It’s official! We are Dopey! Great experience, but I am SO tired.
We lucked out and had absolutely perfect weather today – sunny, in the 50s and 60s, not too humid, and with a nice cool breeze. It was like running in San Diego. Really comfortable for running.
The course was the same as last year, so we had the lap around the Walt Disney World Speedway, and went all around the Wide World of Sports complex again. I didn’t think there were significantly fewer people in the marathon but the roads were less crowded, especially in the narrow parts, and the lines for character photos were shorter.
Before the race we gathered for one final team photo. (Thanks to Alex Armas for the photo.)
The walk to the corrals wasn’t even a shuffle this morning – we could just walk normally! That was really nice. We sat down in our corral to wait for our wave to start.
There were fireworks for all of the corrals, which was nice.
Our corral started about 25 minutes after the race started. We were at the front, which was nice.
Mile 1 – only 25.2 to go! (At mile 1.9 we were exactly half done with the 48.6 Dopey distance.)
I was running with my friend and teammate Linda, and we had a great time when we reached Magic Kingdom – the lines for most of the character photos weren’t too long and we stopped several times.
As I said the crowds weren’t too bad – even on “Cone Alley” as we call the one-lane section from Magic Kingdom to the Polynesian. We saw our friends Gail and Julian cheering near the Grand Floridian and stopped to say hello to them. They come out and cheer just about every year, and it’s wonderful to see them!
I saw several groups of Team AllEars runners out on the course – it was fun to run with them a bit.
Backstage at Animal Kingdom the keepers bring out some of the animals – that’s always fun. This adorable little owl is named Finn – but he wouldn’t look at the camera.
And I had to get my photo taken with Jiminy Cricket – he’s not a character you see very often.
Outside Animal Kingdom was Mickey Mouse!
The stretch from Animal Kingdom to Wide World of Sports is long and boring. Our Team AllCheers group always sets up a cheering section there – they are such a welcome sight!
As I was coming out of Wide World of Sports about mile 19 I found some familiar faces! Lee was running with a different group, and they had started in an earlier corral. They’d been having fun along the coast taking their time, and posing for photos – they even took a ride on Expedition Everest! So I was finally able to catch up.
They were having way too much fun, so I joined them for the rest of the race. At about mile 22 Eddie and Lee did pushups for Sarge. Lee was feeling so good he did clapping push ups.
We eventually made it to Epcot. Aladdin told me I needed to be careful, because Abu likes to steal shiny things. 🙂 I was surprised that there weren’t more characters out in Epcot – I only saw Aladdin and Mulan.
In Mexico we stopped and several of us got frozen margaritas. Let me tell you, that was a great way to end a race! 🙂
At mile 26 is my favorite sight of the race – the gospel choir. They sing us home.
No new wristband today – instead they gave us three medals! Clank, clank, clank. 🙂
The Dopey Challenge has been a really special experience, especially sharing it with teammates, and I’m glad I did it…but this may be a “one and done”. The lack of sleep really caught up with a lot of us today, I think.
The recap of the half marathon is still to come. For now I’m going to call it a night, and I’m very glad that I am NOT getting a 2 a.m. wakeup call tomorrow!
Congrats on your inaugural Dopey!!! Thanks for documenting all of the details of the races. It was fun to relive it and to see some of the runners from a different coral (didn’t see the dribbler – we had flamingos and a guy with a sousaphone).
Very cool Eddie and Lee got to do push-ups with Sarge. I have had it on my list for the past two years and it hasn’t worked out yet. Next year!
Heartiest congratulations on completing the inaugural Dopey!
Thx a mint for taking the time to write reviews on each race – the details and pics are much appreciated! Hope you will be able to note the driving/parking times for the half- and full- marathon days.
Laura replies: Thank you. By leaving our resort at 3:00 we had no traffic issues in driving to Epcot – I don’t think the entire trip from resort to parking space took more than 15 minutes on any of the race mornings. But I think if you drive you have to resist the urge to sleep in, because the traffic starts going up exponentially the longer you wait. You can always go early and then try to nap in your car – that’s better than sitting in traffic.
Congrats to you and Lee for finishing the Dopey (and to all the other runners on TeamAllEars). Having crossed that finish line in a race it’s a wonderful feeling of accomplishment!!
Question for you, how in the world do you keep your tiara on your head while running?
Laura replies: Hi Erin. How do I keep the tiara on my head? My smooth running style, of course. 🙂 Actually, it has combs on both sides that held it on pretty securely. But I also took bobby pins and put them on the band of the tiara and pushed them straight down into my hair. It really didn’t move at all, and I forgot that I was wearing it. Thanks for the good wishes!