Tinkerbell Half Marathon 2013!!!

I know that this post is super late, but better late than never, right?
If you are interested, you can check out my other blogs from the Tinkerbell Half Marathon weekend, so I'll start this one with the very early wake up call at 4:00am and I later realized this was too late, but more on that later.

I got ready, put my costume on and got my watch and fanny pack :) and off to the hotel lobby I went to wait for the shuttle. There were already a lot of people waiting, so I assumed that the bus was due any minute, but it took it forever to get there and time just kept going by. We thought that we were going to be late to the race, so some people started walking to the starting line. I really did not want to walk, so me and others still kept waiting. Finally the shuttle came, I was super happy, but then it ended up being the longest bus ride of my life. So this was the last shuttle of the morning and it was picking up from 4 different hotels and we were the first ones to be picked up. I guess the good thing is that we got seats on the bus, but it took probably another 20 minutes or so to actually get to Disneyland. We finally made it with 15 minutes to spare. I booked it to the staring line, and I mean I literally ran the whole way from the shuttle drop to corral "A" and I made it with 5 minutes to spare. I could not believe it. Needless to say I learned my lesson and did things a little different for the Princess Half. But wow, I could not believe I made it!

Finally off we went, the course itself was amazing at times, like when running through Sleeping Beauty's Castle and all through out Disneyland and California Adventure. Some of it was just okay, there was quite a bit of running through streets of Anaheim, some people were cheering us on in front of their houses, which was super nice and encouraging. I got a ton of pictures in the parks though, they were very nice at letting me use my own camera, they would actually have a cast member by the characters to just take pictures with your own camera and then a professional photographer. RunDisney thinks of everything, don't they?
I couldn't find anybody by the castle on Main street, so I just asked a guy with a baby stroller if he would take my picture and he totally did, so sweet! As I was coming around the castle to run through it I wanted to get a close up picture so I had my iPhone set on the front camera and was trying to take a picture of myself with the castle in the background and I saw another girl doing the same, so I just asked her if she wanted me to take picture of her and she could take a picture of me and she said "yes", that was awesome and super funny as we are both there trying to get decent pictures we could have just asked earlier :)

Unfortunately I didn't realize that the course ran right by our hotel, once I realized that I texted and called my husband to see if he could come down and cheer me on for a bit, but they were still sleeping and didn't get my message until it was too late. That was kind of a bummer, but nevertheless I kept going strong.

I did not see Mickey and Minnie around anywhere, I'm not sure if I just missed them or they weren't there altogether, oh well, I got some awesome pictures anyway. I had to take a picture of Lightning McQueen and Mater for my son Chase and he is super into Star Wars right now, so when I saw Darth Vader and the Storm trooper, that was another must picture for me. I think I stopped for all but one character picture and it was Princess Aurora and her Prince. I was super proud of my time for this race, considering that I stopped for about 9 or so characters for pictures and few for the castle and I actually stopped and asked an Anaheim police officer for a kids sticker (my son collects them) and it took them forever to find them. I finished with 2:28 I believe, you can check my "Race" page with all the details.

The finish was awesome, they had a marching band playing about a half a mile before the finish line, which got me super pumped up. The last of it was going around a parking lot, finishing with Donald, Mickey, Minnie and Goofy at the finish line. It was an amazing feeling to finish this race since this was why I started my running journey. Truly if I would have never found out about the runDisney races and if my husband would not have agreed to spend his vacation time on my runs, I would have never ever started running. I consider myself very lucky and fortunate to have had this opportunity and hope that my runDisney journey continues with many more runDisney races.

After the race they had runDisney foil blankets and the food boxes and lots of water, Gatorade and ice for you sore legs and knees.

I headed straight to the hotel since we were meeting one of our friends who is a Disney Cast member to let us into the park for FREE! I took a quick shower and got ready, put my much deserved medal on and off to California Adventure we went :)

XOXO
Keili

Neverland Family 5K and runDisney Kids Races 2013

I'm back with the runDisney Neverland Family 5K and Kids Races that took place in Disneyland and were part of the Tinkerbell Half Marathon weekend races.

These were my first ever runDisney races and since I was planning on getting my Coast to Coast medal, I figured that I might as well take part of all the weekend races, since we were going to be there anyway. Check out my other blog posts about the Expo and my videos on YouTube!

Both of these races took place on Saturday, January 19th, 2013. The Neverland Family 5K was at 5:45AM, I had set my alarm for 4:30AM, but I had all of my stuff ready from the night before, so I put my costume on and I was ready to go. I used the same costume that I had planned on wearing for the Tinkerbell Half Marathon. Unfortunately I had only bought one blanket with me and I wanted to save that for the Half Marathon, so I ended up using the Tinkerbell half marathon tech shirt that came with registration. It worked out perfect since it was a long sleeve shirt and it was a bit chilly in the morning.

I made my way down to the hotel lobby by 4:45AM, I was the first one there, but there were more people who came as we waited for the shuttle bus. It was nice that they had free rides all through the weekend. The shuttles were running every 20 minutes, so once it came it was a short ride over to Disneyland. I should have given myself a little bit more time, I didn't know how long I would have to wait for the bus, I think I must have just missed it, so I did end up waiting for 20 minutes or so.
The starting line was right by the castle, which was beautiful. It was all lit up purple and later on they had swirly designs playfully scanning across the castle. They didn't really have corrals assigned in this race, although they were calling out corrals A, B and C, we didn't have anything on our bibs. I made my way up to the front though, I though i was going to run it in about a half an hour. There were a lot of kids and families running, and since it was a Family 5K they did not time it. As I waited there they had a stage set up in front of the castle and had a pirate themed hosts keeping us entertained. Once we were almost ready to start they walked us a bit father up to the side of the castle where I could see the actual starting line. Sean Astin was in the front row, running this race as well and then the fireworks started and I was off.

