2026 Wine & Dine Half Marathon Weekend

[fatmanatee]

does runDisney run the telegram site or someone on the DIS?

It's not official, appears to have been built by teamrundis.com.

 

[butterscotchcollins]

I’m shocked that even the charity route is hitting a brick wall. My fingers are crossed to make a random Half or Challenge drop but if we don’t get in this year it wasn’t meant to be.

 

[Thegoofysmers]

THIS!

I think themes and publicity combined probably drove a lot of new interest, and Disney redesigning the page to eliminate link sharing (purposeful or not) impacted the veteran community's ability to virtually guarantee entry.

If it was a design decision, I wonder if they got enough complaints about not being able to move your own queue (due to wifi outage, having to commute to work during the wait, etc) if they'd reconsider adding it back? If it was indeed on purpose and they intended to break up the clique, I think they are going to regret it. The community that's been created around rD is something a lot of companies work really hard for, and to purposefully destroy that is truly shortsighted.

We were lucky and got in, but it seems more than usual did not. I do believe the queue sharing change affected many, especially in this community.

In the past, DVC had a very similar process for registering for their Moonlight Magic events. I got into those by using multiple devices, however many in the community had strong opinions against this strategy. Last year DVC made changes and required you to log in to your account before getting into the queue. Then if you use a different device/browser, once logged in through those, you are placed in the exact spot as your first log in, thus eliminating the use of multiple devices. Needless to say, with that change I didn't get into the event. I just hope runDisney doesn't go in a similar direction.

 

[DisneyParrothead]

I’m shocked that even the charity route is hitting a brick wall. My fingers are crossed to make a random Half or Challenge drop but if we don’t get in this year it wasn’t meant to be.

Not all charities have been listed yet. Many are still signing their season contracts.

 

[CaliforniaGirl09]

We were lucky and got in, but it seems more than usual did not. I do believe the queue sharing change affected many, especially in this community.

In the past, DVC had a very similar process for registering for their Moonlight Magic events. I got into those by using multiple devices, however many in the community had strong opinions against this strategy. Last year DVC made changes and required you to log in to your account before getting into the queue. Then if you use a different device/browser, once logged in through those, you are placed in the exact spot as your first log in, thus eliminating the use of multiple devices. Needless to say, with that change I didn't get into the event. I just hope runDisney doesn't go in a similar direction.

I have always wondered why they don't do this. I suspect it costs too much.

 

[accm]

Why not do both? Increase CrD spots, not more than demand but just enough to grab more money per registrations that now are harder than ever to get. People don't let their CrD lapse because of the perceived limited availability. Then continue to increase registration costs for all races. As long as they keep selling out they have no incentive to change things to better the consumer experience.

They absolutely can, but that doesn't make sense if their goal is to attract infrequent guests who spend more money. My guess is that they'll raise the cost of both CrD and registration. I also think they're using the expanded 5k field and starting times as a trial run, and if it goes well they'll do the same for all the races.

 

[fatmanatee]

They already started bumping the cost more than they have in the first few years post-return. Not thrilled about it but was probably inevitable.

 

[sunshine girl]

Making you log in to join the queue doesn't really help, I think. Anyone can set up multiple Disney accounts for free (unlike DVC accounts) so people will just create many extra Disney accounts. It's not worth Disney's time/money (and is probably not smart strategy overall) to gatekeep regular Disney accounts for this (especially when they are prob pleased with a fast sellout).

I was looking back at last year's Wine and Dine sellout times. The sellout times this year are not that different, except for the Challenge which sold out ~33 minutes faster this year. All others are within 2-3 minutes of last year.

I think the appealing themes for every single event, AND great graphic design (finally! omg! yay!) were very key -- plus the Grumpy Challenge idea is genius -- for sure pushing people toward the full Challenge option and resulting in its faster sellout. I know I personally liked all of the race themes more than I have in years for Wine and Dine.

Plus the "last" Coast to Coast thing, plus extra marketing. I think the extra marketing brought in new people who tried and failed to register, not understanding how fast Disney registrations go (or how fast popular race registrations go in general). And for us disboard folks, the loss of queue-ID sharing made an obvious impact.

Ending my armchair analysis here! Always fun to parse runDisney things with you all.

 

[marty3d]

I think the appealing themes for every single event, AND great graphic design (finally! omg! yay!) were very key -- plus the Grumpy Challenge idea is genius -- for sure pushing people toward the full Challenge option and resulting in its faster sellout. I know I personally liked all of the race themes more than I have in years for Wine and Dine.

