Every Wish That We Put Into Motion.... (comments welcome!)

[Herding_Cats]

And now it is time to start making the exhaustive (very specific) packing lists. And start the walmart pickup order. And worry about the weather and flight cancellations. And hope that my stuffy nose is allergies and not the respiratory garbage DH and DS2 have had.

 

[GollyGadget]

Can you make a list for me as well? And maybe do the actual packing?

I leave in 2 days and have barely even thought about it. Currently I'm "recharging" before I put away more Christmas decorations. The dogs also need a bath and groom.... Plus running. I'm quickly running out of hours!

 

[Herding_Cats]

Can you make a list for me as well? And maybe do the actual packing?

I leave in 2 days and have barely even thought about it. Currently I'm "recharging" before I put away more Christmas decorations. The dogs also need a bath and groom.... Plus running. I'm quickly running out of hours!

HAHAH! I'd be happy to share my list if anyone is actually interested, but I have a feeling that the rest of you all have something similar going.

 

[GollyGadget]

HAHAH! I'd be happy to share my list if anyone is actually interested, but I have a feeling that the rest of you all have something similar going.

You're assuming that I have a list at all .

 

[HangWithMerida]

You're assuming that I have a list at all .

Idk how you no list people do it. I am team detailed list all the way!

 

[Herding_Cats]

@DopeyBadger I have a taper question.
First, yeah. It's taper.

Because I didn't run on Christmas (Sunday, 9mi/2:05 run) and pushed it to Monday, I was planning on skipping my mid-week rest day so I can still do all of the runs on the schedule leading up to the 2nd when we fly to Orlando. I'm sitting at 98.5mi this month, so this is the most I've ever run in a month with 3 days still to go (I hit 100mi exactly in October.)

So Monday was the 9mi, yesterday was 4mi (56min), today is supposed to be 5mi M (60min) and then 4mi on Thursday and Friday. Saturday I'm still planning to keep off, and 4mi on Sunday.

But my achilles this is starting to flare up a little post-run. Especially after pace runs and long runs. I think it's mostly calf-tightness, but I'm wondering if it would be a better idea to take one of this week's runs off the schedule, and if so, which one would be the best one to chop. Rest today, do the 5mi M run on Thursday and the 4mi on Friday?

 

[DopeyBadger]

But my achilles this is starting to flare up a little post-run. Especially after pace runs and long runs. I think it's mostly calf-tightness, but I'm wondering if it would be a better idea to take one of this week's runs off the schedule, and if so, which one would be the best one to chop. Rest today, do the 5mi M run on Thursday and the 4mi on Friday?

Take today off and then move forward with the easy 4 miler on Thursday. Skip the 5 mile marathon tempo especially since paced runs are bothering your achilles at the moment. The gains made from that singular 5 mile tempo are minimal, the cost could be much higher if the achilles becomes a bigger issue. The 5 mile tempo is meant to help keep you sharp for race day, but you're not going for PRs and with Dopey being a multi-race challenge it'll keep you sharp enough.

 

[Herding_Cats]

Take today off and then move forward with the easy 4 miler on Thursday. Skip the 5 mile marathon tempo especially since paced runs are bothering your achilles at the moment. The gains made from that singular 5 mile tempo are minimal, the cost could be much higher if the achilles becomes a bigger issue. The 5 mile tempo is meant to help keep you sharp for race day, but you're not going for PRs and with Dopey being a multi-race challenge it'll keep you sharp enough.

Got it. I'm a little annoyed at having to miss a run since I've managed to hit nearly all of them this month, but this has been an ongoing issue for almost a year now (that has gotten so much better since PT!) and I'm so nervous it's going to flare up on race week.

 

[Herding_Cats]

Thursday: 4mi easy. Heat acclimation training. More foam rolling of the calf. More stretching. Soaked it in epsom salts.

Here we go! Time to wind everything up to top speed for the next 3 days!

Friday: 4mi easy. Heat acclimation training (that I'm tempted to skip looking at the forecast.) DH scheduled us both a 30min massage this afternoon, and then we both have a chiropractor appointment. And then we have a grocery order to pick up, costco run, and a quick stop at the running store for my last minute fueling needs.

Saturday: rest day. Finish prepping the house for MIL to stay for the week. PACK FOR DISNEY. Go to BIL/SIL's to watch the Michigan football game. Not staying until midnight.

Sunday: planned 4mi easy. Last few touchups to the cleaning. Update the schedule board and talk the older boys through how they need to do rides/staying after school for practices this week. Pick up MIL. Pack the car. Try to sleep.

 

[Herding_Cats]

I made it! I’m all packed (minus my shokz, which are going in my backpack) and DH is going to pack the car tonight so all we have to do in the morning is drink coffee and drive to the airport.

