Have we reached the saturation point?

[camaker]

2) Lack of diversity in weekends. With the exception of Marathon weekend, all weekends are Kids races, 5K, 10K, and half marathon in the morning with a different theme painting each weekend. No different distance like the TOT 10-miler; no night races; no relay options (for marathon); etc. rD is staying with a blah formula and I think it's starting to hurt them. I can tell you, Wine & Dine had been on my bucket list, but once it got moved to the morning, I have almost zero interest in trying to run that weekend.

Not meaning to hijack the thread, but I've got to ask. What is the appeal to a relay option for a marathon? You're not really running a marathon, you're running something along the lines of a half marathon (for a 2-person relay) or just over a 10k (for a 4-person relay). Why not just run those distances and have your own race?

When I ran City of Oaks in November they had a relay option and I have to say it was a bit demoralizing to be chugging along in the back half doldrums (say miles 14-20) only to have people blow by me like they were fresh out of the gate. Invariably they had a relay bib on their back, so they pretty much were fresh out of the gate. Now I know the demoralizing mental part is really on me, but I just don't understand the appeal of the relay.

What am I missing?

 

[derekleigh]

Not meaning to hijack the thread, but I've got to ask. What is the appeal to a relay option for a marathon? You're not really running a marathon, you're running something along the lines of a half marathon (for a 2-person relay) or just over a 10k (for a 4-person relay). Why not just run those distances and have your own race?

When I ran City of Oaks in November they had a relay option and I have to say it was a bit demoralizing to be chugging along in the back half doldrums (say miles 14-20) only to have people blow by me like they were fresh out of the gate. Invariably they had a relay bib on their back, so they pretty much were fresh out of the gate. Now I know the demoralizing mental part is really on me, but I just don't understand the appeal of the relay.

What am I missing?

To me, a 2-person relay would be a nice offer as something to add to the weekend. I've never run a relay so I may no be the best person to cheerlead for it. But I think it would be a cool feature and it may help the marathon sell out. Sadly, I don't expect it to return any time soon.

 

[rteetz]

To me, a 2-person relay would be a nice offer as something to add to the weekend. I've never run a relay so I may no be the best person to cheerlead for it. But I think it would be a cool feature and it may help the marathon sell out. Sadly, I don't expect it to return any time soon.

I know they did have a relay at one point. I wonder if it just wasn't a great sell and that's why they got rid of it.

 

[FFigawi]

I know they did have a relay at one point. I wonder if it just wasn't a great sell and that's why they got rid of it.

I think it was quite popular. I imagine the logistics is what caused them to offer it only once. It couldn't have been easy to get all the runners to and from the exchange point near the Grand Floridian and Poly.

 

[Ariel484]

From what I heard, the relay was logistically pretty hard for them to do...and runner #2 had to wait at the exchange point for a looooong time.

http://land.allears.net/blogs/lauragilbreath/2012/01/wdw_2012_marathon_weekend_the.html

 

[Ariel484]

And the only marathon relay I have ever done was as part of a 5-person team. The legs of the relay were all different distances, ranging from about a 5K to a little over 8 miles (mine was a 6.3-mile leg). When Disney announced this relay I thought it would be something similar to the multi-person relay I had done and thought it was a great way to offer different distances to people who were beyond a 5K but not ready for a 10-miler or half (this was before Disney started offering 10K races). But with the chatter that the 2-person relay was hard, I think a 5-person relay would be impossible for them to do! Imagine busing all of those runners to 4 exchange points around property with all the roads closed...

 

[Hannahinwonderland]

Price and how far in advance you have to book is a *huge* factor in my eyes. Traveling from New York to do a race and a short vacation could easily run you $1000 without much effort. I had to throw away the money I spent on the Princess 10K because I just couldn't afford the rest of the trip. In the future, I am not going to be able to register for a race without having ALL of the money in front of me first.

 

[roxymama]

I like when things don't sell out right away. It's kind of like when I book a Disney vacation. I hope every single hotel and type of room is available, I hope all the ADRs are available and I hope I can get FP for everything I want easily. Basically I hope no one else shows up the weekend that I go Same with the race weekends I want to attend. I hope they are successful....buuuuut also that the expo is not crowded and the course is not crowded and I don't have to wait in character lines.
However...I DO want lots of people to go when I'm not there so Disney/rundisney keeps making money so that I can have my nice things.
I am selfish.
(this post is mostly in jest, but also pretty honest)

It's like the really popular restaurants around here that have good food. I want them to succeed so they stay so I can go to them, BUT UGH I do not like waiting 3 hours in line to get in when they open OR having to make reservations months in advance. And once the novelty of them wears off with everyone else (but I like their food) then I worry about them failing because everyone is so annoyed and OVER having a hard time getting in.

Maybe rundisney races are like that restaurant that used to be insanely popular but now is just relatively popular and not as hard to get into? Or like Anna and Elsa meet n greets. You can meet them with a 20-30 minute wait now because there are "more" of them and the novelty has worn off a little.

 

[Ariel484]

In the case of Wine & Dine, I think timing has a lot to do with it.

runDisney just had Disneyland registration, and WDW Marathon Weekend and Light Side weekends just ended, and Princess weekend is coming up. And WDW Marathon registration is coming up. All of this stuff is in a 6-8 week period.

I think one of the reasons people aren't registering right now is because all of this stuff happening so close together - people JUST got back from WDW or Light Side, or they're gearing up for Princess in a little over a month (or more than one of those) - so after just doing that, it's hard to turn around and plunk down the cash for Disney's most expensive half marathon (yes I realize part of that is due to the after party ticket, but still - most expensive). Or they just registered for Disneyland or are waiting to register for WDW Marathon weekend - so with these 3 race weekends registrations so close together, I'm guessing most people will pick just one of the 3...or possibly Disneyland and WDW OR Wine & Dine if they want Coast to Coast.