You're right about the themes and it could have made a difference - especially with people who regularly do rD races but not all of them (looking at me). Prior to the themes being released I was not planning to run W&D at all this year. Within 48 hours of them being released I had talked myself into the challenge and already had hotel and air (all cancellable in case I didn't get in) booked. And I'm not the only one on these boards who made a decision to register because of the themes.

 

[PrincessV]

Amidst all the other registration drama, I missed this entirely: did the 5K registration involve any choice of start times in that giant 3 hour window? Or did they just collect all the regs and will figure that out later?

 

[The Expert]

Amidst all the other registration drama, I missed this entirely: did the 5K registration involve any choice of start times in that giant 3 hour window? Or did they just collect all the regs and will figure that out later?

It did not. Just the usual 5K registration process.

 

[fatmanatee]

Not doing this weekend but theme, artwork, etc is a significant upgrade over last year IMO.

I *do* think that logging in adds enough resistance that you'd end up with fewer "people" in the queue though. It's a matter of having multiple windows open on multiple devices vs. setting up the equivalent accounts, multiple emails, etc. I currently have one DIS account. Multiple email accounts and I guess I could set them up as DIS accounts but the end result would still be fewer potential queue spots than the current situation, which I have to do zero work to set up.

Amidst all the other registration drama, I missed this entirely: did the 5K registration involve any choice of start times in that giant 3 hour window? Or did they just collect all the regs and will figure that out later?

No change. Would hope for some sort of announcement for how they're going to handle this later.

 

[sunshine girl]

I *do* think that logging in adds enough resistance that you'd end up with fewer "people" in the queue though. It's a matter of having multiple windows open on multiple devices vs. setting up the equivalent accounts, multiple emails, etc. I currently have one DIS account. Multiple email accounts and I guess I could set them up as DIS accounts but the end result would still be fewer potential queue spots than the current situation, which I have to do zero work to set up.

For sure it adds a layer of friction, I agree. You're totally right. I do think it would work initially if it's implemented without warning. And if their IT could handle it... lol!

True runDisney addicts would learn to game it and get multiple queue spots per usual. Lots of people would (no special knowledge required, just general tech sense) but most people probably would not. Over time, creates friction for people less in-the-know runDisney-wise or tech-wise. (Or less willing/able to invest a little time to set themselves up.) Perhaps that is something they'd want to do, but also perhaps why bother when they're happy to be selling out races.

I doubt runDisney cares about thousands of new, dummy Disney accounts. But it's possible they don't want to clog up their user database with even more junk. That is out of my wheelhouse entirely though. Perhaps irrelevant!

 

[GreatLakes]

I'm not convinced the theme makes a big difference. Maybe a few people here and there or locals but I've always based which races I do on when I want to be at Disney. The theme wouldn't really move that much.

Other than adding more race weekends to spread the demand I'm not sure what Disney can do to allow more people to get in. Based on what the company as a whole does the other alternative is to keep raising the prices until demand matches supply which is likely on some bean counter's recommendations list.

 

[RadioFr33Europe]

There were definitely people who signed up because of Figment a couple of years ago.

 

[marty3d]

There were definitely people who signed up because of Figment a couple of years ago.

Guilty!

 

[Jessem1133]

There were definitely people who signed up because of Figment a couple of years ago.

My wife was really on the fence about doing our first event this year...but a cat medal? She's in! lol

 

[Novatrix]

There were definitely people who signed up because of Figment a couple of years ago.

Why you gotta call me out like that?

 

[sunshine girl]

Yeah I added the 5k for the first time this year solely because of the theme. I tried to talk myself out of it and failed at the last second. lol.

I've skipped signing up based on theme, but only if I wasn't fully committed to travel. I've added a trip or two (or three, or...), based on great art and themes.

Edit: Oh, but that being said, I do prefer it when they stick with a classic theme for some events like Marathon Weekend -- just Mickey and friends and running. I don't need a "what's your story" secondary theme plastered on top!! And I'll always prefer a Chef Mickey for Wine and Dine.

 

[Amyunder]

You're right about the themes and it could have made a difference - especially with people who regularly do rD races but not all of them (looking at me). Prior to the themes being released I was not planning to run W&D at all this year. Within 48 hours of them being released I had talked myself into the challenge and already had hotel and air (all cancellable in case I didn't get in) booked. And I'm not the only one on these boards who made a decision to register because of the themes.

This was 100% me. I went from maybe springtime Suprise in 2027 and MW in 2028 to signing up for the challenge within 24 hours of the themes posting. DVC rooms booked and everything. It is a great theme I feel so lucky to have gotten in.