Disney's Goofy Race and a Half - 39.3 Miles! (63.2km)

Goofy Race Medals January, 7th/8th, 2012

I have never thought at any point in my life that I would attempt to run both a half-marathon and a full-marathon back to back, and to do it while fighting a cold, a nearly impossible idea.

Nearly impossible, but however improbably, the impossible became probable on the weekend of January 7th/8th at the Wonderful World of Disney :-)

I signed up for the Goofy Run for the challenge of trying to do something new.  The past year, I had done several new events, Ride for Heart - 50km bike ride, Warrior Dash - 5km Obstacle course, and my first Duathlon at the Toronto Islands.  The "Goofy Race and a Half" was part of that phase of trying something new and challenging...  I think after the minute that I clicked on the confirmation, it hit me that I was committing myself to a winter training as well as a summer one.  No more lazy hibernation period after the Scotiabank marathon in October!

Training progressed at an even pace - some weeks weaker than others, but overall, I did 6 races throughout the year:  Warrior Dash 5km, Midsummer Run 30km, Toronto Island Duathlon 9km run, CIBC Run for the Cure 5km, Scotiabank Marathon 42.2km, Whitby Race 16km.  This was all a prelude and training for probably one of the biggest run I have ever done in my life:  63.2km.

Exciting. Yes.  Very. And nerve wrecking too.  Not only was I nervous about the challenge itself, but there was also the fundraising portion that I decided to participate in again with Team in Training.  I figured if I was going to go that far away to do a run, I should also do it on behalf of a charity.  Fundraising this time around, I was pretty lucky in having some really generous friends (and friends of friends) in sponsoring me to do the event.  [whispers:  fyi, I'm still collecting sponsorship $$ for Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of Canada! It's not too late to donate:  http://tinyurl.com/runforthecurewendy ].


Christmas holidays came and heavy hearted I was feeling, I desired to the run more than anything. A series of unhappy events all melded together, and running for me has always been a calming agent. Come boxing week, I caught a surprise cold.  That morphed into a bigger cold.  By New Years, I was seriously not doing well.  Unfortunately doctor's offices were not open.  I took some Tylenol, tried to get some rest (though sleep had evaded me for the most part of the holiday), and finally went in on the Tuesday.  This was January 3rd.  I was flying out on the morning of the 5th (7am flight!).  Not even 2 days away.  My cough had gotten worse by this point, I was starting to scare myself via Googling:  "should you run if you are sick", "should you run a marathon if you have a cough", etc.  Let's just say, many variations of the answers came as to "yes", "no", "maybe".  But the best choice really was to see my doctor.  I certainly wasn't going to take anyone's word on a random forum that it was ok to run in my condition.

It's time to visit the docs...

So off I went to see the docs.  Got myself checked out.  And I had a cold but I could still run.  However, he did say to take it easy.  Ha.  That was definitely what I was going to do.  My doctors said really, I didn't need any medicine, just drink lots of water and get lots of rest.  I asked him, however, for over-the-counter meds so I could stop disturbing everyone's sleep with my cough.  I took the advice of one of my colleagues and asked for Buckley's and Neo Citron.  Checked out with the Pharmicists that this was a good safe combo to take and for the next day I lived and breathed with those two meds.

And Halls too.

Work turned out to be really busy on the 4th, so I worked until nearly 1am.  I had to get up for 4am (taxi was coming to pick me up), so I had very little sleep... I addressed my lack of sleep by literally passing out once I was seated on my flight.  I did not wake up until I reached the Orlando airport.  I also missed my in-flight meal. lol

Jan 5th 2012 - Orlando Florida; 12:05pm.

Coronado Springs Resort, Orlando Florida

We landed, I met with my teammates Canada TNT Flex team, and we took the Disney Magical Express shuttle to get to our resort:  Coronado Springs Resort.  Once we arrived there, I checked in, found out that I  sadly was placed in a separate unit from the rest of my teammates - all the way in the 7B building while they were in building 5.  Mind you, it doesn't sound far, but the 7B building was quite the distance to and from the main lobby building.  At any rate, I parted with my teammates and went to look for my hotel room... got lost for a good 10-15 minutes (apparently I can't follow signs... I later found out I was not alone in my misguidance since my roommate encountered the same problem).

