Disney's Inaugural Enchanted 10k Race Report

The first half of the Glass Slipper Challenge. If you read the first two entries from my weekend(and if you didn't, you can read them here and here), you'd know I'd been battling a stomach virus in the days prior. The day before the 10k, I felt better, but eating and drinking weren't quite meshing with me, so I wasn't able to pack my food in like I normally would before races. After a day at Epcot on Friday, I was able to sleep well Friday night, and woke up feeling even better on Saturday morning, although still far from 100%.

The events leading up to the race, the snafu with billing and having to hash that out, on top of being wiped out by that stomach bug, on top of just being pregnant, had me in a bit of a funk. I wasn't thrilled with the 2:45 am wake up call, but tried to turn my frown upside down.

This race was different from my others. Usually my husband has played supporter in the sense that he takes care of our 3 kids while I run and race. He has never been to any of my races before, local or otherwise. It's not an issue, dragging our 3 hell spawn cherubic offspring out in public for a race isn't the easiest job, so he supported me by keeping them at home. But this time was different. It was just him and me on this trip and I'd convinced him to run the 10k with me. I was excited to do this with him and to give him a taste of my Disney racing obsession.

We had the pleasure of being able to leave a little bit later because instead of waiting for a bus, we were able to take the monorail over to the Epcot parking lot. The ease of this over the buses was definitely a plus. We arrived and went to meet the rest of the DisBroads. All of us, with the exception of summer, were doing this race.

The DisBroads had a Mary Poppins theme going on, I was too lazy to follow along for this race, and my husband isn't that much of a team player.

Aside from being the first race I was doing with my husband, this was also my first time meeting DisBroad Shannon in person. Patty, Shannon and I met long before Disney running and the DisBroads and the blogs. About 6 years ago, we met in an online group for, let's just say, like minded political folks. We've since ditched the politics and chosen to bury our heads in Disney's sand. It's a much friendlier way to live life.

The girls were happy and dancing and me, I was still feeling funky. At the start of the race, they were going to go ahead and the husband and I were going to be taking it easy. I was pregnant and still weak, and my husband hadn't done one lick of training. Normally that kind of thing wouldn't have been recommended, but well, it turns out he had no issues with this and I spent most of the race trying to keep up with him. Men.

We started off from Corral C, the middle of the pack. All of the waiting and naturally, as soon as we set off, I had to go to the bathroom. The first mile and a half of the race is one big stretch of highway. There is nothing there, and this includes bathrooms. I grew increasingly irritated with Disney's lack of planning in terms of restrooms. For as long as we have to stand in the corrals and wait to set off, they could at least slap some portapotties within the first mile. But no, not this time. At almost 1.5 miles in, I had to go to the bathroom so badly. We came to a medical tent and there was one, yes, one bathroom. I got in line but after a couple of minutes I wasn't willing to wait anymore. We ditched the line and I was forced to do something I have never done before. I had to head off into the wooded median to drop my drawers and relieve myself in the woods. Not cool Disney. Not cool.

Feeling much better, we continued on. The first 5k was down, and we still hadn't seen anything of any interest along the way. I was very disappointed in the course thus far. the lines for the few characters we had passed were very long and we decided not to wait, not to mention the characters themselves weren't anything exciting.

Finally, at around 3.5 miles in, we entered Epcot, from a back gate that lead into Norway. We ran around the World Showcase and out the back gate. Here is where my grand plan kicked in. Months before, when the race course came out, I saw that part of it went along the Boardwalk, right past the Boardwalk bakery. There is a certain dessert, a cheesecake brownie, that I dream of. During our last trip, the bakery was closed for renovations, so I missed out. It had been years since I had one, and I fully intended to stop in and grab a snack during the race. Carb loading or eating for two or something like that, right?

Plus I figured it would make for great pictures. I'm all about photo ops. Luckily the bakery opened at 6:30 so by the time we made it to that part of the race, it was open and my brownie was waiting. So when we hit it, I stopped in.

And I scored!