It's just a lot of stuff from runDisney all smooshed together in a short amount of time.

Mostly I am interested to see what they do with pricing going forward. The 5K prices have gone up (which I expected with the metal medals), but if I recal correctly they dropped the price of the Dark Side and Tink Half marathons...dropped or didn't do a price increase, can't remember which. That was my first sign that they are aware that popularity is decreasing.

I think registration for Princess 2018 will be interesting. That is the one weekend that has seemed to consistently sell out all of its events.

 

[Violet Parr]

I think general WDW price increases are also adding to this. We just got back from marathon weekend, and in many ways it was our priciest trip, even though our consumption was lower. (Mostly counter service, fewer souvenirs than previous trips, no park hoppers, etc.) We were also pleasantly surprised by early Jan. (Our first time there during that time.) Low crowds after the marathon, good weather (for the most part) and Christmas decorations still up. We love the Halloween/Christmas bridge week and would like to do W&D, but Jan fits better with the school year and vacation anyway. So if we do just one weekend a year, it will be marathon.

VP

 

[roxymama]

This is a random thought. But have all the recent "value added upcharge events" across Disney properties maybe contributed? I could be totally wrong. But the thought did cross my mind when signing up for my two race weekends this year NOT to do the challenges because I could still run one race and then use the extra time and money to do some "special" things with my family. Like Bibbidi Bobbidi or a dessert party or the magic morning breakfast thing, etc.

Probably not a huge factor for most people on here, but maybe a factor for the more casual run-disney participant.

 

[Ariel484]

I think general WDW price increases are also adding to this. We just got back from marathon weekend, and in many ways it was our priciest trip, even though our consumption was lower. (Mostly counter service, fewer souvenirs than previous trips, no park hoppers, etc.) We were also pleasantly surprised by early Jan. (Our first time there during that time.) Low crowds after the marathon, good weather (for the most part) and Christmas decorations still up. We love the Halloween/Christmas bridge week and would like to do W&D, but Jan fits better with the school year and vacation anyway. So if we do just one weekend a year, it will be marathon.

VP

I agree with this. I'm also getting pretty tired of all of the upcharge things they're introducing and I hate that it's trickling into runDisney. They've always had race retreat but this year they added early expo access as part of the Race Retreat package and had the expo open later to everyone else - I HATED that.

 

[Ariel484]

Hey @roxymama get out of my head!!

 

[roxymama]

Hey @roxymama get out of my head!!

mwahahahahahaha

 

[Ariel484]

mwahahahahahaha

 

[roxymama]

Not meaning to hijack the thread, but I've got to ask. What is the appeal to a relay option for a marathon? You're not really running a marathon, you're running something along the lines of a half marathon (for a 2-person relay) or just over a 10k (for a 4-person relay). Why not just run those distances and have your own race?

When I ran City of Oaks in November they had a relay option and I have to say it was a bit demoralizing to be chugging along in the back half doldrums (say miles 14-20) only to have people blow by me like they were fresh out of the gate. Invariably they had a relay bib on their back, so they pretty much were fresh out of the gate. Now I know the demoralizing mental part is really on me, but I just don't understand the appeal of the relay.

What am I missing?

RE: relays....totally had same line of thoughts as you!!! But then I really wanted to do a mult-generation team of my family for the Flying Pig marathon but my father-in-law got hurt, so that thought was tabled. It was more about a "we did this together...team-building...family thing" and way less about distance. I'd never say "I ran a marathon", I'd say "we did this cool family race together." Granted we could have ran full race side by side but our varying heights and speeds (and just the fact that we'd be in single file a lot probably) made the relay seem like a fun family thing to do. BUT I had ALL the same thoughts as you did too! I guess I thought of the relay race like a "tough mudder" or an "expedition everest challange"...something in the "other" category.

 

[Violet Parr]

I agree with this. I'm also getting pretty tired of all of the upcharge things they're introducing and I hate that it's trickling into runDisney. They've always had race retreat but this year they added early expo access as part of the Race Retreat package and had the expo open later to everyone else - I HATED that.

I think this nails it for general park attendance, too. http://www.fool.com/investing/2016/07/31/5-reasons-disney-world-attendance-is-falling.aspx

The last two years, we have seen constant construction, resort-wide. My husband thinks a lot of people have a "let's just come back when they're done with this mess" attitude.

VP

 

[Ariel484]

@Violet Parr I bet your husband is right! People may be waiting for Avatar/Star Wars Land.

 

[Barca33Runner]

A couple trends reading through the posts:

1. I'm getting a little scared about Dopey 2018 registration

2. RD should be getting scared about all 2019 registrations (a lot of "this will (probably) be my last race" declarations)

 

[bellanotte10]

I'm still sad they got rid of Expedition Everest before I could do it. I'm glad I got to do the last Tower of Terror but the last expedition Everest was less than a month before a wedding I was in and I couldn't swing both. After eliminating that, the only Disney goals I have would maybe to do the kessel run challenge, and I've hit almost all the races but Wine and Dine and Avengers. I'd love to do them, but if I do, i think I'm done because otherwise its the same thing, with just a different overlay. Which is why i think Everest was so unique, and i want it to come back now please and thank you.

Plus, booking everything out at 11 months is annoying. I booked Dopey 2018 before I even flew to failed Half Marathon 2017. I'm incredibly lucky that I got an offer for a job I'd been waiting on while siting delayed on the tarmac that Friday, and it was risky for me to book when I did because I wouldn't know where I'd be working or even living in a year. But i feel like Disney forced my hand by bumping registrations up so much.