And Dopey Begins: Day 1 5k

Family Fun 5k

The first race I ever got my husband to run was the 5k that runs in conjunction with the Wine and Dine, the first RunDisney event I had ever done.  I was so thrilled when he agreed to run with me, as he often says that he does not run.  Since then he has done three (now four after this race), all of which have been RunDisney races.  I’m pretty impressed he does these races with me, as getting up early isn’t really his favorite thing, but I’m glad he does!

That being said, we got up super early and were at the bus stop in All Star Sports a few minutes before the four, when the first bus was supposed to leave.  There was room on the bus that was already waiting, so we got on in our groggy states and I snapped an early morning traditional selfie. 

We got to the race start pretty quickly, which is nice.  I often hear horror stories of how hard it is to get to Disney races with traffic and such, so I make it a point to get on one of the first buses.  We got off the bus and wandered around what we thought was the staging area for a bit.  Turns out that was were the finishing festivities were, but we weren’t really sure.  It started misting/raining so we took cover in one of the gear drop off tents that wasn’t being used for the 5k, and I hunted down a piece of plastic to wrap my phone in, since I was unprepared and didn’t want it to get wet.  Luckily the rain was short lived and we went to the corral without getting soaked. 

I was a little disappointed that they didn’t have any characters at the starting line for this race.  Both Mickey’s Jingle Jungle 5k and the Royal Family 5k had characters that we wasted some time waiting in line for.  Nothing here.  I thought that was odd.

We went to corral A and waited toward the back, knowing that was how they would release us and walk us to the starting line.  While we were waiting there, Z noticed that there weren’t too many 5k bibs around us.  I think we saw like three of them, all of the rest were Dopeys. 

It is always exciting when they release the corral to go to the starting line.  We walk past all of the other corrals and they all start cheering for us as we walk by.  It gets me really excited to run the race.  The National Anthem singer was good, a few people spoke, then Pluto made his appearance and we were OFF!

The first mile to a mile and a half were pretty boring, through parking lots and such.  Z get telling me to go ahead if he was too slow.  He had a terrible cold for a few weeks leading into the race and had little training.  For some reason he thought I would be worried about my time since Dopeys were being officially timed.  But I insisted on staying with him and helping him pace. 

 

Entering the park is always fun.  You come in at the World Show Case and it’s always so pretty, looking at the building and architecture.  They started characters right away, with Dopey being the second one, but we didn’t stop.  Z was really hoping for a decent time, despite having little training, so I ran straight through with him without taking character stops.  Besides, the Dopey line was already really long and I can never convince myself to get in line for pics during a race if it’s going to take too long. 

 

We were doing awesome, Z was on the way to blasting his PR, but then his knee started hurting.  It could have been from the fact that he was wearing new running shoes that weren’t broken in (his luggage was STILL in Tampa), which he bought at the expo.  They didn’t have the kind he usually wears so he tried one that was similar.  Regardless of what caused it, it slowed him down a bit in the last mile.  As we ran by Spaceship Earth and out of the park to the finish line he was hurting really bad, and when we crossed the finish line he JUST MISSED breaking his PR.  Stupid knee. 

They keep you moving after races, even after the 5k. so we got food, stopped for finisher pictures (which is always a pain because you already have water and food in your hands), and then stood in line for pictures with Pluto and Donald.  

We left shortly after that as we had breakfast reservations at Cape May, one of our favorite buffets, and wanted to shower before we left.  There was a pretty long line for the bus when we arrived.  The buses were moving pretty quickly and as soon as one bus was full and moved out, another one quickly took its place, so we were on the road pretty fast.  Overall, a very good race morning!

In case you missed it, Part one and two of my Dopey series:

Getting to the race was a challenge in itself!
Shopping Spree at the Expo

Expo: one of my favorite pre race activities!

I was relieved that we managed to get in to Orlando Tuesday night so that we could be there right for the start of the expo.  Not because I desperately wanted the Disney New Balance shoes (as awesome as I think this year’s are), but because I’ve become quite obsessed with the track jackets that Disney has.  So that is always my first stop upon arriving at the expo.

Staying at All Star Sports was nice because they had the special events bus that took you to the expo, as well as the normal bus that travels to ESPN.  We actually took the normal bus, which got us there earlier than the other one would have, and we were pleased to see that the expo had appeared to open earlier than we had anticipated.  We wanted to get in, get our usual stuff done, and head out to enjoy our day in the parks.

