Disney's Princess Half Marathon Weekend - February 22-24, 2013

[Melanie]

Disney's Princess Half Marathon Weekend -
February 22-24, 2013

Events:
Princess Half Marathon - Sunday, February 24
Royal Family 5K - Saturday, February 23
Kids Races - Saturday, February 23

As of February 12:
Disney's Princess Half Marathon – Sold Out
Disney's Princess Half Marathon - 2 Person Team – Sold Out
Disney Royal Family 5K – 98% Full
runDisney Kids Races – 91% Full

Event Costs:
Disney's Princess Half Marathon Sold Out
$140 by September 25, 2012
$155 between September 26 and November 13, 2012, and during the Run Like a Princess Sweepstakes Flash Sale until 11:59 PM ET on Tuesday, November 20
$170 on or after November 14, 2012

Disney's Princess Half Marathon Team Category Sold Out
$280 by September 25, 2012
$310 between September 26 and November 13, 2012
$340 on or after November 14, 2012

Disney Royal Family 5K
$55 per participant
$60 per Stroller Walk division participant

runDisney Kids Races
$10 per Kids' Dash participant
$25 per 1-Mile Run participant

Official Page here

[Sherrielsb]

So looking forward to this one. I haven't run this one before but have run in previous January 1/2s. Any tips for a first time princess?

[IwannabeinNarnia]

So looking forward to this one. I haven't run this one before but have run in previous January 1/2s. Any tips for a first time princess?

watch out for low flying apples! Hi Sherrie! Welcome to Intercot!

[Christine]

I'm very happy to be running this one as well! I did the princess 5k last year- so this will be a new one for me.

DH will be working media for INTERCOT, so SMILE when you cross that starting line!! You may end up seeing yourself on here!!

[badkitty]

I'll be there! This will be my first Princess half and my third runDisney half. I can't wait!! I'm hooked on the run/walk/run with Mickey. (Doing the Galloway!)

[Sherrielsb]

I have been using that method for over a year now and totally love it. My speed still isn't what I would like but the recovery and post race soreness decrease is amazing.

[badkitty]

I agree, Sherrielsb, that I get good results with Jeff's method. I'm slow, though, with 30/30 but so far good success. I have a friend who has been to two runDisney events with me. I trained with "the Galloway" and she did something else. She injured herself both times.

Oh, and I'm trying out my new signature. Collecting the bling!

[Melanie]

Just a quick note on the Princess Half weekend, which is a change from other WDW runDisney events.

Because of the crazy amount of events taking place at Wide World of Sports, the Expo for the Princess Half will be held at the Coronado Springs Convention Center this year.

Times are:

Friday, February 22
9:00 a.m. – 7:00 pm

Saturday, February 23
9:00 a.m. – 6:00 pm

Plan accordingly. I personally can't wait to hear how it goes. I can imagine getting everyone in and out of Coronado Springs may be tricky. They are asking those not staying on site and using Disney Event transportation to park at Downtown Disney and take the Event transportation from there. So I guess they aren't letting private vehicles into Coronado Springs, unless of course you are staying there.

[Christine]

Ummmmmm, no. Parking at DTD is horrid! I will park at blizzard beach (I have a PAP so it's legit) and walk or bus from there.

This is not cool IMHO. If they're the ones changing it they should have a plan for parking.

Ill try to save my grrrrrr's Til I see what happens.


ETA- bad kitty I love your signature!

[badkitty]

They're posted on the runDisney site!

Offical Race Program
Final Race Instructions
Corral Assignments
Waivers

ETA- bad kitty I love your signature!

Thanks Christine!

[Melanie]

The medal is gorgeous! Love the 'jewel for every year'.

[Christine]

I cannot wait to wear this!!!!

[Sherrielsb]

Can't wait to get that gorgeous medal around my neck! Plan on wearing on the plane going home- TSA will love that, ha ha ha

[IwannabeinNarnia]

Good luck to all the runners this weekend! Hope you all have magical times and safe travels!!!

[Melanie]

Good luck to the Princesses AND Princes!

[Melanie]

Nice Surprise - apparently there are vouchers for the Monday Braves spring training game in the Princess gift bags.

Of course, I can understand some complaints I'm seeing that it would have been nice to know for those scheduling flights, etc.

