The #PrincessMen return for Year 8 – after 7 was cancelled

Eight years have gone by since this started. Wild. I honestly would have never thought we’d still be doing this event, as princesses, after 8 years.
But here we are.

After the 2021 Princess Half Marathon Weekend was cancelled due to Covid, there was definitely a lot of excitement about the 2022 race as it approached.
The question of whether or not we would be running was only briefly a concern after realizing a lot of our group intended on running again. So, we signed up during the Summer of ’21 to race IN February 2022 – a year we also expected to be absolutely packed with people who were upset at not racing in 2021.

For those who want to check out some of my past event write ups, you can do so HERE.

Heading in the 2022 race weekend I was probably the least trained up I’d been in a while. However, that’s relative since I spent Summer and Fall ’21 training for Half and Full Ironman races.
So while I only ran about 6 times in January and February prior to the race I wasn’t too worried since we never run very quick. I also I raced in the Disney World Wine & Dine 2021 Half Marathon in November. And during that race even though I stopped several times for selfies in the parks, and one character stop with Kronk, I still put down a 1:45 race time. PHM is never a hard race in that sense. The real challenge is trying to see people, enjoy the weekend, and deal with very little sleep.

So let’s get to it:

Year Eight:

Race Weekend Planning

As much as I hate to admit any of us are getting older, quite a few of my friends are simply much busier with life. Families and spouses, and jobs/careers have changed a lot of things for everyone since that first race back in 2015.
This year however I was not going to make the mistake of prioritizing work over a vacation with friends. And what I mean by that is I made sure to take whatever convenient flight fit my schedule, come in a day early, and fly out a day late. I wasn’t going to do a redeye or sacrifice my weekend as I have done in the past. And my job now, and team I’m on at this time compared to those in the past were happy to see me take time and enjoy a vacation.

Others in our group were doing the best to the do the same – clearing work schedules and their calendars with the goal of spending a weekend together free of worries.
I won’t lie, there were moments with a couple of the group who reached out concerned they might be be able to swing the weekend and make it work with their schedule. And there were a couple others who unfortunately had to flat out cancel. Life happens. Can’t always avoid that.

So how was the weekend?

Leading up the race weekend I posted briefly online to let people know we would be back racing this year – and I was shocked at people replying they were excited to hear we’d be back.
I knew the weekend was going to be one of the slightly more hectic and perhaps disorganized in terms of people arriving and leaving from out of town.
I flew in on Thursday, as did Chris/Mulan. But while I arrived in the evening, hit the Expo juuuust before close with Joe/Belle and bumped into Theresa/Flynn and enjoyed a nice evening catching up and having dinner together, Chris’ flight was continually delayed and he didn’t land and get to the hotel that night until 1:30am or so.

Friday was when Naidymar caught up with Chris and I in the morning and we headed to the Expo again for Chris/Naidy to check in. Some wandering Downtown Disney and then checking in to the timeshare we’d be at the rest of the weekend. That evening was when Beau/Pocahontas arrived – which was great because there was a moment when Beau reached out to me questioning if he’d even be able to make the trip work with his schedule. DO YOU REALIZE HOW MANY LADIES WOULD HAVE BEEN HEART BROKEN IF BEAUCAHONTAS DIDN’T RACE?!

Saturday was the 10k and a very early morning – Disney races are always farrr earlier for me than any triathlon I’ve been to. It was muggy out, but that’s a welcome trade off to the ice-cold 10k we were previously at in 2020. And that morning we would be able to park at Epcot, as usual, and not the screwy Studios-then-take-a-bus routine we would be doing the following day.
That afternoon I was able to once again do family photos for Joe and spend some time with Erin. Our buddy Ric/Elsa caught up with us, too, and we were able to grab dinner together before heading back to prepare for the Half the next morning.

Sunday morning was the absolute worst wake up ever. 1:45am. What a joke. Now, you could argue that we didn’t have to get up that early. But there were five of us to wake up and shower/change – not too extreme. However we had to drive in to the Studios parking lot, then walk to the buses, then take a bus to Epcot, then walk to through the longggg Epcot race-entry path that we knew was over a mile because we did it Saturday morning.
So we made sure to be prepared to have plenty of time. And you know what? From others we talked to we probably were right about where we needed to be in order to have a comfortable stress-free morning.
What I mean by that is there were a ton of people who were rushing to park due to delays in the line of cars getting in, rushing to the buses, the buses were delayed because of what seemed like poor planning. Then the long entryway left people running to get to their corals. They even slowed the starting process that morning.