Things were going well as we entered Epcot again and came up on mile 6. I had to go to the bathroom again and we passed an actual restroom in the park, so we stopped. My husband told me to hurry, so I set off to jog. And there it was. A sharp, shooting pain in my lower back, that traveled up my back and down my leg. I immediately stopped and told him I couldn't. It hurt. A lot. I limped to the bathroom and went, still in pain. I wasn't sure what happened, but walking was very hard from that point on. I just wanted to finish the race, eat my brownie and sit down. I figured I needed a good stretch and to lay down for a bit. We finished in 1:49, my slowest 10k ever, especially considering aside from bathrooms and the bakery, we didn't stop. I was happy to be done. We had breakfast planned, I wanted a shower and to take some Tylenol and get my back to feeling better.

Unfortunately, my  back problems were just beginning.

So my overall thoughts on this race. I was not a fan of the course. The first half was about as boring as boring gets. I had done the Tink 10k 5 weeks prior and that had a much busier course, with lots to see. This course didn't, and if this is standard for 10k courses at WDW, this was probably my first and last 10k. With as expensive as that 10k is, I'd like to see a little more jazz out there. I was also pretty miffed at the lack of amenities along the first couple of miles of the race course. Given the weather  is usally warm for these races and people are hydrating quite a bit, then the wait in the corrals before starting the race, you'd think something like bathrooms would be common sense within the first mile. Apparently Disney didn't feel the same way. With the course as boring as it was, from long stretches of highway to the not so wowing characters on the course, I can't see myself signing up for this particular race again.

Glass Slipper Challenge Weekend 2014-Part 2

Friday morning brought a little relief. I wasn't aching anymore, I had gotten some sleep during the night and was feeling a lot better. My stomach was still feeling uneasy but no full on nausea like I'd had the day before, it more felt like I wasn't very hungry. But I knew I'd have to get hungry and fast, because not only was I eating for two, but the next day would bring the first 6.2 miles of my 19.3 mile weekend. I needed to be fueled for that.

We planned an easy park day, but first stop was the Expo. We grabbed some breakfast from the cafe at our resort and headed over to the ESPN Wide World of Sports. I much prefer the expos here over my first expo, which was moved to the Coronado Springs conference halls for last year's PHM weekend. We stopped for a few pictures.

We headed inside to pick up our respective bibs, mine for the Glass Slipper Challenge and the husband's for the Enchanted 10k. This also meant I had a lot of tech shirts to pick up too.

We didn't stay at the expo long. I didn't have anything I wanted to buy, since DisBroad Julie had scored me a pair of runDisney New Balance shoes the day before. We also planned to spend the day at Epcot, and with an early night ahead of us, thanks to an early race morning on Saturday, we wanted to hurry over and spend as much time there as possible. We dropped our swag bags off at our room and headed over to Epcot.

I was still feeling queasy but forced myself to stop in China for some orange chicken and rice. Normally this would have made my taste buds happy, but my stomach was still turning. We toured the countries and did a few rides, including Spaceship Earth. I always love the pictures they get of you.

We met a few other DisBroads over for a quick dinner in America before we parted ways to head back to our respective rooms for an early bedtime, just as the sun was starting to set a bit.

I was hoping the following day would allow me to feel even better. It did, but that just meant that something else would go wrong. Stay tuned for my 10k race report to find out how it went.

Glass Slipper Challenge Weekend: Part 1

Yes, I know that the Glass Slipper Challenge was over 2 months ago. But you try being pregnant with baby #4. Better late than never right?

Where can I start with this weekend? This weekend was a disaster in the making from before the get go. I had completed the Tinkerbell 10k and Half Marathon unofficial challenge in Disneyland just 5 weeks prior. While being pregnant during those races certainly slowed me down, I finished those races with no issues and had a great time at the parks with some great friends around those races.

Glass Slipper weekend was to be a trip for just my husband and me. Normally my race weekends are girls weekends, but my hubby deserved a break too, he agreed to do the 10k portion with me and my mom was more than happy to come stay with our 3 kids while we had one last hoorah before welcoming baby #4. Signs that our weekend might not go so well began very early in the week, before we even left for our trip.

