This was my first “real” day of running. Once again my dad and I arrived pretty early, we hopped on a bus just after 4am and it was cold but not
as cold as the previous morning so people were a bit more lively in the pre-race
area. My dad made a beeline for coffee as I went off to meet up with my friends for the race. I was running with my
Australian friends, starting in corral A, so I wouldn’t have
to wait around as long letting my legs get tired and cold as I did the day before. It also meant that
were were dressed up as Anna, Elsa, and Olaf which was super fun and people
seemed to really appreciate our outfits.
With the countdown from Rudy and some festive fireworks,
we were off! We took the run at an easy pace and stopped for some fun
characters. At the first stop a runDisney photographer came up and asked us to
stay with the White Rabbit for a picture that would end up on Facebook, but
then it never ended up there. Bummer.
We ran, chatted, got some pictures and had a really great
time. We didn’t run into too many crowded areas (again we were in the first
corral so our experience is different than others) and we finished in 1:09. The course is okay. Not great but just okay and it’s very similar to the 5k course. The first 3 miles are pretty much all outside the park on the roads around Epcot.
Characters on the course included:
- Anna and Elsa – standing on an overpass
- White rabbit – Just before the bend on the highway outside Epcot
- Lilo and stitch – Just after the White Rabbit
- Mushu – China
- Genie – Moracco
- Mickey – Boardwalk EPSN Club
- Tweedles – International Gateway
- Chip and dale – Epcot West breezeway
- Large puppets – backstage before exiting Epcot to the finish line.
We got our medals and then went to walk through the Dopey
tent but nothing happened there. We just walked through. We weren’t really sure
what was going on or how they were verifying the races. We grabbed our snacks
and then headed back to our respective resorts to shower and nap.
