Welcome...to the Disney Princess Half Marathon!

Would you believe that I'm going to start my blog with a post about the fairy godmother of all half marathons...the Disney Princess Half Marathon?! I haven't yet gotten into all of my reasons for running and my struggles with starting to run at age 41 but we have time for that later! So I'll start with the big guns!

Disney Princess Half Marathon

Part 1 - History and the Expo

  When I decided to sign up for the Princess Half Marathon (PHM) I'd only done one 5K at that point. How crazy is that??? I don't know what made me think that a half marathon would be a good idea but it was Disney after all, right?? It's got to be a magical 13.1 miles! And after I did something stupid, I decided that misery loves company and I told my friend/co-worker Amanda that she should sign up as well! And she DID!! So we began our PHM journey together. We kept each other in check, talked about how our runs went, complained and whined about various injuries (I ended up with a tibial stress fracture and Amanda did some time in a boot!) and became obsessed with all things running.

The day finally came when we were to make our way to Disney. We spent three nights before the race and one night after at Disney's Pop Century resort. We arrived on Thursday, just narrowly missing a giant snow storm that would have delayed us. The first thing on our agenda was to hit the expo! The expo is where you pick up your race bib (the number that you pin to your shirt while you run), the shirt that you get when you run, any other information pertaining to the race and my favorite part...vendors!!! We were very excited to do some shopping! We lined up very early so we could be on the first bus to the expo and once we arrived, the lines to get in were crazy long but eventually we made it to the front. The expo was held at the Wide World of Sports in previous years but this year it was held at Coronado Springs resort.

When we got there, the first booth we saw was Raw Threads. They have lots of cool running shirts/gear here. Amanda had pre-ordered a Rapunzel shirt so we stopped to pick it up. As you can see, it wasn't super busy here at that point.

We then made a beeline for the runDisney merchandise. This area, my friends, was nuts and it proceeded to get worse the longer we were there. I really surprised myself by only getting an "I Did It" shirt and a 13.1 Mickey ear magnet for my car. I'm the world's worst impulse buyer so you should really be proud of me. Here is the crowd inside the runDisney merch area and it wasn't bad...yet.







And here is the checkout area. There is a long winding checkout line to the right and the cashiers are to the left.

After that we went to explore the rest of the expo. I bought some cute little charms to attach to the laces on my running shoes, I bought a baggie full of little Biofreeze packets (have you tried Biofreeze? If not you totally should! It really helps my aching muscles and I use it before and after I run), and seeing as I'd managed to sign up for another Disney half marathon before I'd even completed this one I needed something for my next costume. So for my next race, I went to the Team Sparkle booth and I got a Minnie Mouse type skirt! Seen here when we ate at Cinderella's Royal Table inside the castle the next morning.

We then went to pick up our race bib's. The process was easy and painless. I love the expo! Here is a photo of what the bib pickup area looked like - no lines, in and out in a flash! Pretty cool, huh? Please remember this as we're in for quite a shock.

After this I needed to hit the Runner Relations booth to submit my 10K time that would hopefully move me up into a corral that was closer to the front and I also needed to pick up my wristband for the race retreat (which I'll talk about later). Amanda didn't have to do either of these things so she went to get in line for the next step in the process which was to pick up the bags that contained our shirts, race programs, buttons, pins, etc. This area was in a completely separate end of the room. I stood in a short line to show my 10K time. I had a printout with me and I showed it to the young girl who seemed a bit confused by my printout. She said "What time are you shooting for?" and I said "2:20" and she placed a Corral B sticker onto my bib! Corral B is what I was hoping for. I then got my race retreat wristband in another area and then I went to pick up my bag.

Can you imagine my shock when I saw this??

It may not look THAT bad but trust me, it was. This was about 10 or 15 minutes into my wait. There were no lines and it was a knock down, drag out fight to make your way to the front. See that girl with the headband on? She writes one of my favorite blogs, Running with Sass and I got to talk to her for a little bit which was super cool! Anyway, I kind of stayed behind her and made my way to the front. My phone started to die and I knew that Amanda was somewhere in that mess of a bag pickup. So I got out of there and it turns out that Amanda was still in there and they cleared everyone out so they could start making some tape lines on the floor and to start directing people. So she was stuck there for a long time while they did that. So she was in that area for a super long time.

While I was waiting for Amanda I looked around the expo a bit more. For a brief second I contemplated getting the Minnie Mouse themed New Balance running shoes. But then I saw this line for them and I decided that I didn't need them! 



The expo probably would have been fine if not for the cramped and crowded runDisney merchandise booth and also the jumbled maddening mess of a bag pickup! I have one more comment to make about this. Do you see the tiny area for the bag pickup? Go ahead and look at that photo again, I was in the very back up against a vendor table when I took that photo so you can get a sense of how small that area is. Now look at the other side of the room that they have designated for bib pickup, runner relations, and packet pickup for the kids races and 5K. (Ok, it's not letting me upload that last photo but you can see the bib pickup photo above). But trust me, it is at least half of the room, it's a gigantic spacious area that is not crowded and not being used at all!! Why not make that that bag pickup area because it's so huge? Or at least make that area smaller so the rest of the expo can be bigger.  I think the real fail here, is if they choose to send 20some thousand racers to this expo in a smaller venue and then they aren't able to utilize the space in an efficient manner.

I don't want to leave my first blog post on a negative note. Eventually I found Amanda and we got the heck out of dodge! We went to the Polynesian for a Dole Whip and then we met a fellow runner at the Grand Floridian for afternoon tea which was absolutely delightful! We felt a great sense of accomplishment once we got out of the expo and we were ready to enjoy two days at Disney before the race!