Going the Distance... From Mile 1 to 26.2: A Marathon Weekend 2009 Trip Report

So it’s been four weeks since my boyfriend, Brett (27), and I (26) accomplished a goal we’d only dreamed about in the months leading up to our January 2009 trip… we finished the Walt Disney World Marathon :sohappy:!!!

For those of you who have read either of my first two (extremely long-winded) trip reports you are probably quite aware of Brett and I’s love for the Disney characters. And it might not shock you too much that our original motivation for tackling the miles was the thought of getting to meet all the rare characters found only on the race… that’s right, you read that correctly, we are two crazy people (non runners at that) who were willing to endure 26.2 miles of hell to meet a few characters. And since we’re talking about the underworld and all, I guess I should give Hades some credit as a motivator; he was our most sought after character (ever since we saw a picture of him high fiving finishers), especially for Brett!

To set the stage for this weekend, I should start at the beginning. A little over a year ago (December 2007), Brett and I set a goal to become more active, a new year’s resolution if you will, but we didn’t call it that. We started looking into Disney’s Endurance Series (because of the aforementioned characters) and decided that a half marathon (13.1 miles) was a manageable goal. February through May was spent teaching my body how to run, or rather jog. Seriously, in the beginning I couldn’t run one mile at a 12 minute pace without feeling like I was going to fall off the treadmill and die.

Once we made it over that hurdle we decided to go online and register for the event. Little did we know, the half marathon was already full and registration had closed! This was a huge dilemma. We had already set our sights on being a part of Marathon Weekend 2009 and we didn’t want to let it go. And that was when we started thinking marathon. I contacted my cousin for some advice. She and her husband are Ironman triathletes and she told me the distance was totally doable and she put together a marathon training schedule for us. For those of you unfamiliar with what an Ironman triathlon is, let me just tell you… it’s a beast. It consists of a 2.4 mile swim, followed by a 112 mile bike ride, and it wraps up with a 26.2 mile run. Crazy! Crazy! Crazy!

So we posted the run schedule and a copy of the course map on a bulletin board in the kitchen and began checking off the days. We also used a thumbtack to mark our journey along the map. I spent months visualizing this course, and during earlier WDW trips this past year in May, September, and December I thought about the miles we would cover while we were driving down the roads we would one day be traveling on foot.

We started out closely following the schedule until life and ITB knee pain got in the way. Okay, if I’m being honest some laziness and feelings of “I don’t want to run today, I’ll do it tomorrow” got in the way as well. Fast forward to the week before the marathon and our longest runs had only amounted to ten miles…. we were in trouble and very undertrained, but never did we consider backing out. Granted that might just show quite a bit of stupidity and stubbornness on our part :brick:!

And don't worry, the upcoming posts will include pictures!
 

mouselvrmom

Well-Known Member
Way to go, Holly! My hat goes off to you for tackling such a huge task! :sohappy:

Now you have me thinking about all the rare characters I could meet if only I could run a marathon. :lookaroun:lol:
 

TakeMeThere81

Well-Known Member
Awesome!! I CAN'T WAIT to read your trip report! I'm reaching toward a half marathon(perhaps the Princess one in 2010) so I can't wait to hear your report of running the full marathon(especially after only getting up to 10 miles-I can't wait to hear how you did it!).
 

HollyBelle

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Way to go, Holly! My hat goes off to you for tackling such a huge task! :sohappy:

Now you have me thinking about all the rare characters I could meet if only I could run a marathon. :lookaroun:lol:

Thanks, Jenn! I have a feeling you're going to like some of the pictures I post. While other participants goals for the marathon probably revolved around finish times, our hope for the marathon was that we would meet at least 10 new (or newly dressed) characters!! I know, I know, we're crazy people.

Awesome!! I CAN'T WAIT to read your trip report! I'm reaching toward a half marathon(perhaps the Princess one in 2010) so I can't wait to hear your report of running the full marathon(especially after only getting up to 10 miles-I can't wait to hear how you did it!).

You can absolutely do it:sohappy:!!! As for us finishing with long runs of only ten miles... sometimes I'm still shocked we did it. It really came down to determination and just putting one foot in front of the other!
 

HollyBelle

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day 1, Saturday January 10, 2009: Travel/Epcot/Sleep

So for this trip Brett and I decided to fly to WDW for the first (and last) time. We got a great deal on a flight and thought that this would be the way to go considering it was such a short trip and we might not feel like making the drive home after the run; plus we both like to fly, so we thought “why not?”

