Expo and Kids Races

First stop at the Expo was the Milk House for packet pickup. I was so proud of myself for remembering to bring photo ID along with my signed waiver. I ran into trouble with that one year and am eternally grateful to the volunteer who had accepted my Facebook page on my iPhone as photographic proof of my identity.

I felt like a rock star going to the special Goofy packet pick up area. It was housed upstairs, above the crowd of people who were "just" running the marathon or the half marathon. I say that not to take anything away from those runners at all -- I just found it funny that when I ran the half in 2009 and the full in 2010, I kept saying I was "only" running that one particular race. Only at the Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend do you feel apologetic for "simply" running a marathon and not doing a half the day before!

I received my race bib and was not very impressed by the fact that we had only one bib to wear on both days. My race bibs usually look like they've been through the wringer by the end of a half marathon, and I was worried about how well it -- and the B tag timing chip -- would hold up for both races. I then noticed my corral placement and was not impressed again. I think the Goofy runners were placed relatively willy-nilly with less regard for anticipated finish times than the full/half marathoners. A trip to Runner Relations with my half marathon PR results bumped me up a couple of corrals, and I was on my way to meet the family.

The Kids' Races were to be held on the track starting at 11:00. I rushed to get over there on time, despite the fact that I was starving. My son was to run the 400m race and my daughter was slated for the Mickey Mile. We spent some time checking out "Explore MyPlate," an interactive healthy eating display. The kids received pedometers, which my son immediately started using and attempted to max out the number of steps. Have I mentioned he's a bit hyperactive? We sat around and waited, and waited, and waited for the Kids' Races to start when my husband, Chuck, suggested I run up to the HP Field House to pick up my race shirts and check out the merchandise, especially the "I Did It" shirts (known in my family as "Idiot Shirts"). Naturally, this took much longer than it should have and I missed my son's race, but I did get a really cute Goofy t-shirt.

Luckily I still had plenty of time for the Mickey Mile, which I was planning to run with my daughter. (Still hadn't eaten anything, though). The race started in a grassy field which looked like it was used for soccer or maybe field hockey. There were a few twists and turns along the course, and the uneven grassy footing made me nervous. I saw a man wearing the 2012 Donald Half Marathon shirt slip and fall and hoped he would be able to race the next day. A twisted ankle the day before a race is not a good thing! My daughter took her walk breaks as diligently as one would expect from the child of a Galloway director and finished strong, with a nice kick at the end that left me in the dust.

By this time, I was starving, but wanted to finish checking out the Expo before grabbing something to eat at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Grill. I was captivated by the special Coast to Coast sling backpack giveaway for those who registered for the Disneyland Half Marathon at the Expo, and stood in the world's longest line in order to get Chuck and I registered. It was as if none of the people in front of me had every used a computer before. And Every. Single. One. of them fell victim to confusion when they hit the dialog box asking for their California county. You had to change this to "Not a California resident" if you lived out-of-state, but that was too confusing for most. By this time, I'm ready to start gnawing on my arm, I'm that hungry. Eventually I got us both registered (in less than the average time for one registration amongst the group that was ahead of me), grabbed our precious sling bags, and joined the family at the grill.

We ate, met two friends, watched my son have a meltdown where he hid on the floor under our table, and finally headed back to Animal Kingdom Lodge with all of our bags. Dinner that night was at Boma, one of my favorite Disney restaurants and a night-before-the-half-marathon tradition in the making. This was our second year to eat there on the Friday night before the race. My Galloway Training Program friend and her party of 7 were able to join us, so we had to adjust our original reservation, which had been for a party of 4. As a result, we were seated a bit later than I'd wanted, but the meal was worth the wait. My normally picky son had about 15 Zebra Domes, also known as "the best dessert ever" in my book. My daughter was concerned that there were trace amounts of alcohol (Kahlua) in the Zebra Domes, but I knew both kids would be fine. (See what I did there? That's called foreshadowing...)