So you think you're Dopey?

This is gonna cover in a flash my 2014 and Dopey 2015 run....

Upon signing up for Dopey 2015 in March of 2014 I downloaded the RunDisney/Jeff Galloway training plan. Which doesn't have you start training until July 2014, this would be great if  I was an experienced runner. Up until this point I haven't wogged anything faster than a 15-16 minute mile.  I mean I'm out there running and doing races and having a blast, but I've never had to beat a cut off time.  SO, I plan on training like the schedule says.. but it's Summer in Georgia and it's Africa hot... keep in mind I have FMS and at this point my diet was not what it needed to be for a healthier me... I had a pretty mean Diet Coke addiction (4+ a day, at least) and I became the Queen of excuses... I'm tired, it's hot, I haven't pooped yet today (an actual excuse I used A LOT).  My husband would come home from work and say "I've got the kids, go run" and I would say " You don't get it, I'm tired, there's nothing left in the tank today" and so on.....OH here's where I should tell you my sister got pregnant and had issues and wasn't able to run during her pregnancy and had to defer her Dopey, merp.

So when I  should have been doing 3 runs a week, it looked more like 2ish runs. I would mark my calendar with frowny faces on the days I gave up and continued with the lie that I could run 48.6 miles without training.

In the Galloway plan you (basically) do (2) 45 minute runs a week and then a long run on the weekends and every other weekend you add miles to your long run. I knew I needed  to complete a real half  so around the time I hit my 13 mile Saturday I signed up to do the Diva Half in Peachtree City Georgia in September 2014. By September my longest run was 10 miles.  It was a HORRIBLE experience for me for my first half.  Here's the run down.....

I got up and dressed, (as Audrey Hepburn/Kitty Golightly)  in plenty of time and headed to the parking area we were told to to catch the shuttle to the race. Peachtree City is NOT equipped to host a big race and have everyone park in the same area. It is in fact called Golf Capital of Georgia, so you park away from the start and take buses to the park.  We were in line waaaaay in advance, because I hate being late and rushing. We waited our turn and by the time it was OUR turn to get on the bus (Still an hour before our race start) the race organizers/volunteers started yelling for all the late comers for the 5k to jump ahead and get on the bus because they would miss their start. Why they were getting preferential treatment is beyond me, but I did what I was told, which bumped us many buses back. By the time we got to the park and unloaded it was time for the half to start. I HAD to pee so I got in the super long portapotty lines and waited... there were definitely not enough bathrooms for the amount of runners for this race also. I ran from the potty to the start, paused for a pic

 and immediately started the race because our corral had already gone. I was maybe a minute later starting. Temps were warm and headed for hot and humid. I could not get my Garmin Forerunner 10 to sync with GPS because of all the trees and spent probably the first mile walking waiting for my watch to wake up and start beeping my intervals. I now have a Gymboss for my intervals because a) it doesn't use GPS and always works and B) it saves my Garmins battery. I am hoping to upgrade soon to a Garmin VivoActive that has a 10 hour battery. Back to the race, So we started with the intervals, but I was already in a crappy frame of mind from the late start, no watch and so on... so I had a hard time maintaining the intervals and walked and talked with my cousin with whom I was running more than I should have. Most of the race was on narrow golf cart paths through out the backside of neighborhoods....the water stations were definitely not close enough for the heat that day. Heres where I realized how costumed running could interfere with your race... the gloves came off immediately... cause it was hot... but as I ran along my triple strand of pearls beat me to death, wearing all black made it feel hotter than it actually was. I also learned the lesson of wearing the right bra for me, because as I ran and got hotter and more tired, where my bra hit me against my neck caused excruciating tension to the point that I could only fixate on that pain (which is an FMS problem) It was about mile 9 that my make up (yep i wore make up for a 90 degree race) began to stick to my contact lenses and made it seem like I had cataracts. Mix my neck tension, with the heat, feeling blind and run me down a drainage tunnel (yes there were 2 underground drainage pipes the race took you down, I was about to have a claustrophobic freak out. By the time we hit mile 10 our time was still good (we were right at 3 hours 10 minutes for a 4 hour race time limit) a golf cart pulled up behind us and told us to get on that we had been "swept".....My cousin ran on ahead of me, (she's the rebel in the family) but I did what I was told and got on. The cart behind us with 6 girls on it pulled up, across the street and let the ladies out and they picked up their race... our golf cart would not stop for us... so basically the back of the packers behind us got shuttled a mile and were allowed to finish. We were driven to the last 2 tenths of a mile and put out to finish the race. I was devestated and heartbroken... what should have been an empowering experience was not. I was running a 15 minute mile and would have finished in the allotted time and even as I sat there watching the finishers there were many runners that came in 30 minutes after the 4 hour time limit. So why was I swept? apparently it was a Volunteer enforcing their power.

