This was my first marathon, I ran it in preparation for the Dopey Challenge in January 2020. I read about the majority of the race being downhill, so I trained for that, however, no amount of training could have prepared me for the first mile. It was very steep and gravity forced my into a pace that was not healthy. Combine that with the crested road and my knee was on fire by the 3rd mile. I had completed a 20 training run the weekend before and had no knee pain whatsoever. After the first mile, the pain gradually built to the point that I could no longer run by mile 18, so I walked the last 8 miles. The out and back at the Biosphere Road was very hilly and difficult. After that, it was all downhill and I didn't think the hill at mile 24 was that bad.

I don't believe that there was an aid station on the entire course. I needed a band aid for a toenail issue and after asking at 5 different water stations, one of the volunteers happened to have one. There were water stations almost every mile, so that was a good feature given the normally dry air in Arizona.

The expo was small and could have probably fit in my living room.

Overall, the race profile was probably not right for my level of experience. I don't believe the steep hill at the beginning was necessary and could be easily changed by starting further down the road and making up the distance on Biosphere Rd or going down 1 additional block at the end of the race.

I am following the Galloway training for the WDW Dopey Challenge and this Half Marathon perfectly lined up with the long run this weekend. Although I now live outside Detroit, I grew up near WPAFB in Xenia and attended the University of Dayton, so this had natural appeal. I was not able to pick up my own bib, so my brother, who works at the base took care of this for me. I bit of a wrinkle for this particular event with someone picking up your bib, signed waiver and picture of your ID is required for someone else to get your bib.

Parking was in a large field about 1/2 mile or so from the start/finish line, there is also a transportation option where you can catch a bus from the Nutter Center, however, the last bus left at 5:30am, which is 3 hours before race time. I believe this is an area of improvement for this event is to have buses run a little later.

The start/finish are of this event is amazing. The finishing chute passes under the wings of 3 military aircraft from the museum. Prior to the start, there was a flyover of one of the newest military planes from Boeing.

There was lightening on the course, so the start was delayed about 45 minutes, the forecast for the day had temps approaching 75, so this added high humidity to the mix.

The race profile indicated that the course was a bit hilly on paper, in real life it was like a roller coaster, up down up down...in fact, we were climbing a long gradual hill right after the starting gun.

The course had many different types of scenery, country road, golf course, highway etc, I liked the variety, just not the hills. Some of the best scenery I saw were the great t-shirts that the runners that were passing me were wearing, I'm going to copy several of them!

Around mile 8, a local bar was offering a cup of beer and candied bacon, my pace was already slow so I partook. it was also in the middle of a long gradual climb so it hit the spot. Fast forward past several more hills to the finish line. The finishing chute gave me a burst of energy, the race announcer was enthusiastic and I was pumped up until someone flew past me and the announcer said he was a marathon runner %$#*&!!!

Uniformed Air Force personnel presented the awesome medals and Miller Lite provided a post race beer. Overall a great event, I would recommend it but not sure I will run it myself again unless the course changes.

Two of my children (Kevin and Kayli) and I volunteered at WDW Marathon Weekend in 2016 and decided to gradually build up to doing Dopey. This year we tackled the Half Marathon and thoroughly enjoyed it. I have to point out the none of us trained effectively and that will need to change before we try Dopey, so we did lots of walking.

We arrived to Orlando on Friday, my son Kevin and his girlfriend Brianne are both flight attendants for American Airlines, so I fly standby and therefore travel requires planning. Sometimes, it means going somewhere a day early if there is something you have to attend, LIKE THE EXPO! Fortunately, flight loads were favorable and we were able to get seats same day.

We went to the expo and checked in and then headed over to go shopping. We got a great deal on compression socks and all 4 of us bought some, at the checkout, there was this glitter sunscreen; I had forgotten to pack sunscreen and being a lifelong Ginger, I needed to buy some anyway. The kids PROMISED they would wear it also, but the next morning as we were getting ready to leave the hotel, they opted out and I was the only sparkly one of the group. My thanks to everyone along the way for complimenting me for the glitter!

Our costumes were; Me - Mickey, Kayli - Duffy; Kevin - Gelatoni and Brianne - Shelly Mae. Shout out to the volunteer near the golf course that actually recognized Gelatoni, that made Kevin's day!

Anyway, we got up and hit the last runner's bus from Art of Animation and got to Epcot in time to walk with the blob of people to the corrals. We were in Corral F on the strength of my 2:36 time in the Detroit Half Marathon. It was already warm which made waiting to start nicer than last year when it was in the 30's while we were in the corrals for the 5K and 10K.

As me made our way to the starting line, the excitement built and as normal, we started quickly and flamed out. Some of us were sick leading up so the event, so our lungs just weren't cutting it, so we decided to start walking, unless we saw a photographer or were approaching the finish line.

