Disney Marathon Weekend 2012

So Much for Posting on the Blog everyday!! Life gets in the way sometimes. Had a great fun event filled weekend. Thursday Night arrived at Disney World....My Happy Place. Diane picked up our packets for us. YEA!! Diane!! My shirt was too big. Yea for losing weight boo my shirt looks awful on me.


Friday hopped on a bus at 4:30am  ET  Ran/Walked in the Three Caballeros Fiesta 5K with two other caballeros Dellaine and Diane. Went back to the room to change and off to the Expo to see if I can exchange my shirt. YES!!! The sweet girl exchanged my Large for a Medium. YIPPEE!!! Then I bought a goofy training 2013 shirt. No going back now.

We didn't have time to go to the rest of the expo b/c we had to hop a bus to the Animal Kingdom Lodge for our Mystery Tour. Found out it was an Ultra exclusive V.I.P. behind the scenes tour of all four parks in 8 hours. WOW!!!It was amazing!! A fun and tiring day. There was a group of 10 of us. We all had a blast.  We were first in line to every ride. We got to pass every one in line including the fast pass people. No wait ....Now that is the way to do Disney!! We didn't take time to eat so I grabbed a snack and survived from 4am until 7:30pm on two bananas, a power bar, a bowl of fruit, a sprite and a water. The day before a Half Marathon. Im sure they would have let me go get something to eat but I didn't want to cause the group to have to wait on me. But by the end of the day I was feeling nauseous and tired. We logged 12.40 miles on Friday!!


Saturday the Half Marathon. I was in total panic attack mode. I knew I had to keep a 16 min mile pace including stops. I had planned on wearing the event shirt but it was hot and itchy. Plan B was to wear a cute Donald Shirt over the black shirt I wore during the 5K. Lucky it was cold during the 5K and I didn't sweat. Well the tour ran long and no time to find a shirt. So my only other option was to wear the Goofy Training Shirt I bought to "Train" in. But technically I am in Goofy Training b/c Im gonna have to train all year. Next the knee socks I brought were white with navy polka dots. So cute with the event shirt that I wasn't wearing. They didn't match the Goofy training shirt so I couldn't wear them. I know craziness. The knee socks are like compression socks and when I tell you they make my legs feel so good and not hurt during a race wearing the socks. But matching was more important. Yes I know its crazy talk. So Im wearing the shirt from the 5k the day before under the "Training" shirt that was supposed to be for training, no knee socks b/c they don't match. No Hammer Gel b/c I wanted choc or vanilla and Im out. I was going to get some at the Expo but never made it. And it was my time of the month on top of all of that so that meant for sure at least one bathroom stop during the race. I woke up with a head ache prob due to not enough water the day before (I only had two bottles) and no caffeine.
Charged my ipod and accidentally left it on the bed. Nothing was going my way but I vowed to be positive in 2012 and thats what Im going to be. I knew I needed to finish in under 3:30 to qualify for coast to coast challenge. I was just going to have to resist character photos and run in the areas where there wasn't so much congestion of people. I did take a few pics...I had to. Dellaine gave me a gu pack and I headed off to my corral D.  The race started as I waved at my friend Rudy at the start line. Never finding Katrina who in my same corral.  By zig zaging around people I added distance to my garmin so my watch would beep for a mile before the mile sign on the course. By mile 10 my calf started hurting when I would run so I was having to walk. Well my normal walk pace is 16.30 and I needed to be under 16. I forced myself to run a little even though it hurt. The pain went from my calf around my knee and into my thigh. I stopped at the next medic tent. Took some ibuprofen and rubbed my leg down with biofreeze and prayed. My watch said 3:15  when it got to 13.1 but at the finished I was actually 3:20 and Ill take it. My fingers were so swollen. I qualified for coast to coast challenge.

Went and rested my leg then got ready for the day. Didn't get to meet up with my friends from the cruise b/c we ran out of time. We went and met the Watkins for Katie's Birthday. Rode Cinderella's Carousel at Magic Kingdom which I haven't ridden since I was like 10. We went in a few stores then off to Down Town Disney. Katie wanted to eat at Fulton's Crab shack. It was yummy and my first visit there! Got back to the room and we had logged 21 miles for the day. WOW no wonder my leg hurts.

Sunday slept in and flew home instead of a direct hour and a half flight we flew two hours to Baltimore Washington (a new state on my list) then two hours to Alabama.  So Disney Tired!! As we waiting on the Magical express to pick us up everyone is coming back from the marathon with Goofy and Mickey medals. I felt so insignificant with "just" a half marathon medal. I had total "bling envy-itus" of all the marathoners and goofy challengers. I said I would run the Goofy Challenge 2013, bought the training shirt, wore it during the half marathon and had my photo taken in it and to seal the deal caught a case of "bling envyitus" So 2013 Goofy Here I Come!!!