Monday night, t-minus 4 days before hubby and I left for Walt Disney World, the stomach flu hit our house, and it hit it hard. Within an hour, my husband and 2 older kids went from "I'm not feeling so hot." to projectile vomiting all over my house. I cared for them from a distance and prayed I wouldn't catch it myself. I slept in a different bed Monday night, only to get into a fight with a house plant early Tuesday morning and ending up with a scratched cornea. There I was on Tuesday, 4 days before I was due to complete 19.3 miles, with over half my family puking and half blind.

By Wednesday, things started to look better. A trip to my eye doctor gave me some ointment that healed my eye right up and the stomach bug seemed short lived, both kids affected went back to school and my husband went back to work. I felt good and my 2 year old showed no signs of being sick. I continued on with cleaning and preparing for my mother to arrive. She arrived safely and Thursday morning, hubby and I were set to depart.

I woke up Thursday morning and finished getting ready, and got the kids off to school. I noticed a little queasy feeling brewing but hoped it was just a touch of morning sickness, as I still saw it come and go at that point. It wouldn't be long before I realized this was not the case. We barely made it into the next state when I started feeling more sick and body aches started. I had  not only caught the stomach bug, but I caught it while starting a 9 hour long car ride, 2 days before my races. I'm not sure I've never had a more miserable trip.

But that wasn't all. We had our room booked at the Contemporary Resort, a room only reservation, and standard Disney protocol is to pay any remaining balance upon check in. I called for our remaining balance so I could get my gift cards ready, and Disney's automated line said our balance was paid in full. I started to feel more sick, as worry about how our bill was paid and the stomach bug did not make a good combination. I spent quite a long while on the phone, waiting for Disney to tell me how it was paid, as I had not completed check in and had been paying our balance with gift cards in the months leading up to our trip. They finally told me that I had put a credit card number into My Disney Experience over a month prior, and it billed to that card. Things went from bad to worse. I put the debit card for a not often used account when ordering our Magic Bands, kind of as a place holder, because it prompted me to add one for room charging privileges. I figured it was no big deal, and that we would switch to our main card when we checked into the resort. There was no money in this account and if Disney had billed to it, we would be hit with overdraft charges(which I highly doubt Disney would have given back). Cue a freak out.

There was absolutely nothing they could do over the phone. We would have to fix it upon check in at the resort, where they could reverse the charges. But this absolutely didn't help me as we were still 6 hours away. We had to scramble to find a shared branch credit union somewhere in BFE South Carolina, to transfer money from our main bank. Did I already mention I had caught the stomach bug? I already wanted to roll over and die, I felt so awful, now I had to find a random bank, stand in line and transfer money to cover the unauthorized Disney charges. This added another hour or so onto our trip, a trip already so miserable for me. It was pure hell.

We finally arrived to our resort at around 8pm(a 9 hour trip turned into a nearly 12 hour trip thanks to my illness and the bank detour).

I could barely manage standing at the front desk, and if looks could kill, poor Cast Member Tad would have been dead and buried. My attitude was a lot less than magical. It turned out, in Disney's infinite wisdom, they checked in many of the guests without their consent. They figured it would "expedite" the check in process. Those with credit cards on file(and mine was never really on file, at least not for check in and billing purposes) were billed accordingly. Definitely uncool Disney.

Although online check in is only available within 10 days of a trip, I was told I had checked in online over a month prior to that date. While they were able to reverse the charges and straighten things out, they did absolutely no more than offer a "We're sorry about that." after I stood at the desk, weak, shaky and trying not to vomit for almost an hour. I was extremely disappointed, especially given we were staying at one of the most expensive resorts on property. As loyal as I have been to Disney over the years, I most certainly did not feel the appreciation.

But straightened out, we finally were able to get to our room. We were all the way in the south wing, not in the main tower. This was another disappointment. When you think of the Contemporary, you think of the big resort with the monorail running right outside your door.

But if you don't study the resort well, you could find out that you are spending hundreds of dollars a night to stay in a wing off of the main building, with no views and a nice long walk to the monorail. Naturally, this is where our room was. I really feel like it was a waste of money. If I wanted no view of the monorail, with a long walk to our room, in an ordinary building, I could have saved several hundred dollars and stayed at another resort.