First off, let me say that I thought the expo was decently arranged.  I have done two Wine and Dines and one Princess at WDW prior to marathon weekend.  Both Wine and Dines have been at ESPN, and neither have been an issue.  The Princess last year was at Coronado Springs, which I thought was quite a failure.  There just wasn’t enough ROOM the way they had it organized there.  So I was quite happy to be back at ESPN.  They had a few areas set up just for race pick up items, a separate building to get a ticket number for the New Balance shoes, and a whole arena for vendors. Personally I thought it was pretty well arranged.  The only thing I can truly say is that they could have used more direction signs, because many people seemed lost.

Modeling my new spring jacket!

We swung by the merchandise area, which was still pretty dead when we got there.  I wasn’t overly impressed by the selection this year, not that it kept me from buying stuff!  I got a Dopey track jacket, but it was very simple and not really up to the standards that I had expected from Disney.  Just a small left chest logo, nothing on the sleeves.  I bought it since it was the inaugural one and had said I was getting it prior to arriving, but was a little disappointed in the design.  I also bought a marathon one, as it had a little more personality with some white detailing on it.  They also had a red Dopey jacket that was a little thicker, more like a spring jacket.  It had a hood that zippered into the collar when not in use.  I got that, too, since I actually don’t have any great spring jackets.  I ended up using it a lot on our trip, since the temps were so cool, so I think it was a good purchase.  

They also had the usual “I did it “ shirts, a marathon hoodie (no Dopey, though, which made me sad), a nice coffee mug, a water bottle, magnets, and different style tech shirts for the races.  I saw the Run Disney Tutus, but those are definitely not my thing.  Once again I was also disappointed that they didn’t have any 5k merchandise.  My husband comes down and always runs the 5ks with me, and I would love to get him a nice 5k tech shirt, or SOMETHING, commemorating the race.  But they never have anything. 

The packet pick up was sorted by race type (IE Goofy, Dopey, Marathon only, etc), but I had done the Runners World Challenge, so I had my own place to go.  The line was only consisted of a few people, and it was nice that they had a few people walking around outside their pick up booth who were talking to us, asking how we felt, about our training, etc.  It made the wait go faster.  My husband went off to pick up his 5k bib and Chear Squad stuff, and met me back there.  I was happy to get everything in one spot, except my commemorative pins, which I went to pick up at another nearby booth. 

After that we headed to the main expo area with all of the vendors.  My husband needed to purchase some clothes as his suitcase was still missing (the Tampa airport still hadn’t gotten back to us about having his luggage, even though they were the ones who called US), as well as running shoes for the 5k.   The Champion section had some nice sales, so he got a decent amount of clothes for a good price, and he found a pair of Asics that he liked as well.  I also prepaid to get my medals engraved at the expo.  I think it takes some of the hassle out race day if I don’t have to worry about having money on me to get a medal engraved at the end of the race.  You just walk up, give them your name, and they find your payment info and get you done quickly.   We wandered a bit, but decided it was time to leave and enjoy some time in the parks.  I had fastpassed some things at Hollywood Studios for that day, so we wanted to make sure we had time to go back to All Stars before heading out to there. 

 

Overall I thought expo day was easy, and I was pretty pleased with my purchases.  I was slightly disappointed with what Run Disney had to offer for merchandise as far as clothing, but I also enjoyed finding a water bottle and coffee mug.   Luckily I had enough money put aside just for the expo, so I was able to buy everything that I wanted.  I was also happy we got there early, because we really didn’t have to wait in any long lines and were able to get in and out pretty easily.  It was starting to pick up when we left, so our timing was good.  However, if we had wanted the shoes, I guess we would have needed to find our own ride there about two hours before we had actually got in line to leave our resort.  Glad I’m not that into those!

Thanks for reading and stay tuned for my 5k report!

In case you missed it, Part one of my Dopey series:

Getting to the race was a challenge in itself!

A few bumps in the road on the way to Disney...

All the training was done, everything was packed, arrangements were made for my dogs, so everything should have been set.  Wrong.  Mother Nature decided to mess with us and make it particularly difficult to get to the race that I had been dreaming about and working towards for months.

