Official 2013 Disney Princess Half Marathon Thread - Take 2

[VickiHD]

We are finally back home safe and sound.

I am glad I finally got to experience the Princess 1/2 and earned my C2C while wearing a tiara and tutu. During my year of planning I learned so much here about the little details to make race day go smoothly. But nothing could prepare me properly for the HUMIDITY. I don't know how some of you Princesses do it. I have never run in it and I am happy with my finishing time and I was even stopping for pictures. The one thing that was odd for my was I started out hungry and was hungry the entire race even after doing my "usual" race morning food routine even eating more at the RR. I really am glad I had the race retreat. The RR was a nice place for me to go to in the morning (especially since I was running by myself) and a easy place to meet up with the family after. We drove over from CBR at 3:00 am and saw a bus leave right on time with a couple of runners on it. Hope there were no bus issues for anyone.

Can't help but to compare this race to Tink and the DL 1/2 that I do........I think the spectator support is much more at the West Coast races. They crowds are definitely louder and much more enthusiastic and I missed all the High Scool bands and Cheerleaders cheering you on. This course was a little too quiet for me. For such a LARGE place the course was really narrow in a number of places especially for the number of participants. Thank goodness I had my camera with me.....I was able to get some really great castle photos since once again Marathon Photos has let me down. Thank you to the friendly CM for their photo help.

Saturday afternoon at the CBR, I ran into and spoke to RunDisney's YouTube guy --Dennis. Seems like a really nice guy.

As a family vacation we had some really magical pixie dust moments so I am happy for that. But now it's off to "luggage land" then on to "laundry land" for me.

[PrincessV]

Originally Posted by VickiHD

I am glad I finally got to experience the Princess 1/2 and earned my C2C while wearing a tiara and tutu. During my year of planning I learned so much here about the little details to make race day go smoothly. But nothing could prepare me properly for the HUMIDITY. I don't know how some of you Princesses do it.

I've lived in it for 20+ years Honestly, there are folks down here who never adjust, and others, like me, who feel like death in drier air. I don't know what affects it, but I thrive in high humidity, so the conditions were ideal for me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I've got a decent number of decent photos, so I'm happy overall, considering that I didn't stop for pics along the course (not mfoto ones, anyway). But no Finish line for me. I stormed that finish and would really like evidence of that, but no luck. They got me approaching, and then I was buried behind taller people. ~sigh~

[Cripey]

Originally Posted by JoyaDelMar

Agreed on POR. I got in line around 3:30 and didn't make it on a bus until after 4. Our bus driver then took almost an hour to get to Epcot and missed the turn for drop off. After some volunteers flagged down our rogue bus, he finally dropped us off on the complete opposite side of the parking lot around 5:00. I made it to my corral minutes before the first corral was released. It was nuts!

Offhanded, I don't recall Disney ever asking which hotel I was staying at. You'd think they would have an idea of how many people they needed to pick up at each resort and schedule busses accordingly.

Sent from my iPhone using DISBoards

We got out to the start area very early, dropped our bag and walked out to the corrals as soon as they opened the gates...mostly so BF could get to the front of C and I could be in the back corner of B and we could hang there together until the start. We saw a couple of busses actually pull up on the road along the right side of the corrals and drop runners off?? They all came through the grass and just jumped the fencing to get in...hopefully most of them split off into their assigned corrals, but who knows. I wonder if those were some of the later busses that took a wrong turn maybe, and they were sent there to save time? I actaully saw a few men in B when we started to move forward after A started the race. There were several volunteers at the entrance to B checking bib's and moving people into the corral, but they all were right there at the entrance, facing out, and didn't see the multitude of runners in the front of C corral behind them just stepping over the fence. Granted, from what I could tell, most of those folks were just jumping out to use the porta potties as it was the quickest and easiest way from where they were, but there were more than a few that didn't, so who knows if they were in the right place or not.

We got back in last night from WDW, had a really great trip. I really had fun at the race too, despite the crowds. We wanted to stop for character pics, but the lines were just crazy at all the ones I really wanted so we didn't. Instead we pulled over at all the mile markers and snapped there as well as some of the landmarks like coming through the toll booths to the MK, on the sidewalk of Main Street with castle in the background, etc. I think I'll wait a year or two before I do PHM again though...mostly to see if Disney addresses the crowding either by reducing the # of participants, spacing the corrals more, opening more lanes, etc. Maybe they will, maybe they won't and who knows if any of it would help any...it probably won't keep me from doing another in the future, but I'm just not in any hurry I don't think. (there's also the matter of the ever-increasing registration fee too) I will definitely sign up for Tink again though! I sincerely hope having the expo at the CSR was a one-time thing. I went over there 3 times over Friday and Saturday, at different times of day (only because we were staying at CSR and it was convenient), and it was such a nightmare in there. well, the expo side anyway...all 3 times I went over, the packet pick up side was all but empty. It's too bad they couldn't open up one of the smaller event rooms nearby and dedicate it specifically to the Official Merch booth because what they had set up was complete chaos. I think that was the most disappointing thing about the expo to me. It's too bad they can't set it up like DL with bib pick up and expo vendors in two different places. It's so much less chaotic in my opinion.

