Long, long ago in a galaxy far, far away…
Drawn by the allure of the Dark Side, a young padawan found herself joining the ranks of Challenge racers for the Star Wars Half Marathon despite the dangers of a lack of training.
When the registration went live for the Star Wars Half Marathon, I was at work. Some RunDisney events sell out in mere hours, some never completely fill up. I had been unable to do it the Inaugural year and there was no way I was missing it this year, so my mom did the registration for me while I was working. I promised her I would actually train for this event unlike my other races, but as usual I fell a little short (a lot short) as life continued getting in the way. Nevertheless, I am taking on the Dark Side Challenge this weekend running the Star Wars 10k on Saturday (6.2 miles) and the Star Wars Half Marathon on Sunday (13.1 miles). This will mark my fifth half marathon, third 10k and tenth RunDisney race. This makes numbers eleven and twelve on my 30 by 30 plan.
All Walt Disney World RunDisney Half Marathon events take place over a four day weekend. The RunDisney Expo is always open starting Thursday for the first three days for bib pickup and shopping with the 5k on Friday, the 10k on Saturday and the Half Marathon on Sunday. I usually do packet pickup on Thursday afternoon after the rush of the morning, but today my work schedule did not cooperate with that plan so I had to go in the morning before my shift started.
The RunDisney Expos are held at ESPN Wide World of Sports, Walt Disney World’s giant sports complex. Bib pick up is usually in the HP Field House and the Expo is held in the Jostens Center with shirt pick up. The Expo started at 10 am, but I got there closer to 11:30. In addition to getting my swag, I was meeting a friend and I was worried she was stuck waiting on me so I hurried straight to the Jostens Center. The entrance path wrapped around one of the sports fields in a way I’ve never seen, and you walked past a DJ on your way. Right next to the building were two Stormtroopers,
“Nothing to see here, move along!”
but as soon as someone tried to take a photo with them they began moving along on their patrol. My friend was still in line for the official merchandise booth so I wandered around a bit. I thought about trying to meet her but the line to just get in the booth went down and back about five times, and it wasn’t worth it. I love to window shop at the Expo, I rarely buy anything but usually some of the booths have prizes. For what is supposed to be one of the least expensive sports to take up, there’s a whole lot of specialized equipment for it. Belts, pouches, skirts, compression shorts, kinesio tape, socks, medal displays and more! I almost bought one of the shirts, but I didn’t feel like spending $40 on a tank top when my bib could cover most of the words. Normally there’s a GoodSense booth with a prize wheel where you can get tiny sample bottles of pain relievers, but I couldn’t find it.
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I did stop by the New Balance booth to look longingly at the Haunted Mansion shoes. Every year there’s a new collection of RunDisney New Balance shoes, and this year’s are attraction themed. I got the Ariel ones last year since the bright red Mickey ones were just too loud, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to justify buying a second pair.
Ashley, the genius behind RunPrincessRun!
Then my friend texted that they were out of the line and I dashed over to meet her. Her name is Ashley and in addition to being a Star Wars fan and a runner, she is a talented seamstress and she makes runners’ skirts for RunPrincessRun. Hers are a little different from the most of the ones I’ve seen over the years. They have intricate glitter designs based on whatever character the skirt is for. I wore her Mrs. Potts skirt when I ran the Princess Half back in February, which was great because the design was actually my idea! (Well, making a Mrs. Potts skirt was my idea. The actual design was all her!) This time I am rocking her Rebel Alliance skirt for the 10k and her Empire skirt for the Half, and I had to meet her at the Expo in order to pick them up. We hugged and went our separate ways, I had to go get my bib and she was going to check out the rest of the booths.
Everything about this day was backwards. I always print my waiver out in advance and I always get my bib and swag before I go to the Expo. Well, in addition to doing the Expo first, I forgot my waiver. Printing it out was a surprisingly quick and painless process, and I might just do it there from now on. I only had to wait one turn to get my bib, a quick signature and picture and I was off to the back of the room for my shirts. In this case, I’m grateful I’m doing the Challenge instead of just one race. Only the 5k and the Challenge shirt pick up were in the same building as the bibs, if you were doing the individual 10k and Half you had to go to the Expo to pick them up so I would have had to go back.
I stopped to transfer my three t-shirts into my backpack and threw out the gear bag check. I never use it. Everything I need fits in the Running Buddy pouch my mom got me for Christmas 2015. It folds over the back of the waistband on whatever I’m wearing and magnets hold it in place. I usually only carry my phone and the key to my car, though since the release of Pokémon Go I usually have a charging cable and a fuel rod in there too. That’s way too much mileage to not get credit for! I was a little sad there wasn’t the usual cliff bar sample and other swag in there, but oh well. My biggest disappointment is the transfer to digital event guides instead of printed ones. I get that it’s better for the environment, and less money for Disney, but I like having the physical book to look through and keep as a souvenir.
I headed out towards the parking lot and made what I thought would be a quick detour to take a photo in front of the Dark Side Challenge medal sign. They always have all the medals printed on posters for photo ops, but they’re usually surrounding the globe at the entrance instead of off to the side. The photo itself was quick. I told the girl behind me in line I’d take her photo if she’d take mine, and then the couple behind us offered to take one of us together which was very sweet except we weren’t together. So I picked up the bag with my skirts and kept going towards the car, and about two minutes later realized I’d left my backpack behind! MY DOONEY AND BURKE BACKPACK MY GRANDMOTHER BOUGHT ME! I took off at a sprint to go back and look for it, and my phone bounced out of my back pocket not once, but twice along the way. It’s fine but my case is all sorts of scratched up, sorry Eeyore. The couple who had offered to take the photo saw me running and told me they gave it to a security guard. I found her and had to tell her what was in the bag before she could let me take it. “Three shirts, two notebooks, a set of keys attached to a cat keychain and a wallet.” She glanced inside and handed it to me, and I began the walk back to the car as I tried to calm down from the adrenaline that comes with a burst of panic. I ran into the couple again and thanked them.
I got to the car and checked my watch, still enough time to get lunch before work so I drove to Disney Springs to get Blaze. They always advertise special offers for runners at Disney Springs but I’m usually too busy or too tired on race weekends to go. I still didn’t have time to take advantage of any of them, but there were some cool signs posted around.
My plan for tomorrow is take it as easy as possible and carb load before I have to get up at 2 am Saturday so I can be on the bus to Magic Kingdom by 4 am. I’m a little worried about how warm it’s going to be, and clearly RunDisney is too because they’ve already issued a weather advisory. After the race I’m planning a Star Wars movie marathon with Duffy, then rinse and repeat for Sunday. I’ve got three different friends running, one’s doing just the 10k and two are doing the Challenge so hopefully I hook up with them at some point. The good news is I’m not the only one who hasn’t really trained so either the Force will be with us, or we’re all going to die Rogue One style.
My mantra for this weekend: “I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me.”
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