"Mommy, don't leave me!"

We started getting wind of the bad weather over the weekend.  We were set to depart early on Tuesday morning, and Saturday night was predicting some pretty rough weather to hit our area starting Monday evening.  My husband kept assuring me we'd be fine, but when I woke up Monday the forecast became extremely grim and I started to full out panic.  I asked my boss if I could leave a day early, and he thankfully agreed to let me go.  Zach was also able to get out, so we booked a new flight and headed to the airport as it started snowing harder, hoping that our plane would still get out.  Our flight was one of the few that hadn't been cancelled yet, and walking through the vacant airport was a tad eerie.

Our flight didn't end up getting cancelled until around 6pm.  We were devastated, but were able to get a full refund as they told us the next day they'd be able to get us out would be SATURDAY (um, that would blow every race but the marathon!)  We hadn't cancelled our Tuesday morning Southwest flight yet, so we wandered over to their ticket agent and were then informed that they had already cancelled that flight.  We decided to rebook through another airport and would just start driving.

We rented a car and hit the road.  It was pretty dicey, but we really thought we'd be able to get past the blizzard and be fine.  We didn't realize how bad it really was.  It was white out conditions at times with the strong winds, so there were times I would just stop driving and wait out the wind.  It was hard to see due to the snow, wind, and darkness, so I spent the time following tire tracks and driving down the middle of the road so I wouldn't go off the road like the other cars we had seen.  A few police officers helped light our way and guide us down the road, but they would stop and wave us on if we came to a disabled vehicle.  The road we wanted ended up being closed, and the firefighters waved us in a different direction.

We drove three hours to go what would normally take 45 minutes, and ended up calling it a night, staying at a hotel right on the Interstate.  We would leave after some sleep in the morning.  Naturally, I couldn't sleep, and spent the night looking at other airports and flights since I knew we wouldn't make our new flights.  I called Southwest and they fought me a bit on switching, but eventually switched us to an airport that was only about 30 minutes from where we were.  After watching the weather, checking the airport website to see that all flights were still scheduled, and reading some news sites we decided that this airport seemed far enough out that it wasn't getting hit hard by snow, and would be our best bet to get out.  Then, while watching the flight status, I noticed ANOTHER flight to Orlando opened up, so I ended up booking that, too.  I figured if I had two options to get us out, we'd have a better chance of leaving.  Since it was Southwest, we'd just get travel vouchers for a future flight for the one we didn't use.

We set out early to the airport.  The driving was rough for the first half of the drive, but cleared up and was easy after that.  We laughed at how close we had been to being out of the blizzard, had we just pressed a little farther the night before.  We dropped our rental car off and prepared to wait and hope in the airport.

Our flight ended up getting delayed, which made me really nervous and I tried to nap, but it was a no go.  It wasn't until we were actually sitting on the plane, MOVING, that I began to relax.  Finally, we were on our way!

You'd think that'd be ALL that could go wrong.  Wasn't that enough for two people?  Nope.  As soon as we landed, I turned on my phone and had a message saying that my luggage had decided that it would rather go to Tampa instead of Orlando.  GREAT.  At least all my race stuff was in my carry on. I supposed I could handle it.

We went to the baggage area and Zach went to wait for his suitcase while I stood in the baggage line.  A while later he appeared with MY suitcase.  So it was HIS that was missing.  Not good, as he hadn't brought a carry on.  We went through the process of filing a report and headed to Disney's Magical Express, me with my huge carry on and suitcase, Zach with nothing.  We kept making repeated calls to Tampa's baggage to tell them where to ship the bags, but there was no answer so I left about a billion messages.

That night we went to Downtown Disney, even though we arrived at the All Star Sport Resort around 9:30 pm and were EXHAUSTED.  We hunted for some clothes, but Zach decided to wait until the race expo the next morning, thinking he might be able to find some cheaper clothes there while he waited for his suitcase to arrive.

I can honestly say that no bed every felt as good as the one at All Star Sports when we finally went to bed for the night.  It was quite a stressful trip down, but we were both relieved to have arrived and would be able to attend the expo the following morning right when it opened, as planned.

It was a relief to be there!!!

Next post will talk about the expo and 5k!  Stay tuned and thanks for reading!!! :)