Feeling sick, disappointed and not very magical, we trudged to our room. We passed DisBroads Patty and Tania on the way, and they carefully avoided me to stay far away from what I had. We said our hellos and gave our air hugs, but I just wanted to go to bed. We got to our room, which was very nice and spacious(just not in the main tower), and my silver lining for the day waited for me. DisBroad Julie felt so sorry for me, the fact that I was sick, my nightmare of a billing snafu, and a very long drive, that she picked up a pair of the runDisney New Balance shoes for me at the expo.

They sure were snazzy. After what was one of the longest days I'd had in awhile, I settled in for sleep. I had hoped I would feel better in the morning and that I could put the miserable first day behind us. The good news is, I did feel better the next day. The bad news is, the bad juju was not behind us. You'll just have to wait for my 10k race report to hear all about that.

Wordless Wednesday-Tinkerbell 10k and Half Marathon

Well, almost wordless. I'm a slacker. I admit it. Life, pregnancy, winter, they've all gotten in the way of posting about Tinkerbell weekend. Pregnancy brain keeps me from remembering details from this weekend, so I'll just post the pictures from the first half of my Coast 2 Coast challenge and my first trip to Disneyland.

Sarah, one of many runDisney buddies I've made, and me

My BRF for the weekend, Amy(Mom's Magical Miles), and our flat Julie

A spectacular costume, Kevin from Up. Someone ran an entire 10k in this outfit.

The tightrope Walker and Widowed Bride from the Haunted Mansion, I have never seen them on a course or in the parks before!

DisBroads Amy, Patty and April

April(from Run the Great Wide Somewhere), DisBroad Patty, DisBroad Amy, DisBroad April

Photo Courtesy of Amy

Tink 10k done!

My first A corral start(and last)

The disappointingly small castle at Disneyland. And trash cans.

Really? I pay $175 for a race and you want me to be quiet? I think not.

The DisBroads reunite. On the side of the highway.

Why thank you random stranger!

FINISHED!

Tinkerbell Half Marathon Weekend-Part 1-The Expo

I'm here, I'm alive and I did survive the Tinkerbell half marathon weekend. In previous posts I was a bit worried, because of being pregnant and in the horrors of the first trimester and because the flu hit our house in December, knocking me out for a couple of weeks. But I'm happy to report I finished BOTH races over the weekend. This was my first race at Disneyland, in fact it was my first trip to Disneyland at all, and I have A LOT to say about it all. It's really a whole different ball game for someone who is very used to Walt Disney World and the races in Florida.

My weekend started on Friday. Because I really had to work at squeezing this race in, to earn my pink Coast 2 Coast medal, this wasn't going to be a long trip for me. I left Friday and came home Monday. And I left earllllyyyyy on Friday morning.

That was how I felt at the airport waiting for my 5:50 am connecting flight to Washington DC. I got an awesome deal on my plane ticket, and it came with a "price". I was coming from the east coast so I had time to lose as well. I caught my first flight to Washington DC and landed before the sun even came up. After that was a long 5 hour flight to Los Angeles. Strike one for the west coast Disney, the sheer amount of time it takes this girl to get there. I thought of bringing my family but imagining soon to be 4 children on a flight like that, no thank you. By the end of my flight I was bored out of my mind, my Kindle was dead, and I was starting to see things on the wing of the plane.

Ok, not really, but I did have a seat on the wing and I still can't look out at the wing of a plane without half expecting to see some little gremlin taking apart the plane.

Even though I left North Carolina at 5:50 am, I arrived at LAX just after 11 am, because of the time change. Because United Airlines does not make their earlier boarding passengers stick to the one carry on item per person rule, I had to check my carry on bag because their overhead bins were full by the time I boarded my flight. I wasn't happy having to go to baggage claim and wait for my bags. After waiting for over 30 minutes, it was time to catch my shuttle. Here's another strike for Disneyland. There is no Magical Express. Instead of a timely, friendly bus waiting to take you to your Disney resort at no extra charge, like they have at WDW, Disneyland leaves it's guests pretty much on their own to find their way to the resorts. I was not too pleased with this, and ended up having to pay an additional $30 to have a shuttle van take me from the airport and back to it when I was going to be departing.

