Glass Slippers

Last weekend, I went down to Disney World to participate in the Glass Slipper Challenge! The Glass Slipper Challenge involved running the Enchanted 10k on Saturday and the Princess Half-Marathon on Sunday.

My awesome mom who was my driver for the weekend!

On Thursday night, I headed to NA to stay and a little before 7 am on Friday morning, Mom and I hit the road.  My awesome mom was my chauffeur to and from Florida! Her original plans were to visit friends that lived right outside of Disney World, but due to illnesses they couldn't meet. So instead, she got a weekend away to relax!


We made great time getting to Florida and the drive wasn't bad at all! The only time we ran into traffic was in Florida - those roads are awful!  After having the wrong address for our resort (Coronado Springs), we finally made it a little before 2 pm. We met up with KQ, her sister JQZ, and our other friends LS and MS got there about that time too!  After dropping off my luggage, saying a quick goodbye and thanks to my mom,  the Disney crew headed over to the Expo to get our bibs, gear, and do some sports shopping before dinner! After exploring the Expo, we had a 5:45 reservation at the Turf Club Bar & Grill in the Saratoga Springs Resort, which we barely made due to the bus to that resort running almost 30 minutes late!  Some more friends that arrived later that day were able to join us for dinner and after a scrumptious meal, we took multiple buses to get back to Coronado Springs so we could head to bed!

The Clemson Grads Before the 10k!

Our alarms went off at 2:30 am (ugh) on Saturday morning so that we could catch our 3:30 am shuttle to Epcot to where the 10k race would start and end. We had to get there early so that we could be dropped off, walk to the starting/warmup area, and then be in our corrals by 5am for a 5:30 am start time. Out of the 6 runners in our group, 5 of us did the 10k (3 of those 5 were competing in the Glass Slipper Challenge). We were spaced out in our corrals, with 2 in Corral C, me in D, and 2 in E, so we all started at varying times. I think my official start time was around 6 am. I wasn't too worried about the 10k race. I had been running 6.2 miles the last few Saturdays and felt really comfortable with the distance and pacing I had trained at. However, because I knew that I would need to conserve some energy for the half the next day, I made sure to walk the water stations (partly because I am not capable of running and drinking water at the same time)!  I ended up running a negative split for the 10k (meaning my last half of the race was faster than the first), including a 9-minute mile the last mile!!  Since we were in different corrals, we all finished at different times, so while waiting on each other to finish those who were done got our medal, got iced up and ate our post-run snacks Disney provided.

Of course I had to take a picture with the Glass Slipper!

After everyone finished, we loaded up the buses and headed back to our resort to shower and get dressed to go to the park. But before we went to the park, we went and got our second breakfast so we could get our Mickey Mouse waffles! We went to Hollywood Studios on Saturday, and our timing ended up being perfect! We arrived just in time for our first fast pass for the Rockin' Roller Coaster and once we got off of that, it was time for our next fast pass on the Tower of Terror.  We then went a few more places and a few more rides before we went to our late lunch reservation at Mama Melrose's Ristorante Italiano inside the park. After lunch we did the Star Tours ride and saw the Little Mermaid show and then headed back to our hotel. We were exhausted by this time and knew it was another early morning the next day! We grabbed a light dinner back at the hotel and then headed to bed.

MS got a picture of me
running by him around Mile 5!

The alarms went off at 2:30 am again on Sunday morning so we could catch the 3:30 shuttle. Although I think we caught one closer to 4 because we were moving a bit slower that morning (I can't imagine why).  The four of us running the half marathon started the LONG trek to our corrals, as we were again in separate corrals. The Half-Marathon course starts in the parking lot of Epcot, goes to Magic Kingdom (you run through the Castle around Mile 6), back into the parking lot, with a final loop through Epcot to have you cross the finish line in the parking lot. I got a little frustrated with the course/race this year. I was in a farther corral than I was in my last Princess Half Marathon, and several portions of the race involved a narrow stretch of course, so I ended up getting caught behind some walkers and not being able to get around them the first mile.

I was also pretty nervous about the half-marathon because I never did a long run longer than 6.2 miles during my training (oops), but I did do all my runs on a course that contained a lot of hills. I also cut out Diet Dr. Pepper the month of February (well at least until after the race - I had one the Monday after I got back!) and was more intentional with my diet making sure to have good carbs and proteins for fuel. I had also planned to walk through the water stations, because again, I can't run and drink at the same time.

I kept joking that the weight of all those medals is what hurt my back!

My "goal time" started out as anything under 3 hours, and then I revised it to be under 2:50. (I guess I should back up and say that I am a slow runner, and my current PR is 2:34:52). However, running on hills during my training really paid off! Every time I hit a hill, I got a renewed burst of energy. I had two pace bands on my arm - one for a 3:00 finish and one for a 2:45 finish. Around mile 7, I realized that my pace was more aligned with a 2:45 finish and I was still feeling pretty good, so I started to push myself. When I hit mile 12, I was feeling really good and gave myself a bit more of a push. I ended up finishing in 2:38:51 and ran negative splits again during the second half of the race! The pace was slower than my training, but considering I had run a 10k the day before and had not run more than a 10k in practice I was pumped about my time! I actually smiled when I crossed the finish line and realized that I not only met my goal, but crushed it!

Post-Half Marathon Smiles!

After I got iced up, I got my medals (one for the half and one for completing the Glass Slipper Challenge) and waited for everyone else to finish. Once we all finished and took our celebratory photos, we headed back to the hotel to clean up and head home.  We hit the road that afternoon and stopped by Statesboro, GA on the way to NA so I could see K&J at their new house. It was fun to catch-up with them and show off my new clinkage!

Showing off my new clinkage!

After a fun weekend of running 19.3 miles, I'm ready to get faster and run it again!

The gang (minus LS&MS) before we headed home!