The night before our trip we went to my parents’ house which put us about 30 minutes closer to the airport. Even so, we still had to get up at an ungodly hour to make our flight. The plane touched down in Orlando around 11:30am and we quickly made our way to the DME counter. The check in line was rather long, but it moved pretty fast for its size. We were staying at Port Orleans Riverside and headed over to the resort queue, which we stood in FOREVER. We got on the bus and sat for another 20-30 minutes before taking off. Riverside happened to be the last of four stops once we got to WDW, which isn’t a big deal because someone has to be the last stop and the drop offs were actually quite quick. All told though, this was my first experience with DME and I was really perturbed with how long the process took. I’m certain my hunger and lack of sleep were huge factors in my impatient demeanor; however, we did not walk into our room until just after 2:30pm. It had taken us three hours to get there after we had gotten off the plane! Is this normal?!? If so, I had no clue DME took that long. I guess I need to not take advantage of the fact that we can drive to WDW!!!

DME signage:

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Here we are with Mickey and Tigger, bored in the airport and waiting to get to the happiest place on earth… they were the perfect mascots for the marathon:

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And our ride:

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Our Magical Express woes were forgotten as soon as we got to Port Orleans. One thing I will say for not having a car, is that it allowed us to wander around and experience the resort more fully then we probably would have if we'd driven. So after arriving, we immediately headed back out to the Wide World of Sports and packet pickup for the marathon. We did take some time to admire the resort as we headed to the front to catch a bus:

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This was our first time staying at Port Orleans Riverside and it definitely left a great first impression. The grounds are beautiful.

Next up… Marathon packet pickup!
 

canuckCM

New Member
Look forward to the rest! Random question, you weren't touring Epcot and stop to get some food in Canada did you? You look familiar, or I'm crazy.:wave:
 

HollyBelle

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Look forward to the rest! Random question, you weren't touring Epcot and stop to get some food in Canada did you? You look familiar, or I'm crazy.:wave:

Nope, wasn't me. Although I wish I was touring World Showcase these days, it's one of my favorite places at WDW!

Wow--I'm totally impressed with your desire to meet rare characters by running a marathon. I can't wait to read more!!!

It's okay, feel free to call it like you see it... we've got a little crazy in us :D!
 

HollyBelle

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
At the Wide World of Sports, we headed to the Milk House to pick up our registration packet which included our bibs, champion chips (which track our official time throughout the race), official marathon pin, and the Marathon Weekend program.

Program:

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From there we headed over to the expo to pick up our goody bags and official tech shirts. I was looking forward to finding out what other official merchandise they had and was disappointed to see that they had already sold out of all the shirts I liked in my size. I knew we were there on the last day of the expo, but it still really upset me. So we bought the small Marathon Mickey plush and were off. We didn’t spend much time wandering through the merchandise booths and instead headed back to the resort to drop off our loot and get over to Epcot.

Expo signage:

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Expo from above:

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Mickey Marathon Banner:

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We noticed many people at POR, the expo and later on at Epcot wearing their Donald Duck medals (meaning they completed the half marathon that morning) and it got me so excited! I couldn’t wait to get my Mickey medal! And I love the fact that people actually wear them around the parks during the days following the event!
 

HollyBelle

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
We knew we were going to take it easy once we got to EPCOT and decided a slow journey on Spaceship Earth was just the ticket. After our first of only three rides this trip :eek:, we headed over to the Land to pick up some muffins from the Sunshine Seasons bakery; we would need the carbs to fuel us at 3am! From there we headed to MouseGear to take a look around and burn a little time before dinner.

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I was really dragging from lack of sleep, so we finally decided just to head to Nine Dragons about an hour before our ADR to see if they would seat us early; it was no problem whatsoever. We had a delicious pre-race meal at one of our favorite restaurants where I felt bad for the server who had to refill our water glasses an insane number of times due to our hydration strategy… really though, their water glasses are quite small!

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After dinner it was back to the resort where we unpacked, set a wakeup call for 2:15 am, and laid out all of our necessities for the morning (if you can call 2:15am morning!). We were both out by 8:30pm and slept surprisingly well considering the excitement and nerves surrounding our first marathon.

Next up: MARATHON DAY!
 

myhappyplace

Crazy Cat Lady
ooh-Holly, I am seriously eager to read your report. As soon as I saw the title and saw it was by you, I thought, "was it a marathon of character greetings?" lol. Great report so far, and yay for you!
 

