2012 Walt Disney World Marathon Recap: Part III

Okay, it's taken 4 months, two posts and now a captive seat at 33,000 feet for me to finish this marathon report (a marathon, itself).

Sunday morning, race day! I was up way earlier than needed, but c'mon who really sleeps the night before their first marathon? Devin's coughing fits subsided enough for about 3 restful hours and she was out cold (thanks, codeine!) I took a quick shower and tried to eat something, but I'm not much of a breakfast person and my body was really fighting my attempts to get some food in it. So I downed a Powerade, ate some performance jelly beans and grabbed a bag of mini Chips-A-Hoy from our snack bag and headed out the door. It was early, like 3:05, early and like yesterday, the Wilderness Lodge lobby was devoid of any and all human life, save a few runners who had the same idea I did which was to get to the race early. We hopped on a somewhat full, but very quiet bus. Sensing the tension, the bus driver shut the door and said, "Off to the airport!" We all sat up in our seats and he said, "Just kidding!"

The trip to the race was very quiet, so much the voice in my head was screaming for me to hop out the emergency window and steal off into the night so as not to have to run. In a bit of a panic, I sent off (as I was expecting due to the hour of the morning) a feeble post on ROTE asking for "some love." To my surprise, a good many of ROTErs were online and shot right back with motivation (love you guys).

Got to the race, but there were just so many people, I couldn't find any ROTE folk, which bummed me out, but in the line for the bathroom found some nice folk from Chicago so spent some time with them. When it was time, I made the death march with everyone else to the starting line and noticed just the sheer amount of people running as I made my way to Corral A. The anticipation and excitement was simply too much and I just wanted to start the race immediately. No fanfare, no DJ chatter, just start the race!

Finally, the time had come and after seeing the fireworks shoot up into the air I was off, hoping the lack of training wouldn't lead the paramedics on a 500 foot trail of poop to a frozen corpse on the side of the road. My goal was to run a steady, easy pace for the 1st half of the race and then bump it up for the second half, but I was about 1 mile in and at that point, anything was possible. As we hit about Mile 2, I ran into Fundulidae and DeltaPilot (from ROTE) who were humming along at a good pace. We hung out a bit and then parted ways (Thanks for the kind words, guys).

The course led us into Epcot through the auto toll, where I encountered a wheelchair athlete in a standard wheelchair struggling. I wasn't sure what to do so I told one of the race people as I headed into Epcot. The course took us through Future World and backstage through Mexico, heading back around to where we started the race. After making the loop, we turned onto World Drive towards the Magic Kingdom through the TTC. I absolutely loved this part of the race, since it was really the first chance to get close to the folks who were cheering us on. Seeing them was more than inspirational, and quite frankly, I don't think there is a word in the English dictionary to describe the feeling a runner gets when first encountering a group of people cheering them on. So, I'll establish a word: Motivationarunneralabalous! Yes, seeing the people was Motivationarunneralabalous! It was so cool, I sped up to a 8:30 mile. "Holy shit!" I exclaimed, scaring the runner next to me , "I gotta slow down." As I motored through the TTC, I felt great and headed towards the Contemporary. Heading down the incline underneath the boat crossover, I started running backwards and sticking out my thumb to the passing cars, getting a bunch of laughs from all the other runners.

We were reaching Mile 11 and the point everyone single runner was anticipating, the magical run down Main Street towards the castle, and let me tell you, I was not disappointed. Making the turn onto Main Street and seeing all the people cheering, with the castle, I would be lying if I said I didn't well up with a tremendous feeling. And then it got better, running through Main Street, I caught eyes with the most gorgeous looking woman in the crowd and low and behold, it was my wife! She was there with my mom, and her parents. Let me tell you, that moment was über-Motivationarunneralabalous!!!!!!!!!!  At that, moment I felt like was I was going to shoot right into the lead and win this sucker (a fleeting thought for sure).

We headed to the right, through Tomorrowland, Fanatsyland and then that magical trip through the castle (which was amazing). We rounded out our Magic Kingdom visit through Frontierland, backstage through Gate 6, and left towards the Grand Floridan. I knew this would be the last place for awhile where there would be onlookers so I drank it in as much as I could. I knew right ahead of me was dreaded Mile 13 and the dark forest of nothingness.