All that’s left to do is decide how I want my nails for the weekend and paint those while we watch TV tonight.

On a “why not just overdo things” note, I think we are going to attempt MK in the morning on the 9th for medal pics before we go to the airport. Walking post-marathon will be good for me, right?

 

[The Expert]

I made it! I’m all packed (minus my shokz, which are going in my backpack) and DH is going to pack the car tonight so all we have to do in the morning is drink coffee and drive to the airport.

All that’s left to do is decide how I want my nails for the weekend and paint those while we watch TV tonight.

On a “why not just overdo things” note, I think we are going to attempt MK in the morning on the 9th for medal pics before we go to the airport. Walking post-marathon will be good for me, right?

Safe travels! See you soooon!

 

[Herding_Cats]

And THERE’S my trip anxiety. Took all the way until 10pm the night before this time!

 

[Herding_Cats]

Apparently this will be the trip of anxiety. Ugh.

Drawn to Life was great. Thanks to @Naomeri for the tip on the seats.

We “only” walked 7.5 miles today between the expo (wow what a $h!t show!) and our trip to DS for the show and dinner. Getting a whole 4 hours of sleep tonight is going to be great.

 

[Herding_Cats]

If Wednesday night, last night (Friday), and this afternoon are an indicator, I don’t think I’m ever going to sign up for Dopey ever again. Whatever it is about these challenge races and these trips just trips all of the switches on my anxiety and I feel absolutely awful. It’s not a fun time between races. ON the course I’m ok, but all of the in between is sucking the fun out of this trip for me

 

[Livelovedance]

If Wednesday night, last night (Friday), and this afternoon are an indicator, I don’t think I’m ever going to sign up for Dopey ever again. Whatever it is about these challenge races and these trips just trips all of the switches on my anxiety and I feel absolutely awful. It’s not a fun time between races. ON the course I’m ok, but all of the in between is sucking the fun out of this trip for me

I have a hard time making a runDisney trip like a Disney trip. It’s either one or the other for me, I envy those that can do both. My anxiety has been under control this week, but I have had very limited park time. Luckily (or not, according to my wallet), I still have an AP so I don’t feel guilty about only riding 2 rides today. I did have one episode when I tried to do more and couldn’t because of the incredibly long waits for rides (I miss fastpass so much, and if I’m not able to be in the park open to close I feel like paying for Genie+ is throwing away my money). But I dialed it back, reminded myself this is a runDisney trip, and calmed down. However, I don’t have young children or a family to manage expectations with. I saw a couple just now that both ran and have 2 very young children in the parks… I applaud them!

 

[HangWithMerida]

I agree. I enjoy running weekends so much more when I just focus on that. It takes something off your plate. It's a fun thing to be in the parks but I definitely enjoy it more when I'm not worried about how much I'm walking or needing to get to be early. The parks are super stimulating and I need some quiet to recharge after all the mental focus races take.

 

[Herding_Cats]

DH is taking MIL back home this morning, and DD is finally willing to not be actively touching me, so it's time to start the trip report.

Monday: our flight left early-ish....7-something in the morning from our local airport, so we took DS1 with us so he could drive the car home. Stress point number one of the trip came when the 35min drive home took him almost an hour. AND he took for.ev.er. to text us back when he got home. There we sat in the terminal, knowing he should have been home 20min ago, him not responding to any texts, and wondering if he ended up in a ditch somewhere since the roads were a bit slippery. DH was getting ready to send BIL out to look for him when DS finally messaged us back that he was home and that he'd gotten stuck behind a drivers-ed car for the last 1/3 of the drive home and that's why it took so long.

Layover in Chicago of nearly 3 hours is too long. Just sayin. I was also surprised by how few of the passengers on our plan were obviously going to Orlando for the race weekend since last year at least half the people on the flight had on previous years' jackets, spirit jerseys, or hats.

Baggage claim, toll pass (with the detour over to Terminal A to pick it up), and rental car counters went smoothly. I pushed the wrong button on the grocery pick up and instead of pushing "I'm on my way" I selected "I'm here!" and then the store started calling me because our car was not in the pickup area. Whoops!

Stayed in the new resort studios at GF on Monday night. The rooms are very pretty, and we got to watch the water pageant from our room. Dinner at Polite Pig (which was actually good this time!), ordered drawings from the art store, and grabbed a dole whip (because dole whip is necessary on all Disney trips.)