EXPO, picking up racekit

I met up with my team again, talked to my coach about my cold and what the doctor had said.  She was a little concerned (ok, very concerned, since I was coughing, stuffy nose and looked pretty pale).  She said to take it easy on the day of the course, just to see how I felt.  I completely agreed with her on that.

We made our way to take the shuttle to the ESPN expo to pick up our racekits.  We found out that the racekits were separated into two sections:  #1 You had to pick up your bib separately from your goodies bag.  They were in separate buildings.

Lunch outdoors on picnic table

Once we had picked up our individual kits, I parted ways again with my team, and decided to grab some lunch.  It was nearly 3pm now, I was famished.  I bought myself a nice "healthy" lunch, grilled chicken burger basket.  And popcorn.  It was really expensive is all I got to say.  Disney = expensive.  This meal [see to left], cost $11 USD.  That's not including the $2.50 water.

As I ate my lunch quietly outdoors on a picnic table.  I felt chilled, yet when I looked around me, an elderly couple in their mid-60s in tshirts, kids running around in tshirt and shorts... I figured that there was definitely something not so hot going on inside me.  I chewed on my no-frills chicken burger thoughtfully as I calculated how many hours I had left to recover to be well enough to at least run the half.  God I couldn't even imagine doing the full marathon at this point.  Chew chew, drink drink, mmm popcorn.. cough - not a good idea popcorn.  It was also a little stale.  French fries were good though.

Working on laptop in hotel room

After the meal, I made my way back to my hotel room.  On the way back to my resort, I of course, had to get lost again.  I boarded the wrong bus, ended up at another resort and had to double back.  This took time away from the stuff I needed to finish from work before I could head off for dinner with my Canada Flex Team.  Eventually, I did manage to turn on my laptop and work away....

I also decided I needed some "company" (my roommate had arrived but had left to pick up her racekit before I came back to my room), so I turned on the tv and watched introductions to all the different themeparks in Disney world.

Ideally, this should have been my day to go to the themeparks, but I was so low on energy that I couldn't bring myself to do anything.

Dinner with Canada Flex Team

5pm came around, and I left to meet my team for dinner at the Maya Grill.  Food at the place was ok..  I did not like what I got, some sort of fish called the Mahi Machi.  Dessert was good, Strawberry Cheesecake.  While I was at dinner, I had actually gotten a refillable souvineer cup and put some NeoCitran in it.  I was getting verrry sleepy during dinner time.  lol.  One of my teammates who sat beside me looked at me with concern:  Are you ok??  I had to grin sheepishly that I was kind of drowsey from medicine.  Made me a terrible conversationalist.  Although I always find myself usually very warm and welcoming, with a cold, and struggling to cough + being terribly drowsy, I must have given everyone the impression at the dinner table that I was very standoffish.  They were all there to run a good race - I didn't want to give them my cold too.

After dinner, I went back to my hotel immediately and there I met my roommate, Terri for the first time.  Best roommate ever :-)  We got along really well, and honestly, she made my experience at the run so much more fun and we hung out together all through out the 4 days we were there.

Terri was not only doing the Goofy Race and a half, but she was also doing an additional 5km run on the 6th.  So, 5km, 21km, 42.2km.  Craziness.  But amaaaazing.  She had to turn in early, since she had to wake up for 2am to catch a shuttle in the morning to get to the startline of her 5km run.  I too decide to turn in early, I wanted to catch breakfast with the entire Flex team.