Mile 13 was near the Hess station and banana distribution. I absolutely hate bananas, but knew I had to eat something, so I muscled it down and prepared to shift into the second piece of my strategy. My Garmin beeped Mile 13 and my mind shifted towards a new focus, "Speed. I am pure speed." I got a hungry look in my eye and looked to up my game. One problem, my legs never seemed to have gotten the memo. I was still running, but my run was something akin to your first car where it could never seem to cleanly find second gear. Grinding, straining, and with the occasional backfire, I was stuck in neutral and slowly losing time. Worse yet, we were at the sewage treatment plan, no man's land. So, I immediately came to grips with not hitting my goal time and figured I'd just do my best and leave it at that. Making out way though the back areas, Disney had some signs up to keep us occupied, the funniest of which being a sign that read, "If you believe in telekinesis,  raise MY hand." Clever.

The second half of the race was rough, and I was wrought with emotion. Sadness, anger, denial, depression, all the emotions every runner feels as they attack a marathon, but I kept moving forward.  It also helped that a few runners patted me on the back when I had to walk,  cementing my belief that runners are the most compassionate athletes. 

Passing through Animal Kingdom which the course layout was "meh" at best, we turned onto Osceola Parkway which was built for the sole reason of making runners die.  After being on OP for what seemed an eternity, we headed through the Studios, past the Boardwalk, Yacht & Beach and back into  Epcot. Running through World Showcase, it was just a mere 4.5 hours before I was jamming along feeling great. I motored through the Finish in a sad, but I guess respectable 5 hours, 1 hour past my goal time. Who cares, though? I did it! Adding to my 13.1 membership, I had just been inducted into the 26.2 club, and man, is that Motivationarunneralabalous!

Never been so tired and happy!

Highlights:
Running through the castle. Amazing!
Seeing my family along the route
Running into ROTErs
Course entertainment

Downsides:
Osceola Parkway

2012 Shamrock Shuffle 8k Race Recap

Don't worry, we'll get to Part III of my Walt Disney Marathon in a day or two. But in the meantime, I wanted to talk about my most recent race.

Last Sunday, I had the opportunity to try the Bank of America Shamrock Shuffle 8k in Chicago. Touted, the “world’s largest timed 8k,” the race certainly was my firs t experience in what I’m calling a “real race.” Mind you, I’ve run big races at Disney and the Hot Chocolate series, but the Shamrock had a veritable “who’s who” in today’s running. Names like Delilah DiCrescenzo and 2012 Olympian, Abdi Abdirahman would lead the pack and look for a victory after traversing the Chicago city streets in glorious running weather. The other races I had run were big, but not really big name. Plus the Elite Corral was jam packed with sub 25:00 runners, so you know this race was serious.

This was to be my third race of the season, but first major one.

Expo

First, let’s start back at the Expo. My wife and I went on Saturday to pick up our packets. I was glad to have submitted a qualifying time to move me up since there would be 40,000 runners in this monster. However,  I could only muster up a Corral B, which was kinda sad, since this was the first race in a long time I wasn’t seeded in Corral A, but as of late, an old stress fracture injury started to rear its ugly head, so I planned to take it easy anyway.

Overall, the Expo was well done and easy to navigate. Packet pickup was a breeze, as were the lines to get our shirts (seriously, red shirts for the Shamrock Shuffle? Very much a fail (even if they do look kinda cool)). Afterwards, we decided to check out all the goodies being offered at the Expo (I love running expos!). It was the usual same ole “I run for beer” bumper stickers, GU gels and apparel. But, there were a few highlights. First, the Motorola Motoactv running watch which is really cool. It remembers the songs that are playing when you show a jump in performance, effectively learning what works for you (beats all the Excel spreadsheets I do manually). I wasn’t really looking for myself, since I use a Garmin 610 & Nike + (more on that later), but more for my wife who recently asked about getting an iPod shuffle to use Nike + (she is currently using a Garmin 210).  We played with it for awhile and felt it’s a really neat device, and may pick up once one of our devices craps out.

The other neat booth was the Newton running shoe booth. I had heard about Newtons before, but didn’t know much until after reading about them in the April Runner’s World. I was curious to check them out since my stress fracture was due to my running style and Newtons had strategic rubber placements to help combat these issues. I tried out the Newton Distance which were really comfy and light! Because of the extra layer of rubber on the midsole of the shoe it would definitely take some getting used to, but a very cool feeling shoe. Since I already have about 4 pairs of running shoes in rotation (and a few still sitting in boxes), I couldn’t really justify the cost just yet (but, they are on the horizon).