[DISNEYFOS]

In case anyone else was interested, I was attempting to get a "I Did It" shirt because due to the crowds I wasn't able to at the expo etc... I had sent an email and got a call from Disney WW of Sports merchandizing.

They said the "I Did it" was sold out but they had a few logos and could make one for me. They just didn't have the logo for the map and it could only be white or gray (long sleeve or short). They could print your name, bib number, finish time etc... I would of liked the map..but whatever at least its something.

I got the princess 1/2 logo on the front for 2013 and had them print 13.1 on the back.

The number they have on the facebook page to call is 407-939-1451

[saysay]

Originally Posted by JoyaDelMar

Agreed on POR. I got in line around 3:30 and didn't make it on a bus until after 4. Our bus driver then took almost an hour to get to Epcot and missed the turn for drop off. After some volunteers flagged down our rogue bus, he finally dropped us off on the complete opposite side of the parking lot around 5:00. I made it to my corral minutes before the first corral was released. It was nuts!

Offhanded, I don't recall Disney ever asking which hotel I was staying at. You'd think they would have an idea of how many people they needed to pick up at each resort and schedule busses accordingly.

Sent from my iPhone using DISBoards

Last year we were at POFQ and went to bus around 3:30....same thing, we waited a bit and then traffic getting to the start was CRAZY, took forever. Then the walk from the parking lot to corral was crazy slow....though luckily seems like this was fixed this year.

This year we were at bus stop by 3:15, much to the chagrin of my posse. I really believe that extra 15 minutes made things so much more less stressful for me before the race. We drove to the start no traffic...granted we stood around a few minutes before the race but I was able to find my friend who I was running with. The red carpet into the starting area was bottlenecked...nice touch Disney, but I really don't like shuffling in a large crowd, so no need for this. I talked to some people who run the WDW 1/2 which is also big and they told me to avoid traffic get on the bus by 3:15...worked.

I had fun and would love to do it next year.

fun running into princessv in the starting corral and some other Dis'er during the weekend!

[joan4mickey]

Well I have been thinking, and my DH says that is always a bad thing. I have run all 5 years, and I can't think of a reason to keep running this race. It is crowded if you don't start in corral A, and I have plenty of photos and they all start to look the same except for the outfit I choose. This year was the worst expo and I think last year was the best.
I have always started in A or B and I was thinking to make it interesting to start at the very back...last runner to cross the start line and get a new view of things. I could chat up other runners as I make my way through the course and see things differently.
Maybe I will continue to run this race and just to it differently.

[Gryhndmom]

Originally Posted by joan4mickey

Well I have been thinking, and my DH says that is always a bad thing. I have run all 5 years, and I can't think of a reason to keep running this race. It is crowded if you don't start in corral A, and I have plenty of photos and they all start to look the same except for the outfit I choose. This year was the worst expo and I think last year was the best.
I have always started in A or B and I was thinking to make it interesting to start at the very back...last runner to cross the start line and get a new view of things. I could chat up other runners as I make my way through the course and see things differently.
Maybe I will continue to run this race and just to it differently.

Hmmmmm...interesting thought...

DH and I were talking about the crowd and thought maybe the humidity was getting to folks thus the slow down/clogs along the route. Perfect weather right now in San Antonio...62 and low humity...sigh...if only !

Noticed you were for NC...my Mother's family is from the Hickory, Caldwell County area.

[sunnygal041]

Guess what?? I Did it shirts @ www.************.com. How much????? $70.00! 😳

[dumbo_buddy]

just a quick hello and congrats to everyone who ran. i just got home tonight with my family and we are pooped. the race seems like 5 months ago. i had a great time. it felt hotter than the marathon but who knows. maybe just more humid.

i'm 99.999999% sure hockey dan blew past me by the race track. and i'm also pretty sure i saw joan4mickey at some point after the race. maybe at epcot. my 3 year old was having his 563rd meltdown of the vacation so i didn't introduce myself.

the expo was terrible. rundisney merchandise was nothing to get excited about and after the family 5k was one big clusterf**k trying to get anywhere towards epcot. the 5k itself was fun except i think by the time the stroller brigade came by (my family) they had given up on characters. we saw 3 characters the whole time.