 

[Herding_Cats]

Tuesday: Park day 1. Approximately 13.5mi walked. We were packed, checked out, loaded back up in the car, and in the AK parking lot by 6:45 for the 7:30 ETPE. We rope-dropped Flight of Passage, then walked over the Everest (my first time riding EE!), and then hit Dinosaur where we were reminded that it's a very jerky ride. And then we got in line for Nomad Lounge. I think we waited longer in line (pre-opening!) for that than we did for FoP!
After lunch we parked at the Poly (before our room was ready), walked over to the TTC, and hopped over to Epcot where I had stacked some LL (despite the app's best attempts to not work for me at all at 7am!) and had big plans too just graze around the world. Managed to ride Ratatouille, Soarin', Living with the Land, and Figment. We poked around the pockets in world showcase that we have always missed when we took the kids with us because they aren't really interested in meandering through the back of Morocco or UK when there are things to eat and rides to ride. It was a different way to experience WS and I enjoyed it. It was a long, slightly exhausting day, but I figured that doing a park day this far ahead of the races would be for the best since there shouldn't really be that much walking on expo day. Hahahaha!

 

[Herding_Cats]

Wednesday: Expo day. Cirque Du Soleil day. Morimoto day. Approximately 8 miles walked. Oh yeah. Totally a low-key day, right? DH and I both did VQs for the expo, I got group 19 (for 2 people) and he got group 64 I think (also for 2 people.) As everyone else said, this day was nutso. After reading the reports from W&D I thought things might be better than they were for last year's MW from a merch standpoint, but it was absolute chaos in there, and things were already sold out in some sizes by noon. And the sizing was all over the place! The purple dopey hoodie was at least 1, if not 2 sizes smaller, like it was almost kid-sizing and not adult womens. A very helpful CM checked in the back part of the building for stuff that needed to get put back out for an XL for me and managed to find one, which someone else tried to get from her (not rudely, she didn't know that it was something that was specifically being brought to me.) I understand Disney wanting to control the people who think they need to show up at 3am to get in line for merch, but they definitely did not anticipate what the VQ would do to the line for bib pickup, AND there was a huge line coming out of that building to get into the 'regular' expo for shirts! Everywhere you went you had to stand in line. That's one way to drive sales for clubRunDisney I guess. I stayed behind to get a picture with Dopey while DH went and got into the bib line since he had to go to multiple tables for his stuff while I only needed to make one stop. I thought maybe I'd be able to jump into line with him, but his line moved faster than mine. So much time standing around.

Our feet were not happy, so we went and hung out in the pool and the hot tub for a little bit before heading over to DS for our show and dinner. OH MY GOSH. That show. It's so good you guys. We sat in the middle section of the theater, first row on the 2nd tier. Very easy access to the exits for the end of the show, and no one to have to try to see over in front of us. Although, people who arrived 5 or 10min after the show started did walk back and forth in front of us until an usher helped them find their seats.
Morimoto was yummy, as usual, but we did get to bed a little later than I wanted since we ate after the show (745 reservation.) We set up all our costumes, bibs, etc. AND packed our bags up again because we were checking out in the morning. Again. And had park plans. What could go wrong?

 

[Herding_Cats]

Thursday: 5k day! WOO HOO! "Only" 16.5 miles covered this day! Thursday was so much fun, but definitely made me appreciate how spread out the course gets for the half a full because having 12k+ people on a 3mi loop is just going to be a clogged up course no matter what you do. Made a few character stops, and was once again reminded how much faster DH is than me. I felt like I spent most of the time trying to keep up with him, and get him to take more walk breaks, even though running felt better on our feet than walking.

Looking at the character lines post-race we opted to NOT stay for those as we were planning to rope-drop MK, and had a tour scheduled for 11-6, so we wanted to get a few things out of the way before that started (namely BTM, and a nutella and fruit waffle from Sleepy Hallow.) Unfortunately for us, turn around time took a bit longer than anticipated and we were in the park only 15min before they released everyone to all of the lands, so even though we got all the way up and around the back of the castle to head to Thunder Mtn, both masses merge near the ferry and the line was immediately 45+min long. Instead, we opted to hit Jungle Cruise, then Sleep Hallow for me, and shop a little on Main St since it was trying to rain. DH mobile ordered from Casey's and I slept sat at a table in the corner while we waited for that. Our tour was AMAZING. We rode Space, 7DMT, HM, and BTM, hopped to HS where we rode RnR, SDD, TSMM, MMRR, and Star Tours. THEN we went to Epcot and rode Guardians (which was absolutely awesome!) and TT. Lastly, we got over the AK for FoP and EE if there was time. Something happened in the ride group before us the we got the extra, extra, extra long pre-show for FoP (where he has to "reboot the system" multiple times) so we didn't make it back to EE, but at that point we were absolutely exhausted. It was an amazing day with so much fun during the race and hitting all 4 parks with pretty much all of the headliners in 7 hours. We grabbed food on the way to our room at Saratoga (our resort for the last 4 nights) and crashed hard. We decided to sleep in a little extra the next morning, so we just kind of tossed our race costumes on the couch and called it a night.