Race Day

It was a slightly cool, breezy Sunday, perfect for running. My wife and I got to the race about 7:30 for an 8:30 start. I always like it when races are slated to have wave starts, even more when organizers police the corrals guaranteeing the correct runners are in the correct places. Both my wife and I were in Wave 1 which was helpful (since Wave 2 wouldn’t start for 45 minutes until after Wave 1). Bag check was a breeze, so after checking my bag I wished my wife good luck and headed over to the B Corral. According to the official guide, Corral B was to have about 3,000 runners but it felt more like 1,000 meaning space was abundant. Since I got there early I had plenty of room to stretch and prepare. Once warm, I threw in my ear buds and visualized the course in my head knowing there were 8 turns from Start to Finish.

Once the National Anthem was complete (sung by the incomparable Wayne Messmer), the horn blew and we were off. My game plan was to manage a safe 8:00 pace for the first 2 miles and then turn up the last 3. Well, that plan was shot the minute I crossed the Start line. Getting caught up in the excitement (I know better); Mile 1 rang out on my Garmin at 7:23, Mile 2: 6:49. Holy crap! I had to slow down! I was risk of either dying out early, aggravating my injury, or both!

Sidebar

Lemme just take a minute here and note how much I love my Garmin 610. It stayed true even after running under a bridge at Mile 1 to which the Nike + on my iPhone completely scrambled itself (It said I ran a 1:43 mile and did a 5k in 19:00 – I blame AT&T for its crappy service in the city). Suddenly, that MotoActv started to look pretty good.

Okay, we’re back

Anyways, filing past Mile 2, I was way under pace and I knew I wouldn’t be able to manage that time consistently for the length of the race. Problem was, I couldn’t slow down. Every time I tried to cut back to a 7:55/8:00 I felt like my body was working harder. So, I did the only damage control I could think of, I stopped. At Mile 2.whatever, I moved to the right, put my hand up, and stopped running.  I walked for about 30 seconds and managed to get control of myself and started back up. I felt much better at my planned 8:00 pace, but the damage was already done, I was pretty winded so any chance of speeding up in the last mile was all but lost.

The final stretch was pretty wide and flat (after just running over a somewhat sizeable hill). I gave it all my might and finished at a respectable 39:06, about 20 seconds short of a PR. My wife rocked her race and set a new PR for the 8k, so there was cause for celebration on her accomplishment.

The Course

I really enjoyed the set up. It was somewhat similar to last year’s Hot Chocolate race, taking us north to Grand, than pretty far west, south on Michigan Ave, and then finishing on Columbus (same as the Chicago Marathon Finish line). Since the roads were closed, everyone had the chance to make a notch for themselves and get into a rhythm without having to bunch up. I really enjoyed running over the bridges and looking down at the water. The other thing I enjoyed was just the sheer amount of people all along the route (especially, the perplexed tourists trying to get out of their hotels). There were also some great signs along the course such as “Do epic shit!” & “Worst. Parade. Ever!” I love this city.

Overall, this was a great race. It was well organized and a terrific route through the heart of the city. I’m really looking forward to next year, where I WILL get in Corral A.

2012 Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend Part 2

The alarm came fast and early Saturday morning as the day belonged to my wife, Devin who was running her first Donald half marathon and 2^nd half overall. She was still fighting a nasty chest cold and had been up most of the night (as was I ) with coughing fits. I planned to meet up with her folks and my mom (who were not staying on property) later in the morning, so I wished my wife luck as she sped out the door and slept in about an hour. At around 4:30 I got up, texted Devin to see if she made it to the race okay and got about my day. The lobby of the Wilderness Lodge is impressive even at its busiest points, but at 5am it’s incredible and quite cavernous. There weren’t many stirring about so I stopped and just enjoyed the tranquility of the lobby for a moment. As I walked outside, I realized a very serious problem staying where we did, there wasn’t any spectator transportation. I had planned to meet everyone at the TTC, so I started walking in the pitch blackness. If you’ve ever been to the Wilderness Lodge, it prides itself on being tranquil and not exactly on the “Diney grid.” Therefore, there was no walkway, only road. I tried to stay on the grass, but it was wet and cold, so I hugged the road. About 3 minutes into my walk a pickup truck pulled up behind me, it was a Disney security guard. “You aren’t allowed to walk on the road,” he said, “it’s dark and you might get hit. Where are you going?” I told him my situation and I was only going to the TTC. His response, “Well, you can’t walk.” Mind you, I was almost there. “Well,” I said, “you wanna give me a ride?” He then just drove off.  From what I’ve learned from my beyond extensive experience with WDW is if you ever meet with any castmember resistance, just explain common sense to them and they tend leave you alone.

