down from ours had a back passenger window smashed. Both had stuff stolen. Fortunately ours was ok. I don't know why we were so lucky, except maybe because all our stuff was in the trunk, so they couldn't see it. This just freaked us right out and we decided that even though it was only 11:30 we would drive up to our hotel and check in so we could get our stuff out of the car. If you ever want a good hotel to stay at in Orlando, go to the Homewood Suites just off International Drive on American Way. It was EXCELLENT! The best part was that they provided a hot buffet breakfast and a light supper - the last night we were there we had grilled chicken, mashed potatoes, corn and caesar salad. Oh, and free beer and wine with your supper - and they let us take a couple of glasses each up to our rooms. All included with the cost of the room! This saved us a lot of money!! They also had unlimited coffee, pop and juice in the lobby all day. High speed internet access was included with the price of the room as well. There were washers and dryers to do laundry ($1 a load). I believe we only paid about $130 Cdn a night which isn't bad when you split it four ways. Here is a link to the hotel under Expedia if anyone is planning a trip: oops - link deleted because it didn't work. But you can find it on expedia. Here are our photos in our "suite": We spent the rest of Monday shopping at power malls and Supertarget. I hate to say it but it was nice to get away from the Disney hype (and the $$$$$ that you pay for it). But we did venture back to Animal Kingdom on Tuesday and spent the day there. We loved the Safari Ride. It was cool so we bought rain ponchos and did the water ride (can't remember what it was called) SEVEN times! There was no line up at all. That was a lot of fun. This was about the most wild ride that we went on. We left when the park closed at 5 p.m. Wednesday we went to Universal Studios which we enjoyed the most. The weather was cool and the longest we had to wait for a ride was 15 minutes. I must say that we didn't do the most popular rides as we are wimps. But there weren't many people there at all either. Because we bought our tickets to Universal at our hotel, we got into BOTH of their theme parks for the price of just one. That was an added bonus and we really loved Seuss' Landing!! I kept thinking of you, Seuss, and Thing 1 and Thing 2. If you have never been there, you really MUST go! Your girls would just LOVE it! The colours were just amazing! Here are some photos from it: We left when the park closed at 6 p.m. We spent all day yesterday getting back home. Flew from Orlando to JFK Airport in New York where we got on a Dash 8 airplane -- 32 passengers -- to Syracuse. This didn't bother me too much as I have flown for ten hours in the back of a Hercules cargo aircraft before. However none of us enjoyed the thrill of the two sudden drops of several feet and then lifting back up again just as we were coming in to land. When the stewardess' eyes just about pop out of her head, it does kind of concern the passengers!! Don't forget that we are the four ladies who don't do the wild rides at the theme parks! But we made it home safe and sound. Now to recover..... I am exhausted. _________________ Jane