Disneyland Half Marathon Sweep Question

[airtime247]

Hi, I was wondering if you experienced Disneyland Half Marathoners can answer a question for me. I know about the 16 minute mile required pace that starts after the last person crosses the start line but in the new program, I noticed the two sweep points - 1:35 at Mile 4 and 3:10 at Mile 10.

This will be my wife's first half marathon and she is getting concerned about being able to complete it in 3:30. My question is, is she safe from being swept as long as she gets past the 10 mile mark by 3:10? We estimate she will hit mile 10 at 3:00 but finish around 3:50 (chip time). Does anyone know at what point they stop giving out medals and stop recording the times? Do they stop giving out the Coast to Coast medals (for me) at the same time as we will run it together?

I noticed in the 2009 results, the last finishers had a clock time of 4:25 so I'm assuming we should be fine. Do you think those very late finishers still received their medals?

I'm pretty sure we will be starting in the last corral as she didn't have a previous race to submit when she registered so we may not be starting too far ahead of the last starters.

-steve

 

[Padstack]

Hi, I was wondering if you experienced Disneyland Half Marathoners can answer a question for me. I know about the 16 minute mile required pace that starts after the last person crosses the start line but in the new program, I noticed the two sweep points - 1:35 at Mile 4 and 3:10 at Mile 10.

This will be my wife's first half marathon and she is getting concerned about being able to complete it in 3:30. My question is, is she safe from being swept as long as she gets past the 10 mile mark by 3:10? We estimate she will hit mile 10 at 3:00 but finish around 3:50 (chip time). Does anyone know at what point they stop giving out medals and stop recording the times? Do they stop giving out the Coast to Coast medals (for me) at the same time as we will run it together?

I noticed in the 2009 results, the last finishers had a clock time of 4:25 so I'm assuming we should be fine. Do you think those very late finishers still received their medals?

I'm pretty sure we will be starting in the last corral as she didn't have a previous race to submit when she registered so we may not be starting too far ahead of the last starters.

-steve

Since this is a new format for the DL HM, I am not sure how they would handle the sweeps after the last checkpoint. My guess would be that they would still sweep up to the point that they cross Harbor (due to road closing permits by the city). The best advice I would give is to have her line-up at the very front of her corral. This would give her a bit of time in the bank.

 

[cewait]

I went to the program to read the requirement. It’s clear that they are looking to clear streets this year – I am betting in a previous race they had a straggler issue. The 10 mile time is a 19 minute pace at that point. You may run the risk of being swept around mile 6.4 through 8 at that pace as they attempt to open some of the lesser affected roadways if you are only maintaining that pace in that part of the race.
Nevertheless, while I cannot really guarantee the stretch from mile 10 (leaving property) through mile 12 (returning to property) I believe that once back on DL property you would be safe from the sweeper.
As far as medals…. If you finish later than the 3:30 after the last runner crosses the line you may not be in the official finisher list but should receive you medals as long as the finish line is open. Normally Disney will keep the results running for some period of time after the time limit of the race. When looking at the results remember the wave starts. The 4:25 clock times may represent a 3:45-3:50 finish.

Interestingly there seems to be some real corral jumping going on in Anaheim. A lot of the time differences (chip vs clock) one would expect to see on the last finisher results are not really there. Seems like the 30 minute spreads are 4-5 pages in front of the last finishers on the list. The average delta for the last 100 finishers was only 13 minutes. You two may want to keep that in mind – though I would not personally encourage anything more than pushing to the front of your assigned corral.

 

[Padstack]

cewait - That really surprises me about the corral jumping. From the races that I have run, Disney is the best in keeping just that from happening. I remember being checked not only when I entering the corral, but while I was in the corral I was asked to show my number to verify I was in the correct one.

 

[kirkson]

cewait - That really surprises me about the corral jumping. From the races that I have run, Disney is the best in keeping just that from happening. I remember being checked not only when I entering the corral, but while I was in the corral I was asked to show my number to verify I was in the correct one.