Jan 6th 2012 - Orlando Florida; 9am.
I skipped the morning team in training flex group run and just joined them for the breakfast.  The food at breakfast was sadly lackluster.  We got muffins, coffee, bagel and fruit salad.  Mind you, to join this Meet and Greet breakfast was $36 I think.  Ouch.  I already met my team... I could have slept in. lol

After breakfast I headed back to the room, changed to something more comfortable, asked Terri about picking up my themepark tickets.  I had purchased them online (via a special group discount form), and it had said something about "Call Window" pickup.  She suggested maybe see the Concierge about it or maybe I would be able to pick it up at the themepark itself.  I decided it made more sense to be at the Themepark, so I headed to Epcot and ha! there it was in a big sign "Call Window".  I went there, showed them my ID and got my parkhopping ticket.  As I entered the park, I swiped my ticket and then got "fingerprinted" by the entry machine.

Epcot!!

Yay. Epcot.  Amazing.  I had always dreamed of Disney world as a kid.  Despite the heavy heartedness I'd felt all through the holidays, something about Disney World did lift a bit of the cloud away, maybe just tucked it away for a little bit, further away into the back of my mind; even for a moment.   I wandered around aimlessly, just drinking everything in.  I finally ventured into the "GLOBE" (spaceship Earth) and did some 'time travelling'.  It was a cool ride.  No screaming required :-)  Not like I had much of a voice to scream with!

I ended up doing two more "rides", one was flight simulator, and another was a storm weatherer one (4-D) - this one I got sprayed with water.  Sad to say, the flight simulator one kind of made me nauseous... motion sickness from a simulator!  goodbye dream of being an astronaut. haha.  And then...somehow I found myself drawn to the gift shop at Epcot.  Here I bought my mini-ears :-) to run with during my race and my little souvineers.

Pretzel and Cheese sauce

It was almost 4pm before I realized I hadn't eaten anything all day except for a muffin at breakfast.  So, I bought a giant pretzel and some cheese sauce on the side.  I realized about 2 bites into the pretzel that cheese probably wasn't the best idea since I was planning on racing tomorrow. So had to toss it. :-(

The pretzel was ok.  Not as big as the ones we got in NYC, but it did its job, filled my stomach with some food until the "Inspirational dinner" at 5pm.  I walked around a little bit more and finally at a quarter past 4pm decided to head back to the resort.  I wanted to see the other themeparks, but there really wasn't enough time.  And tomorrow was the half-marathon, I didn't want to tire myself out.

Ethan Zohn (from survivor) talks about his Leukemia

The inspirational dinner had some pretty amazing speakers:  Ethan Zohn (from Survivor and the Amazing Race), Bruce Cleland (founder of Team in Training), and the infamous John "The Penguin" Bingham.  All were very touching speeches.  The hall we dined in was huge.  There were 902 people, and all of us together raised 3.1million dollars.  That is an astounding amount of money to fundraise.  There were of course people who went way beyond their fundraising goals, one person raised $30,000+.  lol. No, that person wasn't me! (wishful thinking though...)

Me and my mini mouse ears

After I returned to my room, I decided to tryout my "outfit" for the next days half-marathon.  I attached my bib, shoe tag to my shoe, put on my team in training jersey, filled up my water bottles, packed my electrolytes to my water belt and readied up my body glide, IT bands, and my cap for the next days race.

As a finishing touch, I put on my mouse ears... oh they were so adorable!!  And fuzzy hehe.

My roommate came in not long after my crazy self-photoshoot ;-) only putting one of the many crazy shots I took of myself in full gear!  we chatted a bit and discussed what time we should get up for... and we determined it to be 1:45am

OMG. that was so early.  My roommate was so dilligent in making her honouree/in memory ribbons and attaching it to her jersey.  I lent a hand in the end, seeing that time was running short.  We went to bed at around 10:30ish.  There really wasn't much time to sleep!  We both set our alarms.  mine was set to go off at 1:30am, hers to 1:45am.

