I am super excited, because I have been waiting for almost 2 months now to give you a review of the Disney World Marathon and Half Marathon. The reason for the delay is that I have been waiting to get my marathon photos. The CD arrived today, and I am happy to share them with my blog readers.

After a 2 am wake up call, we arrived at Epcot  just before 3. When a race starts at 5:35 am, you have to get going pretty early to be ready to run 13.1 miles. After weaving my way through a very congested pre-race area, I walked the near mile trail to the start line to wait in a corral for another hour. The pre-race process at Disney is very taxing! I finally crossed the start line about 6:05 am, and the congested feeling that had been present all morning continued on the race course.

I have posted a map of the course. From the start of the race, we head straight on Epcot Center Drive, and then proceed on the ramp to World Dr. The course was so congested here that I was ready to scream. The combination of a very full race (27,000+people) and a narrowing course caused me some major problems. While I used the Galloway method to complete the Goofy Challenge over this weekend, I run quite a bit faster than many of the folks I was corralled with. I was walking because I simply couldn’t get by people, not because I wanted to. By mile 5, we were in the Magic Kingdom, where I dropped off my tech shirt to my mom near the castle, and moved along the course.

I finished this race strong, but disappointed and frustrated that I felt stifled by the crowd. My finish time was 2:45:05, which was my goal actually. I was excited and frustrated to think that I could have easily run that race a lot faster had I not been held back by the thick crowd of runners.

The rest of the day was spent sleeping, relaxing and refueling for the big day that was coming. My body felt pretty good for having run 13 miles, but my feet were a bit sore. Mom ordered us Outback, steaks and vegetables for dinner, and we took them back to the resort, sat by the pool and ate. After dinner that evening, I jumped in the hot tub for about 20 minutes to recover a bit. It was all the perfect combination, because the next day went splendidly…

More on the full marathon soon…