HollyBelle

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Great TR! I am doing the Half Marathon in Jan, and your TR has a lot of helpful info in it. :)

Yay :sohappy:! We might see you out there, we're contemplating the half for next year.

oh my, i am so ready to read more! great report.

More, more, more!!! :sohappy:

Thanks, ladies! Hopefully I'll get most of the race up over the weekend.

Wow, I've got "pre-race gitters" just reading your report! I want a medal too!:shrug:

That's right... the medal is quite a motivator! More than once during the run I had to remind myself that it was waiting for me at the end. You mentioned doing the Princess 1/2, I'm curious to see what the medal for it will look like; I don't even know if they've released it yet considering this will be its inaugural year!!

ooh-Holly, I am seriously eager to read your report. As soon as I saw the title and saw it was by you, I thought, "was it a marathon of character greetings?" lol. Great report so far, and yay for you!

Amber, you've got me all figured out! It is most definitely full of character greetings. And thank you!
 

HollyBelle

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Just to forewarn everyone… the marathon portion of this report is extremely long. I wanted to make sure I didn’t leave anything out, as this serves as a personal journal of the event for me, but I figured I’d share it in full just in case anyone was interested in all the details!

Day 2, Sunday January 11, 2009: Marathon/Port Orleans Riverside

For marathon weekend Disney contracts a ton of Mears busses to transport participants to and from all the events, and we were informed busses began pick up at the resorts at 3am Sunday morning and would make their final round at 4am. We had also heard that waiting until 3:45 or 4am might result in not making a bus. No way were we going to risk not making it to the starting line of our very first marathon… so we were on a bus at ten after three and it was a very quiet ride over to the starting point at Epcot.

Below is a map of the course (I scanned a copy from the program so it's not the best quality), which travels through all four theme parks (Epcot twice). In the beginning there are actually two courses that merge after the first 5K. Each course travels through different areas of Epcot and by the time it gets to the merge point, people should (in theory) be running with others at the same pace. We were on the Red Course:

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Another little note about the course… all runners/walkers had to maintain a 16 minute per mile pace throughout the marathon. If not, they would be picked up by the “sweepers” and transported to the finish line. Now, let me just tell you, in the months leading up to this my mind had envisioned many different ways we could be swept off the course. My favorite of which was probably Fantasia sized brooms looming in the background awaiting the opportunity to sweep me away. But now is not the time to be thinking of sweepers… now is the time to be thinking positive thoughts!

We entered the family reunion area in Epcot’s Wonder parking lot, which was essentially a holding tank for those of us waiting to get to the corrals. At least they had a little entertainment set up… if you could call it that. There was an 80’s band, the 80’s All Stars to be more precise (they must have been fresh out of original ideas when they came up with that one), trying to pump of the crowd with the likes of Madonna, Billy Idol, Devo, and Wang Chung!! The area also had an Official Merchandise tent (this one didn't have any shirts in my size either) and Runners Retreat tent; if you paid extra you could utilize this area until the start of the race. I believe it had comfortable seating and warmth, but I didn't go in so I don't really know for sure. Instead, we spent the time sitting on the ground, consuming our baked goods, drinking water, and discussing the characters we’d like to see out there.

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Brett’s knee strap with Goofy hanging on for dear life (I had bought a Stitch to join me on my fuel belt, but unfortunately, I had left him in the room that morning :cry:):

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Entertaining ourselves with the camera:

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After about an hour we headed through baggage claim to the runner’s only staging area (aka port-a-pottie central). At 5am we were escorted to the starting corrals; it felt like a leisurely half mile walk to get to where we were going. Oddly, we came across some Jungle Cruise boats and Studios Backlot Tour trams gathering moss along the side of the roads back there :shrug:. We made a pit stop at the last cluster of port-a-potties and then headed into the F corral, which I believe was for those who claimed a 6 hour finish time.

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Here we are, freezing a bit just minutes before the gun, after ditching our throwaway clothes (which Disney donates to charity):

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I don't recall being very nervous as we were waiting for the marathon to start; I was actually quite calm. I just remember thinking to myself that I had signed up for this and it was a challenge I was going to embrace. We had no time goals other than to finish, but we thought we could do it in about six hours.
 

HollyBelle

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
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The starting line festivities were underway as we were closing in on 6am. We sang the National Anthem and my heart raced as the countdown began… 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1!!!!

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As we took off they were playing a version of the “Celebrate You” song that is paramount to the 2009 WDW marketing campaign and at the risk of sounding corny, I have to admit it was one of those moments I’ll never forget… I really felt like absolutely anything was possible; it was empowering. Every time I hear the song now it takes me back to the beginning of our journey.

