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Comments:  I had to take it very easy because of my back, though it did feel better when I was warm and moving. I walked a little around mile 2 at the water stop, and also up one hill near the end, but only for about 45 seconds. My friend, who was visiting from Pennsylvania, wasn't really acclimated to the heat and humidity -- poor gal was sweating before we even began. So she stayed with me the whole time, which was fantastic (and a new experience for me -- I have never actually run with someone else for any period of time!). During our pre race chat, as we were looking at all of the folks in their costumes, and Jen mentioned my experience with the Banana at the IronGirl. We had a bit of a laugh about it. At around mile 2, we ran past a tall African American guy with dreads and a Rasta hat that may have been fake, or may have been his actual hair style. As we ran by, Rasta man looked really startled and did a double take when he saw my costume. I don't know what came over me, but I said to him "you are about to get passed by a turtle!" He laughed, but as Jen pointed out: YOU are now the banana. Ouch! Even though it was a fun race, even though we didn't need to, we nonethless booked it over the finish. And we were smiling and happy doing it, too!  What would you do differently?: Not tweak my back. I wish I could have stopped for more characters, but I was afraid we would get swept off the course with it's 16mm limit.  Post race
Warm down: Waited in line for pix, then gave my muffin to Alex, the banana to Nate, and had nothing left for me. Such is the life of a mother.   But that's OK -- we went back to the hotel and showered, and then had brunch at the Grand Floridian with a few of our friends (Mary Poppins, Alice in Wonderland, Winnie the Pooh and Tigger too!).   Then, despite my back, the kids and I hopped on the monorail and spent the day at the Magic Kingdom. Had a blast, too! What limited your ability to perform faster: Did I mention my !@@#$ back? Event comments: With all of the magic of Disney, why do I rate this race as average? Because it isn't a race. For a hundred buck entry fee, I am sorry, but have a darn timing chip. Instead, it was a "fun run," and so there was no timing chip. But seriously, if you are going to call it a "fun run" then don't have a 16 minute per mile cut off -- that's pretty fast for walkers and a pressure for folks like me who are turtles. I felt like I couldn't stop and enjoy the course because of the threat of the sweepers, but yet it wasn't a "race." Also? Would have preferred a tech shirt to a t-shirt, but I guess that is part of the "this is just for fun" aspect, too. Still, each racer got a free ticket to Mickey's Not so Scary Halloween Party, which I wish we had been able to take advantage of. But it was for Sunday night, and we could not take Monday off, so it went to waste. Oh well. Last updated: 2010-09-28 12:00 AM
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United States
Walt Disney World Sports
80F / 27C
Sunny
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Spent most of Friday worrying that we weren't going to make it to Orlando in time to make the required packet pick up. So had lots of stress hormones going on Friday afternoon and evening. We did make it, though -- made it at around 7:15 (expo closed at 8). When we walked in, we split up and Mike and Alex went to pick up Mike's packet for the half, and Nate and I went to pick up my packet for the 5K. Except when I went to print out my waiver, dutifully typing in my last name and my date of birth, it came up "no record found." More stress hormones! Nate and I had to walk all the way to the back to the furthest corner of the Expo to find out that when my darling husband registered me for the race, he aged me by two+ years -- guess he wanted an older chick (or, he just typed his own birth year by habit. Anyhow, they fixed the record and sent me back upstairs. Nate (he's 4 and a HALF, don't forget the half!) and i trudged back upstairs and all the way around, and when I got there to print out my waiver, AGAIN it didn't work. But this time, I know how to correct it, and pretended to be two years older (not that it mattered) so I could get my darn packet. Intended to get to bed early, but by the time we got the packets, picked up some Gu for Mike, got sidetracked by a video game demo, stopped at the grocery store, checked into the hotel, fed the kids (who had all but refused to eat their dinner and were predictably starving at 9 pm), put together my costume, read to the kids, and got them to stop with the tickling, hitting, kicking, and playing and just Go.To.Sleep. it was 11 pm and my nerves were fried. Oh well.
Up at 4:45. The wake up call was late by 5 minutes, and didn't have a recording. Weird. Hung up and got dress. Phone rang again. And again. The damn phone wouldn't stop ringing! Finally put it on speaker and mute so that we could get ready in peace. Then there was a knock on the door -- security, making sure we got up since the wake up call system was wonky. Well, at least the Hotel took the wake up call thing seriously!
Got all dressed in my turtle costume, and we were doing great on getting out the door. And then I dropped the hat. Which wouldn't be so bad, but I bent over to pick up the hat. And in so doing, something snapped in my lower back, so badly that I was hit with a wave of nausea and couldn't even breathe for a moment. I told Mike "I am not sure I am going to be able to do this run" but I didn't want to disappoint my friend Jen, who I was meeting, and so I grannied my way to the car.
When we got there, we hooked up with Jen after some cell phone tag and I went down into the chute (at the 13-15 minute start area) waited. Chatted, people watched, and waited.