I exited the airport and stepped into a nice thick cloud of smoke(blech, so much for CA being cleaner)from the smokers outside of every exit door. I then had to wait on my shuttle for close to 20 minutes. Atleast it was warm outside. I was coming from a region of the country stuck in the polar vortex, so the warmth was CA's first redeeming quality.

When my van did finally come around, I had guests waiting on me. Disbroad Amy and our roommate for the weekend, Julianna, were picked up at an earlier stop. At least we all got to take our $15 per person ride together.

It's about a 35 minute drive from the airport to Disney/Anaheim. We were staying on what's considered Disney property(which is extremely different from what WDW property is) at one of the 3 Disneyland resorts, the Paradise Pier hotel. We arrived for a quick check in, to drop off our things and head to the expo. I will give a full report on this resort in another post, because it was really different from what I've ever stayed at at WDW, and I wasn't completely thrilled.

We got checked in and made the quick walk over to where the expo was being held. That's another thing that's different between WDW and DL. At DL, everything is within walking distance of each other. Each resort, the two parks and Downtown Disney, all within walking distance. So we were able to walk to the expo at a neighboring resort. It was nice to be out in the sun. I didn't mind the walk and it was nice not to have to wait for a bus but the whole walking distance thing would turn out to be both a blessing and a curse in the coming days.

Our first stop at the expo was the official runDisney merchandise booth. I wanted to pick up a few commemorative Tinkerbell 1/2 marathon items and hoped everything wasn't sold out. Pickings were slim and I was able to pick up a jacket and a car magnet. Sadly the car magnet is already falling apart. This was my second big fail in terms of official merchandise, as my Wine and Dine "I Did It" t-shirt started falling apart in less than a week. I'm really disappointed in the quality of Disney merchandise, especially given the prices we pay for them.

After the official merchandise booth, we all had our own respective shopping to do, but not before stopping to say hello to runDisney training guru Jeff Galloway.

After chatting with Jeff(the nicest!), I headed to pick up a few items from around the expo and then downstairs to pick up my bibs. Perhaps it was the time of day, but the expo wasn't crowded at all. I had already missed out on the big ticket items like the New Balance runDisney shoes and the Dooney and Burke purses, so much of the morning's frenzy had died down. I heard the horror stories of the crowds at the Disneyland 1/2 Marathon expo and I experienced nothing like this during my short stay at this expo. The bib pickup area is another area separate from the shopping area, and it took me less than 10 minutes to pick up my bibs for both the 10k and the 1/2 marathon.

After bib pick up, I headed upstairs to pick up my race packets and shirts. This year's shirt were very nice(and like a very bad blogger, I didn't take pictures). My roomies and I met back up and headed out of the expo, dinner time was coming and we wanted to drop our things back at our room before heading down to meet up with many others from the PbRC group for chatting and chow. We stopped for one last picture before leaving the expo.

On the way back to our resort, we passed one of the entrances to the Disneyland Hotel. Standing right there in the lobby, greeting folks was none other than Goofy. A character? In a resort? Just there? Unheard of. Maybe DL wasn't so bad afterall. We ducked in for a quick picture.

After dropping our stuff off at our resort, we met up with Disbroad Patty and Disbroad Summer, gathering 4 of the 5 Disbroads racing that weekend. We gathered at Trader Sam's, an interesting little bar at the Disneyland Hotel. They all enjoyed their fine island adult beverages while I drank some pineapple juice with an umbrella in it, trying to catch the same vibe. I did not catch that same vibe. I grabbed some food and we gabbed with other PbRC members before parting ways with Patty and walking over to Downtown Disney. Again, just a quick little trip across an aptly named street.

We grabbed dinner at Earl of Sandwich, then decided to walk around a bit. DTD at Disneyland is similar to the DTD at Walt Disney World, with many of the same stores. Having been up since 3am EST, which is 12 am on the west coast, and since it was now 6pm on the west coast, well that's a long time for a pregnant woman to be awake, I wasn't up for window shopping and we headed back to our room. There is one benefit of being from the east coast and having a body on east coast time. When you need to get to bed early for an early morning race the following day, it's actually quite easy. So before 8pm, I was out like a light, in preparation for the inaugural Tinkerbell 10k the following morning.