We both took a picture together as pre-half-marathon:

2:30am January 7th, 2012 - Terri and I pre-race (for half-marathon)

US Flex Team

And dear god, the most horrible thing happened... my calendar reminder alarm went off at 11:55am.  It jolted both of us awake.  Luckily we were able to both go back to "sleep", and promptly woke for the 1:45am alarm.  We freshened up and we were ready to leave our hotel by quarter before 3am.  Because I was situated so far away from my Canadian Flex Team, I was suggested by my coach to go with the US Flex team since it would be easier.  So I ended up taking my team photo with the US Flex team :) at the lobby before taking the shuttle out to the startline area.

For every marathon I have done, I have always worn something extra that would toss away during the actual run.  This was no different, despite it being in Florida and supposedly quite warm.  It was bloody cold!  So cold, I could see my breath.

Tony Horton, P90X guy telling us to ways to stretch

We were sitting at the checkin baggage area for about an hour or so.  While sitting there with Terri, we heard an announcer on stage say that Mr. Tony Horton, P90X guy was there!  Wow, famous people anyone??  He was calling out stretches, and people were hopping to it.  I was just too cold, tired, and miserable to move.

Finally we checked in our baggage (which I put my sweatshirt, extra water, and my ballerina shoes for post-race comfort shoes).  Once we checked in the luggage, we were funneled through as we walked for who knows how long... 15minutes? to our respective corals.  After the first wave (Coral A) started off, it was at least a half an hour wait before it got to our coral.  I later found out that there were about 22,000 half-marathoners!! Crazy!

running during half-marathon

The run turned out to be not as difficult as I predicted.  With my cold, I ate some halls, took it really easy and took my time, taking pictures whenever I could, but always made sure that I watched the time - since there were sweepers (people who come to pick you up if you don't get to certain mileage points).

Terri and I ran into each other at one point, took some pictures as we ran through the Magic Kingdom.  So amazing.  It was scenic, very entertaining, lots of characters were out there for us to pose with.  I got a picture with Launch Pad :) And donald and daisey duck.  One in front of the magic Kingdom, etc.

In general, the route was by far more interesting than any other route I had ever run in the past 5 years.

I finished the race feeling very strong and although still coughing a bit, the rest of me felt good; legs were not sore at all.

I crossed the finish line, got a medal, emergency blanket, and food and water to last me the next day :)

That evening, my roommate was kind enough to invite me to join her Indiana teammates for a pasta dinner.  The restaurant was located in downtown Disney, so it was a first time for me in going down there and I was excited to see what it was like.

It had a LEGO store!! woooo!!  unfortunately, no time to go in it... we went to this restaurant called TREX. It was very atmospheric let's just say... lots of dinosaurs and prehistoric creatures... that roared and moved.  Surprisingly good food, however, when I tried their salmon dinner with rice.  I had originally wanted to order pasta, but all the items had cheese and extra cheese with different types of cheese.  No need to upset my stomach anymore than it was already.

Dinner at Trex, day before full marathon

Salmon was DE-LIC-IOUS!  so so good, I was just shocked how yummy it was.  After finishing dinner, we headed back to our rooms.  Terri and I were determined to sleep earlier.  1:45am, again, we awoke.  We headed to the lobby again after freshening up and gearing up for the run to take our team picture.

2:30am January 8th, 2012 - Terri and I pre-race (for full-marathon)

US Flex team

The marathon was a bit tougher.  Although my legs weren't all that sore, my cold was still pretty persistant.  I managed through, halls and pretzels and some banana's they gave us as fuel along the way.  Unlike the half-marathon, marathon day wasn't as cool, but it was still very cold while we sat there waiting.  I was fortunate to meet a person that gave me heat packs to grip on to :)  Lifesaver indeed.

Despite how cold it was while sitting around waiting, as soon as we started running, it warmed up quickly.  I dumped my giant sweater (you can't miss it in the picture), not even 3 miles in.  I did hold on to the heat packs until well into mile 16.

There was a few amusing moments through the race, and some tough ones.  Amusing was trying to outdo "Mr. Incredible".  He was a very consistant paced person, but in the end, I ran passed him.  Great costume though.