I made it to the TTC no problem and met up with my mom. It was about the 6 mile mark and it was empty. It was also about 38 degrees out, yowza! My in-laws parked at Epcot and took the monorail over to meet up. We proceeded to wait until we started seeing the wheelchair racers come through and then the “elites.” I saw a few friends of mine, a couple of ROTE hats & shirts, and after a little bit saw Devin.  She looked good was happy to see us. After the fanfare, we hopped a monorail to the Magic Kingdom to see her again. I have to applaud Disney for opening up the MK early for folks to cheer on the runners, and seeing that castle in the morning had me pretty excited for my race on the following day.

 Unfortunately, for us, Devin was a little faster than I had expected and she had already passed by the time we got there. But, on the monorail trip to Epcot, I was able to pick her out on World Drive (having that pale, Chicago winter tan certainly helped). We caught up with her a few more times at Epcot and then it was all over. Devin had a blast and knocked 20 minutes off her previous half time!!!! The only hassle was trying to get out of the parking lot, it took over an hour. We all went back to Wilderness Lodge and had lunch and then all headed back to our respective hotels to take much deserved naps. 

Great job, Hon!

I had done my job as a husband, cheered on my wife and had a blast seeing her run. Now it was time to focus on my task at hand. I had to change gears and start mentally preparing for the monster that was less than 24 hours away. My focus was on a Finish Line, but 26.2 miles were in my way and they had something to say about it.

Disney World Announces A New Race.....

....well....er...sorta. You see, runDisney just announced (after their usual corny clue deal) starting 2012, the Tower of Terror 10 Miler would be back in the Vacation Kingdom on September 29th.  Well, wouldn't exactly be back. You see, the Tower of Terror 13k (~8 miles) had been a previous race which ran (from what I believe) from 2007-2009. For some reason it just vanished, much like the characters in storyline of the race's namesake. Ooooooooohhhhhhh scary stuff.

Anyway, I never had the chance to run, but I will be in 2012 and am excited to do so. If you have read my blog regularly (I thank you for your patience), you will have seen that I spent a great deal of my WDW tenure working within the Studios. You will also have known that the Studios kicked my ass during Wine & Dine. Well, it's payback. Granted, it's only 8 miles so it's a relatively quick race, but the park will stay open until 3am for us runners, that's a lot of Rock n Rollercoaster, Tower of Terror, and Great Movie Ride!

I'm really excited for this race as it will be a good last speed work exercise before Wine & Dine Half Marathon which has been moved back to November 9th (much cooler weather). Doing some interweb digging, I came across the course from the old ToT 13k. We'll see if it's the same.

Seems like during Wine & Dine we ran 8 miles all in the Studios. WWOS? Whatever.

So far the reaction to the news amongst the Disney runners is mixed. Most folks really wanted another half marathon, others wanted a Disneyland race. With it being so close to W&D and the race length (which should take about an hour), wonder how many folks will make the trip and pay the Disney premium?

RunDisney doesn't have much information yet, but I'll make sure to update this post as they update their info.

What are your thoughts? Are you psyched? Angry? Have you already cut a check to participate?

Walt Disney World Marathon is Getting Closer

Here we are in December, 30 days away from the Walt Disney World Marathon. My first full marathon to be exact. I can't say I'm counting down the days in excitement, rather counting the days to my inevitable collapse. Thanks to some rather severe knee issues I haven't been able to put in large mile chunks like I had wanted. Plus, the below freezing temps of the Midwest aren't making it easy for me. I'm really wishing I had signed up for the half like my wife. Well, I guess we'll see.

Anyway, the final instructions for the race are out, here are links:
Full Marathon
Full - Relay
Half Marathon
Goofy Challenge (If you're nuts) - Best of luck to my ROTE friends running this!

