Disney Princess Report

Two words: LOVED IT!

This trip was more of a whirlwind than the birthday extravaganza I had in January for the marathon but still had a great time. The expo was basically the same as for the marathon. This time though they had characters at the expo so I could get a picture out of the way up front (you know how I like to stalk the characters during the race!)



I had not originally planned to run in costume for the race but after attending the expo, I was hit with the burning desire to piece together some sort of frilly costume for the race. For me, this is HIGHLY unusual in that I generally prefer not to draw attention to myself. I located a Target store in the area and purchased a child size "fancy nancy" skirt that I was able to piece together to do the trick. Add one sparkly Bondi band and I had a costume of sorts. (I would have LOVED to run in a tiara however I am afflicted with a larger than normal head and one size fits all does not include me!)

In typical Disney style, the race starts pretty early and with the time change that weekend it gave me extra reason to be nervous about whether the alarm clocks were set, etc. I never sleep well the night before a race because I can't get my mind off worrying about whether I will sleep through the alarm. I had three alarms set and did wake up! I left the hotel at 4:45 and made it in plenty of time. The Disney race is great in that you park right next to the finish so you really don't need to bag check. At around 6:00ish I headed to the start line which is a little over a half mile from where you park and tried to wedge my way into corral A (I was in the first corral!)



We were wedged in like sardines! I could not really even get into the corral so was sort of on the outside of the fence between corral A and corral B. The gun went off and the Fairy Godmother gave us her final blessings as we crossed the line.



From the start I had to weave through A LOT of walkers. I was kind of surprised at the number of walkers who were placed in the first corral. Not even one mile into the race I bumped into two of my friends, we call them "the Wendys" because they look alike and, well, they are both named Wendy.



I was pretty excited to see them as the odds of running into 2 people you know at the beginning of the race out of 8,000 runners are pretty slim. I ran with them for the rest of the race. In usual Karen and Disney style, I stopped for 1,000 photo ops along the way. I generally just took my time and ran a slow paced, fun race. Here are a few of my pics:



















































...and a good time was had by all! The race was followed by a mad dash to shower, pack up my room and get back to Daytona Beach for my ride home with Rick.

Last week was pretty good as far as the running and getting back on the nutrition wagon goes. I took Monday off from boot camp - I was too tired to get up! I actually did not catch up on my sleep from the last week until today. I got in some good mid-week runs and 2 strength workouts during the week which made me feel like I was getting back on plan. Today, we had a lot of rain but I had a long run of 17 miles on the calendar and decided to go for it in the rain. I lucked out and the rain was light to non-existent while I was running. It did not start getting heavy until I got in the car to head home. I ran at a local park which was *supposed* to have a 3.4 mile loop but the loop ended up being more like 2.5 so I had to go around a few more times than I had expected. The only downside to that is the temptation to stop and get in your car every time you pass by. It ended up being a nice run - very peaceful as they were no other crazies out there in the cold rain today :)

Tonight - I must do laundry. UGH. Tomorrow if the rain holds out, we have the first match of our tennis season at 1:00 so I will get to sleep in again - YAY!

Have a good Sunday :)
K