The course was very easy, they had characters on the side of the road, just like I had heard about. They did not however have professional photographers by the characters, so you had to bring your own camera if you wanted to take pictures. They did have them on the course, so I got some cute pictures from the race in addition to my own. At the very end just before the finish line they had Mickey and Minnie waiting for you, I got my picture and to the finish I went.

 

It was still dark when I finished, I got my medal and my food box. They did have a cute Peter Pan reusable bag that you could put your stuff in, which was super helpful. I walked back to the bus stop where the shuttle had dropped us off and there was nobody there. I happened to come across a bus driver who said that the shuttle did not start going back until 7:20 and I was done with my race by 6:15sh. I most certainly did not want to wait there for an hour. I was disappointed in that they did not plan that better, they should have had some sort of transportation going back to the hotels. Oh well, I was a little frazzled by that and didn't really know how to get back, so I put the hotels name on my phone, but it took me in the wrong direction. I walked so far out of my way before I realized that this was not right, so I turned back around and just walked back to Downtown Disney were I knew how to get back to my hotel. It took me probably an hour to finally get back. My husband and son were still sleeping, so I took a quick shower and by that time they were up and off to Disneyland we went.
The Happiest Place on Earth - TRUE STATEMENT!

runDisney Tinkerbell Half Marathon weekend Expo 2013

I know this post is a little late, but being a Mom and having a full time job, doesn't really leave me much time for anything else. Here it is anyway, better late than never right.

We arrived in LA on Friday January 18, we live in Seattle so it was just a quick 2 hours flight or so. We flew into the John Wayne airport in Orange County which was wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy more convenient than LAX and it was much closer to Anaheim as well. Definitely recommend that if you are going to Disney. We got in about 10:00am and we had planned on spending some time at Newport beach and just hanging around that are for a little while. My little boy is a beach baby and he loves the water and the sand so much that he could spend all day playing in it and running around. The weather was beautiful and the sun was shining, so we spent a few hours at the beach and then rode the Ferris wheel and played some arcade games. After that we were ready to head for Disneyland.


We stayed at the Holiday Inn Anaheim, I thought the hotel was very nice and clean and much bigger than I thought. We got a great room with a Kings size bed and lots of room for Chase to play. We wanted to rest a bit, so we played some games and I unpacked a little and then I decided to go to the Tinkerbell Half Marathon Expo. My husband and son stayed behind, we were going to meet up at Downtown Disney and have dinner once I was done.

The hotel was walking distance to the Expo, which was held at the Disneyland Hotel. It was not at all crowded by the time I got there at about 4:00PM. I had to pick up my packets on Friday because I was running the Neverland Family 5K and my son was running the Kids races on Saturday morning before the expo opened. They had set everything up very conveniently, I walked downstairs first and that's where they had set up all of the packet pick ups. I picked up my Tinkerbell Half Marathon packet and shirt, then the Neverland Family 5K packet, then the Kids races packet and finally the ChEAR squad packet. That's where they also gave the pins and the necklaces if you had pre-ordered them, so I got all of my things and I headed upstairs. That's where they had the Official Merchandising area set up, the speakers and ton of other booths that sold all sorts of running related merchandise.

 

New Balance was there with their new runDisney running shoes, I wanted to buy them so bad, but they were kind of pricy at $125.00 and I just wanted to think about it and I figured since I was going to the Princess Expo a month later I would buy them from there if I still wanted them.

I looked around the booths, but nothing really stood out to me and I didn't want to spend too much money anyways, but I did want to get something from the official merchandise section. I ended up getting the Tinker Bell mug and the runDisney Mickey Vinylmation with the little Tinker Bell medal and the vinyl Mickey ears magnet.

Once I was ready to leave, right by the doors they had set up a little photo opportunity with the Tinkerbell Half Marathon background. They had cast members there taking your photo with your own camera, which was nice so you weren't forced to buy the photos, you can just use your own.

I had so many bags as I was leaving, I consolidated them all into one and off I went to meet my husband and my little boy. We had an awesome dinner at the House of Blues and went back to the hotel and crashed early. My race was at 5:45am the next day!!!!

 

Tinker bell Half marathon here I come!!!!

I finally registered for the Tinkerbell Half Marathon!!!! I'm so excited and cannot wait to go, next up the Princess half opens July 10!!!! In addition to the Tinker bell I signed up for the Never Land family fun 5k and the Kids races. My son will be 4 by the time we go, so he will be running the 200 meter dash, he is so excited about getting his own medal.

I'll be doing the Family 5k by myself, Chase is still too little and my husband is not a runner at all. In fact he probably won't even be there to watch since its so early, but oh well. I'll be dressing up as Tinker Bell and believe it or not, I'm already making/buying the pieces I need for it. That's how excited I'm about this race.

The reason I signed up for all of the races is that I don't know if I'll be running these races again. It is expensive and far for the three of us to go, so I'm taking advantage of it while there. I'll keep you posted as more info comes out. Registration is already 51% full so make sure you register if you want to race with us!!!!