race day itself was great. i finished at 2:37 which is WAY off my PR but i stopped at almost every single photo opportunity and had a really fun time. my knee started to go around mile 10.5 but by then i was close enough to just push through. plus i got a bunch of texts from my girlfriends so that helped keep me going!

dh and the kids were not able to cheer for me until about 50 yards from the finish. the bus driver got lost on the way to epcot so it took them too long to get anywhere to cheer for me. stinks. but i did see him so that's cool

i got myself bumped into corral A (had a 10k race in oct with a pace of 9:21mm which was enough to get me into A) and i'm so glad i did. i was clearly the slowest person in there due to injury but it was great b/c the lines for the characters weren't too long!!

[flatlandcycle]

Originally Posted by joan4mickey

Well I have been thinking, and my DH says that is always a bad thing. I have run all 5 years, and I can't think of a reason to keep running this race. It is crowded if you don't start in corral A, and I have plenty of photos and they all start to look the same except for the outfit I choose. This year was the worst expo and I think last year was the best.
I have always started in A or B and I was thinking to make it interesting to start at the very back...last runner to cross the start line and get a new view of things. I could chat up other runners as I make my way through the course and see things differently.
Maybe I will continue to run this race and just to it differently.

My wife would say go get some KT Tape...for your mouth. How can you run without Nicole?

I cannot, for the life of me, walk a 16 min mile. I end up with ITB issues. Running faster is no problem. If you choose to do this, make sure that you can walk that fast, and train to be on the course for 3-4 hours.

[joan4mickey]

Originally Posted by flatlandcycle

My wife would say go get some KT Tape...for your mouth. How can you run without Nicole?

I cannot, for the life of me, walk a 16 min mile. I end up with ITB issues. Running faster is no problem. If you choose to do this, make sure that you can walk that fast, and train to be on the course for 3-4 hours.

I do hope Nicole is back next year.

I can walk. My DH and I walked 300 miles with packs across Spain this past September. We were doing 12-20 miles a day. But I thought I would just slog by others, sort of bob and weave and hope to finish in two and half hours.

[Lawyer Mommy]

Wow! I had a lot of pages to get through! Almost like running a half marathon.

First, I want to thank all of you for all the wonderful advice and support you've provided on these boards over the past few months. It was invaluable. I really felt *ready* for the race because I completely knew what to expect, and I wouldn't have felt that way but for all of you.

I did manage to finish my first half! Wow, was it HOT and HUMID. Being from the DC area, I'm used to the humidity in the summer but I've been training in 30 degree weather. It was a total shock. By mile 3 or so, I could have wrung out my Sparkle Skirt. When I finished the race my 5 year old son was disgusted by how wet I was. I was dripping.

I looked for some of you -- particularly those that had posted pics of their costumes -- but never saw anyone. I'm sorry about that. I kept searching for Cripey's boyfriend's "Princess Protection Officer" shirt from behind but never saw it. And I accosted a lovely woman in Beaches and Cream on Friday who looked like Joan. She was sitting there eating with her "Perfect Princess" sash on with her friends (also wearing Perfect Princess sashes) and I asked if her name was Joan. It was not. I think she thought I was insane.

Overall, I was really happy with the race. I know my time would have been faster but for the crowds but fortunately my goal was simply to finish and have fun. I did that. I can see, however, how it would have been really frustrating for folks who cared about their time and really wanted to see how fast they could go (like annmarieda).

I must admit that I was stunned to see and hear people who clearly hadn't trained and just wanted to do this for the sake of it. I was up in Corral C and finished in just under three hours. But there were people there who clearly had no intention of even trying to run. They were just happy to be so far ahead of the sweepers. I wish something could be done about that. It creates a dangerous condition, as does forcing the men back into Corral C. I think a separate finishing chute for the men is a better compromise.

So, who's already in for next year? I am unsure. Given what I'm hearing about Tink, maybe that's a better option? I sure like running, and having a race to look forward to is motivating for me.

[joan4mickey]

Nancy....I was at Epcot Sunday afternoon. When I got to Main St and saw my DH I said I felt like I was at mile 20 of the marathon it was so hot and much more humid.

Gryhndmom....I'm north of Charlotte, your family lives in a nice area. After being in FL it just feels cold here.

[dumbo_buddy]

Originally Posted by joan4mickey

Nancy....I was at Epcot Sunday afternoon. When I got to Main St and saw my DH I said I felt like I was at mile 20 of the marathon it was so hot and much more humid.

then yes it was definitely you!

[dumbo_buddy]

my favorite picture...buzz and i match <3