Mickey and the gang sending us on our way:

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It took us about 3-4 minutes to cross the starting line and begin running. We tried settling into a comfortable pace but it was difficult because of the crowd, and we didn’t want to weave in and out. We certainly did not want to add to our overall distance. Before we knew it we were upon the first Sharpie Mile Marker; it felt like it took two minutes to get there, not twelve.

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After the first mile we began a large loop to the left and under an overpass where a local radio station was set up, playing “Who Let the Dogs Out” and calling for different groups of people to identify themselves… Floridians, Goofy Racers, Canadians, First Timers… you name it. Excitement was all around us! There was also a lady on the other side of Brett who was seriously walking at a pace faster than our run… and I’d say she was barely over 5 feet tall! It was impressive, and we had a good laugh at our own expense.

We finished the curve of the underpass and headed through the toll booths marking the entrance to Epcot. There were cast members all around telling runners to watch their step around the curbs as they went through the area.

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Next up was Mile Marker 2… and soon we were heading down the tram lane with Spaceship Earth rising ahead of us in all her beauty. My knee was already starting to bother me at this point, which scared me because it had never hurt this soon into a run. I stopped to put my knee strap on and made a mental note that it was going to be a very long day.

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HollyBelle

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Once we entered the park and were running amid the Leave a Legacy pillars, I was startled by No Doubt… never in my life did I think I’d hear “Hella Good” as I made my way into the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow!! Brett actually commented on it and we laughed at the absurdity and ridiculousness of it all. We headed around SSE to the right and made our way towards World Showcase. When we got there all the countries were lit up and the torches were glowing as they do during Illuminations… it was a very inspiring sight at such an early morning hour. Later Brett told me that this was his favorite park experience throughout the race.

We made a left towards Mexico and passed Mile Marker 3:

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At this point we veered off the course and headed into the bathrooms outside the Odyssey building. Back on the course and approaching Mexico, Brett spied two chipmunks and a puppy in ponchos! Yay! This was the reason we were here. Our first character meet and greet just so happened to be with three of my very favorites:

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I apologize for the photo quality of all these night pictures. They came out quite grainy as Brett was carrying our older digital camera throughout the race.

Next up was a real surprise, Ariel (on two legs!) and Eric outside Akershus:

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On the other side of the course we could see Mushu and Mulan but decided to pass them up since they can easily be found in the park on any given day. From here we exited Epcot between Norway and Germany and made our way through some backstage areas until our course merged with the blue course and we all came upon Mile Marker 4:

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Notice all the shoe reflectors behind the sign; those are the people waiting in line for the port-a-potties. That’s why we made sure to utilize the park bathrooms as much as we could. You could lose some serious time in those lines. And we wanted to make sure any extra time we had was spent in character lines!

At the water station after mile four, Brett and I took our first gels. We had five apiece and our fueling plan was to take one every hour throughout the race. After this water stop, I realized we were on the loop back around to the starting line on World Drive. At Mile Marker 5 it was obvious that we had been here before. Although this time around, the newness and excitement of the marathon was beginning to wear off and the reality of what lay in store for the next few hours was beginning to sink in.

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Somewhere between miles 5 and 6 we came across an aid station with volunteers handing out biofreeze (a stronger form of bengay, if you will)… and I was ready for it. How sad? Only 5 miles down and I’m already trying to numb the pain! We also came across some festive volunteers who were trying to pump the crowd up and encourage runners to keep on moving. Here’s a blurry shot Brett took as he was running:

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On to Mile Marker 6 and the exit ramp to World Drive:

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Once we reached the bottom and made the turn north towards the Magic Kingdom I looked up to see all the people behind us heading across the bridge. It really was an amazing sight. Now that we had three lanes people began to spread out and it made it much easier to run. We went through another water stop before coming upon one of the many high school marching bands, who as you can see were standing amid a slew of empty paper cups.

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Next up was Mile Marker 7:

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By this point my knee was really bothering me. The pain had worsened after making our way down the banked ramp so Brett and I moved to a run/walk plan. He was still feeling great and did a wonderful job motivating and encouraging me. Sometime after Mile Marker 7 I heard a whooshing noise. It took me a second to realize what it was because I was so focused on running, but once I noticed the monorail making its way down the track, it hit me that we were getting closer to the magic. I can imagine what a sight it would have been to look down from up there and see all the runners making their way to the Magic Kingdom.
 

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