We were still in high spirits when we hit the entrance to the Magic Kingdom (photo attached), however the sun came up, it started to get hot and we started to fade. Then we hit Main Street and the excitement re-entered us and we ran through MK with a fury previously unknown to mankind (except for taking a pic in front of the castle and to apply some biofreeze, take a tylenol, go to the restroom, get some Gatoraid, yada yada yada) I know that the Medical tent staff was happy to see us move on.

After leaving MK, our enthusiasm faded again, so the volunteer who knew who Gelatoni was, gave us some juice for about 3 minutes, but that got us to the jelly bean stop, and stop we did, and filled up with as many beans as we could before the volunteers were on to us. Fun fact, some people drop full, un-opened bags of beans about a mile after the stop, if you are paying attention, you can find them, #5secondrule.

Now we were struggling, we hit the green army man on the exit ramp and swore at him to stop judging us! Then...as we were on the overpass near the entrance of Epcot, it happened. We looked down the stretch of highway that we had just exited and there they were...THE BALOON LADIES! How did they catch us? Was it the walking? The bathroom stops? The nap? who knows, but time to stop messing around!

We entered the Epcot parking lot, snaked our way through and saw the finish line, time to run! After all, there will be photographers there. We finished, got our medals, bags of ice for our knees and our box of food.

We boarded our bus and went back to the room, the kids went to bed and I went to the pool...and fell asleep on a chair, fortunately, I still had on the glitter! In fact, as I am writing this 2 months later, I am still finding glitter on me, pure evil!

We are planning on Dopey in 2020 and perhaps some training...maybe!

My son and his girlfriend (Kevin and Brianne) learned about a sale on bibs for this, so we on a whim signed up for the 10K and Half Marathon. However, "whim" may not be the correct word for running a Disneyland Paris race. There is a different process for these races and a French government requirement that you get a medical clearance before you are approved to run. The process is to purchase the bib, and then later on register for the race (and upload your medical form). I don't want this to sound like I'm complaining about it, it was just different so you have to pay attention to all the requirements.

We decided to go two days early and spend a couple days in Paris, I had been to Paris several times and so had Brianne, but this was Kevin's first. Therefore, we had to do everything! We walked and walked and walked for 2 days covering the entire city before heading out to Chessy in the French countryside where Disneyland Paris is located. We opted for renting an apartment on VRBO one train stop from the park. Maria, the owner, was very kind with her apartment and gave us a lot of valuable advice.

We went over to the Expo to pick up our bibs, the Expo was quite a bit smaller than at Disney World, but we still managed to spend some money. We ran the 10K and Half, which was the Bibbity-Bobbity-Boo Challenge, so we went to pick up our T-shirts, but they were out of the challenge shirt. This made on particular Frenchman quite angry, but we just put our name on a list and got them in the mail about a month later.

There was also a 5K, which they ran in the evening, so we hung around and watched it. One thing I liked about the entire set of races is how much time you spend running through the parks and the 5K ran right through the Disney Village as we watched outside the Starbucks. While at Starbucks, we met a US Military woman stationed in Germany. Her and her husband were running the races also and they were Disneyland Paris Passholders, so we got some more great info from them!

The next morning we started out for the races, they start an hour later than at WDW so we got up at 5:30 and headed for the train. The RER had special early trains running the entire weekend for the event. We rode the train with hundreds of other runners and everyone was happy.

We got in our corral, there were only 3 but they were huge. There were many great costumes, but our favorite was a couple who were dressed as Belle and Gaston and Gaston was carrying 5 egg cartons, we thought this was a clever touch. The 10K was run entirely inside the 2 Disney parks and the course was lined with Cast Members cheering you on and lots of character stops. Our favorite was Woody and Bullseye. We got in line for that and they we trying to hurry us because Bullseye only had 2 more minutes before he had to leave, we got the last picture with him!

Just before the finish line, Mickey and Minnie were out so we had to stop for that one also.

The next day started with a 5:30 wake up and a train ride again, this time there were THOUSANDS on the train with us. The weather was perfect all weekend long. the first half of the half marathon course followed the 10K course from the previous day. Then it left the park through the back lot and went out on a road that is a perfect circle that surrounds the DisneyLand Paris complex. We stayed on this road for a while and then entered the French Version of Celebration. During this section, the course took us around a lake on a path rather than paved road. This was the only part I didn't like, I avoid trail runs like the plague, and the grass was a little slippery. But this was less than a mile so not too bad.

Then it was back on the circle road going to opposite direction and re-enter the parks through the resort area. This was a pretty cool area that we didn't run through the day before. then it was through the Disney Village and across the finish line. I got the Half Marathon Medal and the Challenge Medal, Kevin and Brianne got those plus the Castle to Chateau Medal.

It was a very fun run that we will do again in the future.