Here's my poop out van selfie:

And my cousin getting her medal for finishing:

So my first half was actually a 10 miler and I learned many lessons at this race. I was angry and upset and sent emails to the race director for the transportation, water and sweeping issues and basically got an unapologetic response of "we use volunteers and have no control over them"  I wasn't expecting a discount offer for another race or any freebies but an apology would have been nice. A Race that I thought was designed to empower women left me feeling less than able,  So I swore off Diva Races, but looking back there was a lot to learn from that race.

Here's what I learned:

Don't let late comers  take the bus in front of you... if you are there on time you stand your ground and get on the damn bus, if you have to lie and say you are a 5k runner also, then do it!

 As far as MY capabilities I realized I was under trained, certainly for those conditions (heat and humidity). I was running with fashion over function and it hurt me, the heavy pearls, black dress, earrings etc all contributed to the extra stress and pains I experienced. 

Make up, I no longer pile on the make up for a race over 6 miles, it's bad for your skin and it is pointless. 

 I was wearing the wrong bra, I can't tell you how important the right bra is for big boobied girls to have... I was layering 2 and 3 cheaper bras for support and in return I still had clapping boobs and shoulder pain. Moving Comfort bras revolutionized my running. If you haven't tried them I'd recommend you finding a local store and trying them on.

  I also should have carried more water/Gatorade myself, self fueling can literally save your life in races that don't have enough water stations. 

I also should have ran on ahead of the poop out golf cart when they pulled up behind me...It wasn't a police officer or anyone with any real authority.. 

I went home in shame, gave my medal to my daughter and committed to taking my training seriously for the next 13 weeks... 

How a RunDisney addiction began

Lets go back to 2014.       My FIRST Disney Race.

My sister and I had run many 5ks (3.1 miles) the first year of wogging together (mostly for the costumes) and we came to a point where when we finished the races we thought "eh that wasn't so bad" and we wanted more, so we decided to bump up and try a 10K (6.2 miles).  Caught up in the RunDisney experience via a friend's facebook post who ran Disney all the time we decided to signed up for the inaugural Minnie Mouse 10k in January 2014.

Disney registrations can be trying and hard to get in (sell out in minutes) so we signed up through a charity and ran for Autism Speaks. Which means you pay an initial race fee to the charity and then you spend your months prior to the race fund raising for your charity.  I don't remember even training much for the 10k. I don't think we varied our twice a week runs even.  I do know I put more time into fund raising and even more time into my Minnie Mouse costume , you know, the important stuff.

The Disney experience is magical one, but it's also overwhelming to a noob. So much info to process, we have to wake up at what time?! (3;30 am) We have to stand in the corrals how long?!? (2-3 hours)  You have to plan ahead, be prepared for the early hours, have food in the room to consume at 3 am for breakfast and so on.

 Our first race experience we stayed up late getting all the details of our costumes and laying out our "flat runners" for the perfect picture  for Facebook and THEN decided to read the racer book we got at the expo, which started the panic of we have to wake up in 3 hours, we have to catch a bus because you're not allowed to drive? (which isn't true) and all the other stuff a first time Disney runner is told. I text my experienced runner buddy to work out the details/find out what time she was getting up and worked out what time was best for us.  So we set our alarms and wake up calls and our back up alarms and our back up back up alarms because we've invested WAAAAY too much money to sleep in on this race! But believe it or not, I've heard several Disney horror stories about sleeping through alarms and missing races. I am incapable of sleeping that soundly, because I'm so excited to be running in Disney!