In my experience, from last year's race, folks generally stayed in the corral to which they were assigned. The problem was that they lied about their expected finish time, and were assigned an "earlier" corral than they should have been. To my knowledge, Disney did not check to verify qualification times. So, I was conservative about my finish time (it was my first 1/2) and I ended up behind hundreds and hundreds of walkers. Not folks who ran some/walked some. Walkers from the starting line. It was extremely frustrating.

I should caveat this to say that I have no issue whatsoever with folks who walk the race, more power to you for doing it in the first place, I really think it's great. But please be honest about your expected time!

This year, I have a better idea of where I'll finish, so I was able to HONESTLY put myself in an "earlier" corral. Still, I expect to see many walkers starting in front of me. At least this year I'll be ready for it and less impatient about it. SERENITY NOW!

 

[dsnyfan21]

Personally saw two people corral jump at the princess. I was in the front of the second corral and two people went under the green mesh stuff they have to separate the corrals. This was pretty early on in the "waiting in your corral" time, then more volunteers showed up to stand near the green mesh.

As far as walkers/runners - unless you are an elite runner and get the "up front" section, you just need to be patient. Disney races are just typically when there are LOTS of people everywhere doing many different paces and intervals and also people stopping to take photos and all that. Relax, have fun and be prepared to use your race manners!

 

[cewait]

cewait - That really surprises me about the corral jumping. From the races that I have run, Disney is the best in keeping just that from happening. I remember being checked not only when I entering the corral, but while I was in the corral I was asked to show my number to verify I was in the correct one.

I was just looking at the finish times, only. The second to the last listed finisher in 2009 started 2:13 after the gun. That is a wave A1 or A2 time difference. However, I did look at the bib number after reading your response and I think we both are correct to some extent. I do see a few bib numbers that would indicate a falsified/overly ambitious predicted finish time but there are also bib numbers in the mix that should have had a 20+ minute delay at the start and do not.

Frankly, I agree that Disney does a great job of corral management. They could use a little input from Elite Racing with regard to wave starts but that is a different story. However, in the 12 years I have been running Disney I see a greater disdain for the rules and have observed more instances of corral jumping in the last 5 years. I am not talking about the fence/rope coming down and folks shooting for the gaps as space compacts but am talking about hopping over the side fence into a corral 3-5 corrals ahead of your bib number or reusing a bib multiple times to get all friends into a faster corral.

I honestly think the escalation in jumping started with Florida publishing their stepped up enforcement of the sweep…. Essentially the year they posted hard sweep points just like DL did with this race. I think folks who are on the cusp of a 16+ minute pace are looking for any advantage they can get. In many ways I do not blame them as the RD has increased the fear factor of the sweep. If you are pushing a 16:30 pace and can get a 7 minute advantage over the last person to cross the line in a half marathon then you are assuring yourself having a 16 minute equivalent pace. It kind of makes sense.

Anyway it’s good to hear they were rechecking in the corrals. I think corral policing and entry time policing is an area that can be greatly imporved. We all enter electronically and nearly all races report results electronically – it would not take much effort to link to Athlinks, Active or some other database to verify results.

 

[dsnyfan21]

Not sure if anyone noticed but they did change the starts for the Princess Half this year.
The first year there were three big corrals. This year, I think 5-6 smaller corrals and each corral started 7 minutes after the other, not 2 corrals on a wave start, etc. I think it worked pretty out pretty well for spreading out the field.

 

[mandac]

I have only done one Disney race (2009 DL) and I estimated about right, as a walker, to finish in 3 hours. I even checked the box for walker, so I was really surprised when I wasn't in the last corral. I tried to line up in the back of my assigned corral, but I felt bad when the runners from the waves after me would come through. I knew they were frustrated with me for walking in front of them, but usually there was no where to go to get out of the way! Too bad races don't have a fast lane.

 

[kirkson]

to be honest, part of the problem last year was that there were a few narrow choke points in the first 3 miles of the race that just completely STOPPED the flow of traffic. So, hopeully they have addressed that this year