[Christine]

Just saw that - while I don't follow the baseball, I agree, that's very nice!

[Christine]

Congrats to the folks finishing the 5k now!!


I didn't get any of "the baseballs" vouchers in my bag

But I'm just lucky to have gotten my bag. Wow- the expo being held at CSR should never ever never happen again! If I was staying at CSR right now I would be LIVID! The traffic was horrendous- all of the busses and a few guests (who had their resort parking paper in their dash- totally doing the right thing but not able to come & go from their resort easily). Busses everywhere! They're just not set up for 28k ppl to descend in two days there.

Inside? Madness. Picking up my bib was easy- they wasted half the facility on those desks. The other half of the facility was ALL the vendors with enough room in a booth for about 3 ppl. The bag pickup- winding lines just to get into the area of winding lines to the pickup desks.

The runDisney merchandise tent? Heavens. A line outside wrapped and wrapped to get in the tent. inside the tent, shoppers pushing (not being rude, but being bumped intoIto one another) and "chain gangs" to get merchandise. Ppl hollering to the one lucky person up by the shelf "will you pass 3 mugs back here?" Can you pass back a medium tee?" Those folks may very well still be there! The line to check out was in FRONT of the walls of hanging and shelved merchandise and wrapped thru the tiny walkway in the tent.

I hope Whatever event trumped the princess and kicked the expo out of WWoS was worth it. The princess is NOT a surprise- it happens every year at this time. This was insanity. Yes, most expos are busy crazy crowded - especially around the dooney's, but this was chaos.

I went around 4pm & getting my bib, bag, and coffee mug and tee took 1 & 1/2 hours- I stopped at NO vendor booths. Did no photo ops. And that was not as bad as what I heard about from others who went early. When I was leaving, the crowds began to swell again.

Most folks were extremely pleasant. Most CMs were doing their absolute best to stay friendly!
The guy that rang me up for my shirt and mug was really struggling bc I can't imagine how horrible his day was!
He saw my Dooney sketch wristlet that I've had for years and grabbed it and said "I need to ring that up!" I thought he was joking so I smiled and took it back. He grabbed it again and said "you have to pay for this!!" Now I realized he was serious! I said "sir, look- this is my bag- it's not a runDisney Dooney- it's mine- it's old" I showed him my stuff in it, the stains inside it, etc. He looked at me and said "sorry, I get discombobulated in the presence of a princess". Bless his heart! Poor thing was clearly rattled from the day!

I don't think that expo venue be happening again. It better not!

Now it's a day of rest and stretching, lots of water and good eating! Then it's off to the races in the morning!!

Good luck to all the princesses & princes out there!! If you see a very worn out, slow, awkward Mary Poppins, say hello!!

Ill be tweeting on INTERCOT's page starting first thing in the morning- see you then! Alongfortheride will be posting pics on here as well afterwards.

Keep on running!

[Melanie]

The event that pushed out the Expo was opening day of spring training. Poor planning on Disney's part, period. The race weekend should have been moved, and even stranger is that Gasparilla races are this weekend as well.

Been reading the runDisney FB page this morning, and folks are livid. I had a bad feeling about this, when we stayed at Coronado last month and imagined all those folks coming in and out. We did see some folks who were happy they were staying at Coronado, but those were runners. I can imagine the immense frustration if you were just a regular guest.

Hopefully it's a hard lesson learned for runDisney. Bet some folks are really feeling the heat on this one.

[badkitty]

Good luck Princesses!

The expo was a zoo. I went early and was there four hours and didn't even really look at the vendors. I experienced the same lines that Christine described. I waited an hour just to my coffee mug. I debated how badly I needed it but my desire to keep my collection of race beverage holders going won out.

I did get to hear Ali Vincent though. What a dynamic speaker. As I was leaving, I walked past the NB booth to see the new shoes. To my surprise, there was only two people in line to try on shoes still they were now out of most sizes. (To note, the line had wrapped through the exhibits and zig-zagged across the back wall.) I checked and they had a pair of 7-1/2 left! So excited and I'm very pleased with the fit and feel. I can't wait to break them in when I get home.

I'll be on the lookout for Mary Poppins but I'll most likely be way behind you!