Alarm goes off at 3:30 and I'm up... because getting my fake eyelashes on right is priority number one. (Boy have things changed, make up and costumes are not AS important to me anymore). Once dressed we headed to the race. My husband, was sweet enough to wake up and drive us to the race start. We followed the signs and he dropped us off where the buses were dropping runners off which is like a MILE away from the starting line. We have since learned all the tricks of where to go to park close and limit your walking / waiting pre race. Elise (my sister) and I walked to the security lines and met our husbands who had parked and beat us to the start by the time we got through bag check. This particular race the temperatures were cool and pleasant, no need for sleeves or extra layers, but running in Florida in January can be any temp so being prepared and having gear for all weather is a must!  There is A LOT of standing around pre race... they want you at the "starting party" an hour before you are suppose to be in the corrals, where you stand for another hour and a half.
Race start... Fireworks and we're off...  (Blurry pic... cause I'm running and taking a pic, duh)

The first 3 miles of the 6 miles is an out and back on the highway there are a couple character stops, but Balloon Lady fear kept us from stopping and taking any pics...

Mile 4-5  you run a small section of Epcot (Used real bathrooms, yes!) and then out to the Boardwalk, which was wet and VERY slippery from humidity

 ....it's not til after mile 5 you enter in the backside of Epcot and run IN the park.

 We took lots of selfies along the way which didn't mean losing time waiting in any lines for photo ops.

Mile 6 is just after you run under the Epcot ball and the final stretch is the .2 miles.

Our First 10k, our first race medal and the start of a beautiful thing...

(^^^ 6.2 + miles and my eyelashes and lipstick are still on!<things a serious runner would never say!)  : ) 

My first real race medal and the start of a true blue addiction....

(Lessons learned in this race: DO NOT wear panty hose/tights under your socks for any distance... it makes for raw sore feet and squished toes, cut the feet out at the ankle or better yet wear Zensah Compression sleeves like I do now)   Also this was the defining race for me to realize NIKE's were NOT the shoes for me... it has taken several brands of shoes to find my perfect shoe... Nike's give me horrible shin splints, NB I have knee issues and shin splints, I am now running in Hoka's (Clifton II)  and have very little post run issues with foot and leg pain.)

Post race and back at the hotel we were starving (because we weren't prepared and didn't have breakfast in the room pre race)  and in need of caffeine and thought we'd walk over and fill our cups up... but the walk around the pond added an additional mile to our morning...this is what your face looks like when you are hungry and tired and have to walk back to your room:

The photo did not convince our husbands to come pick us up... so we ate without them and then took a bus back to our room.

SOoooooo the experience was awesome but it wasn't until our last day in Orlando we went for massages at the Swan resort (if you have an opportunity to do this, I'd say DO IT) and we met 2 gals in the dressing room... they were flipping through pics on their phone and talking about having just finished the Dopey Challenge but said they couldn't find there finish line photos (Fast forward 3 years to my completion of Dopey and I have a conspiracy theory that these ladies didn't indeed finish, that they were probably swept but that's for another blog) .... we were intrigued and just like little fish we bit the RunDisney line.  We began saying things like "If THOSE girls can do Dopey, then we can" and other lies you tend to tell yourself in post massage bliss. So we marked our calendars, set reminders to sign up for the next challenge and started saving our dollars.

(a failed attempt at duck lips) : )

So we go from finishing 6.2 miles and decide 48.6 is our next step, that's totally logical, right? Whuuuuuut? Up until this point anytime I've heard someone say they've completed a half my thought pattern is always "I could NEVER run a half and WOULD never ever run a full, that's just crazy!" 

The test results came back Positive, I'm crazy.