Plus, I'll be doing the fun run 5k. It's at Epcot and themed after the 3 Caballeros (bah)
Fiesta 5k

If you haven't gotten your waiver or bib# here's the link:
Bib # & Waivers

And if you want the official race program, well, here you go:
WDW Marathon Official Race Program

For those of you running, Best of Luck and one way or another I'll see you at the Finish line!

Always On the Run

Recently, I mentioned I have really gotten into running. Well, “gotten” into running is an understatement, I have really made it a near daily activity. It’s really one of the last ways to unwind from the fast paced day to day activities and an opportune time to clear my head of all things work and just run. I will admit though, there is more of an incentive than just the “me” time. This October my wife and I will be running our first half marathon at the Disney Wine & Dine Half Marathon in Florida. Secondly, I will be participating in the full marathon at Disney World in January. What other place would be better for your long run firsts than Disney? Needless to say, I’ve been training hard.

But that’s getting ahead of myself, maybe I should start at the beginning…..

Last October, my client at the time, sponsored a 5k in one of the Chicago neighborhoods. As a sponsor we received free entry to the run and thought it would be fun for the team to participate. So, I started running to get in shape, but not giving it that much effort since, when I was younger I was always the one of (if not the) fastest in sports, so I felt like I had an edge. Boy was I about to get an unbelievably rude awakening.

So race day is upon us. It’s a crisp, clear fall day with the temperature around 55 degrees (perfect running weather). The group meets up and sets off to the corral to start. Headphones in my ear with the quintessential running mix of perfectly cut motivational music to put me in the lead, I was confident, conditioned. I was ready.

Off goes the starting gun and we are underway. We started mid-pack, but quickly I was moving up the ranks, easily overtaking groups of runners at a time. 1 mile down, no worries, I had this thing licked. About 10 minutes into the race I started seeing runners coming back towards me on the other side of the street, to which I thought to myself, “The turnaround is just around the bend, making pretty good time.” Unfortunately, the turnaround was nowhere in sight and for quite awhile. Then it hit me, I was nowhere near the leaders of the pack.

“I must be near the turnaround since I’m getting so tired.” I pleaded to myself. All of a sudden, my chest started to feel like my heart was trying to escape, much like a person buried alive grasps at the coffin, and my legs started to act as if they were being possessed. I thought I was going to die. “Ugh, something must be terribly wrong with me!” I had to slow down to a walk losing precious spots against the runners and walkers I easily surpassed just moments earlier. There was a lump in my throat that made me gag every time I tried anything more than a brisk walk. This was embarrassing. All of the symptoms could have illustrated some type of injury – a pulled muscle, a broken bone, a stroke! Yep, it was none of those. Turns out I was severely out of shape and my ego just defaulted on a check that body certainly could not cash. So there I was stuck in neutral, feeling sorry for myself while falling deeper down the results page. I decided to walk just a little bit more and muster up whatever energy I had left to finish this sad 3.14 mile journey strong. I began to jog, which turned into a healthy run. I started feeling better. At the 2.75 mile mark I could see the finish and with all the energy I could summon in my worn out body, sprinted like a demon towards the end.

When the results were posted I viewed my time with a timid one eye open. 27:53. “Not bad. Not great, but not bad,” I thought to myself. Then I saw the winning time which was just a shade under 16 minutes. Bah! To get anywhere near that I was going to have to get serious, but it wasn’t the winning time that set me ablaze. TWO, yes, two of my colleagues finished ahead of me!!!! “No, no, this is all wrong,” I exclaimed, “I’m the fast one!” I was mortified. Here I was a shell of the athlete I was once fading into running obscurity even against my office mates. Granted, I have about 4 years on both of those guys and their times were marginally faster than mine, but I couldn’t let this happen. Call it ego or call it fear of becoming irrelevant, but right then is when I decided to get serious.


Post race.

Getting up and running (no pun intended) was actually pretty easy, staying motivated was the tough part. But after a few steady runs I saw the benefit of getting out and putting some miles behind me. What also helped was having a specialty running store near me to get the proper setup (yes, you should really get fitted for the proper shoes) and discuss best practices to running.

I’ve been consistently running for about a year now, except for 8 weeks off due to a stress fracture (which is being stubborn), and even my wife caught the bug. I highly recommend it as a good way to stay in shape and clear the cobwebs.