Again, took lots of pictures.  I got very teary eyed at one point of my race.  Got through it.  Rewarded with a free chocolate lol.  Ate 3 bananas.  Finished off all my pretzels in my pouch.  Finished 2 rows of cliff blok jellies.  and nearly ate all my stash of HALLS.

When I finally crossed the finish line, 2 medals on me, I was both relieved and quite astounded I made it through.  I remembered to check in at the TNT tent (that way my coach wouldn't hate me and have to look for me through all the 42.2km).  After that, I headed straight back to the hotel, showered and slept like a log until the Victory dinner.  So much for themepark hopping!

Photo taken in the dining hall with Chip N' Dale

The Victory dinner was really quite entertaining.  I sat with Terri and took pictures of my food (surprise surprise), and of the people around.  There were a lot of thanks going around, a lot of dancing on the stage, and both Terri and I agreed that the Black Eyed Pea's song "Tonight's gonna be a good night" should be the themesong for the entire weekend.  It was constantly played throughout the 4 days I was there.

I decided to turn in early since I had an early flight the next day (8am), and according to the Magical Express, pickup would be at 4am.  So yet again, I had to get up far too early for anyone on "vacation".  I noticed though as I left the dinner that my wallet was missing.  Trying not to panic, I returned to my room and found that it was not there.... it was time to panic.  My roommate helped me look around the room, and I decided to head back to the dining hall to retrace my steps.

Thank god.  I found it under the table in the dining hall. I went back to the lobby and did some gift shopping and finally returned to my room.  It was bed time alright.

At 3am I was up and I rolled my luggage out and all the way to lobby, checked out, and to the magical express.  As I waited for the bus to arrive, I met another friend I had huddled with in the cold, Kaylee.  She was an inspiration to talk to, being in the airforce and all :) I was super impressed.  She could fly a helicopter! Wow.

Breakfast at Orlando Airport

We talked for a while, and finally we arrived at Terminal A.  Kaylee was at Terminal B.  We parted ways.  Once inside, I was so hungry.  I got myself a croissant sandwich from Burger Kings.

Customs went smoothly, and while waiting for my flight, I finalized some things for work.  Was able to send it off, just before my flight arrived.  TO, here I come!

Again, I was fast asleep on the plane.  With neocitran in my system now.  When we arrived in Pearson, I realized what real cold was.  with my parka zipped up, extra hat, and runners, I jetted to get a taxi to go home.

What an adventure to Disney.  Most interesting course I had run in my life.  My legs felt fine though, a tiny bit sore, but nothing compared to how I felt at the Scotiabank marathon.  I guess it means my body is in good shape despite the cold? :)

Hurray!!

Until the next race :P  this would conclude the mileage of the year (until I get my next pair of runners :-) )!

Thank you again to all my wonderful sponsors:  Jeffrey Lam, Kaibar, Lucy Wong, Liana Li, Anna Do, Stephen Lavoie, Richard Tanha, Joyce Quan, Vina Ly, Lynette, Cousins, Michell Wong, Mildred Avendano, Susan Jong, Madeline Avendano, Cecilia Tsang, Kathy Tazumi, and Rafeeza Khan.

Without you guys, I would not have been able to do the race and in turn, help save lives with the funds.  So a big thanks to all of you!!  And to those who wanted to support me, but wasn't able to do so financially, thank you, I know your thoughts were with me as I ran my final mileage on the race course.  I also of course have to thank my Coach, Theresa, and TNT organizer Cheryl for making it a smooth transition to and from the Disney race and matching me up with an amazing roommate, Terri.  To my Canada Flex Team, you're awesome, great accomplishments everyone.  Hopefully we will all get a chance to meet again in another run in the future :-)

[edit] Adding the course maps :-)

Disney Half Marathon Course (21km)

Disney Full Marathon Race Course (42.2km)

** Note:  I didn't lose any toenails! :-)