Look, if you’re rushing around to get to the start corals and worried about time and getting their to be first and race as hard you possibly can… then I’d argue you’re doing the Princess Half Weekend totally wrong.

Ok, I’m going to get into more details in my captions below.. but first..

Let’s take a look at what made this year’s races a bit ridiculous:

The 10k

The redesigned routes.
This is not a big deal, for the most part. Routes change. Construction. Business needs. Whatever it might be. The biggest immediately noticeable change was no hairpin in that first mile that everyone is used to. And of course the rest of the run was different as well – I think it was all due to construction going on. Instead of running through the entire World Showcase and Boardwalk area like 2020, this route took us through part of the Studios, Boardwalk, and then of course Epcot. I actually liked the switch up.

Top Results for any segments on these runs for me aren’t really a thing I pay attention to. The only event I ran a normal-for-me pace was the 2021 Wine & Dine that I ran alone because it was Yzma & Kronk themed and I love New Groove. That morning I put down a 1:45 Half, sooo… a bit quicker than this 10k. lol.

But this 10k morning it was Me, Beau, and Chris that were in costume. Beau had to do the last-minute check-in since he arrived at 10p in Orlando the night before. Theresa was running it, but not in costume.
It turned into a muggy race that slowed Chris down a bit in his heavier costume. So it was basically Beau and I adding to our collection of ridiculous photos together.

The important thing here is to not destroy our wigs. Ha! I had brought two others just in case – though I didn’t like the other two much at all.

– more on the 10k further below –

The Half Marathon with the rest of the Group

I’m sure there are tons of other blogs that have written about what an absolute mess the race morning was for arrival, parking, bussing, and starting… but holy crap.

But let’s take a look at Disney’s infinite logic in planning this race morning. I’m willing to bet whoever came up with this entire plan has never actually run a race themselves. Because they would understand that “Starting at 5:00 instead of 5:30 like always” is a huge difference and not “just 30min” for the runners.
They would have understood the amount of time it takes to walk from where they had everyone park at The Studios – clear across the parking lots from the bus pickup. Olaf Lot.
They would have understood the streets and lights that would have to be crossed by busses that were taking people from Studios to Epcot.
They would have understood the distance still required to walk from Epcot’s bus station to the actual race start.
And lastly they would have considered what 2 1/2 extra miles of walking would take some of the racers in this event and the time required for all the above.

Why it was terrible planning on Disney’s part:

First let’s look at the parking lot situation.
We were required to park at The Studios. So of course that in itself was a mess of people trying to figure out where they were being directed to park. And of course Disney made everyone park in the FURTHEST lot possible. And you had to walk 1/2-3/4 of a mile to the bus pick up.

Then you had to get on the bus

We boarded the buses right about 3:28am according to my photo time stamp. THREE THIRTY IN THE MORNING.
We got off the bus at 3:59am. We were jokingly taking bets with each other if “we’d get there before 4am”.

Consider that for a minute. IT TOOK HALF AN HOUR TO BUS FROM ONE PARK TO THE OTHER. And we were there early.

Here’s a look at the 30 minute (for our bus) drive, and the walk from the Bus Station to the starting parking lot.

At the bottom you can see the “Charter Bus Parking” from the other map where I showed the parking/walk. Here you can see the drive we had to take to get to Epcot’s bus terminal. Then then I marked off the walk through the front of Epcot’s security check point and around to the far East lot of Epcot’s parking.

Final Thought on the race parking/start: I think this was more than likely an extremely poor decision on the part of Disney. There was either very little or no thought put toward just how long this parking/walking/bussing/walking process was going to take. It was a bad decision and hopefully one that will be corrected next year. However me and my friends could not help but also acknowledge the recent downturn in “Disney Magic” that is the focus of so many blogs and articles the last 12 months. This has carried over into the experience at runDisney, too. And the combination of “start the race earlier, get them off the course faster” and “make morning check-in so miserable people won’t want to come back” was 100% a believable conspiracy we discussed that morning while sitting on a bus, not moving in traffic trying to get to Epcot.

Pre-Race

I don’t even know how long the walk was from the bus stop to the race entrance. A half-mile?
We were able to say hello to some familiar faces and friends as usual.

And we got interviewed for runDisney!

I don’t know how, where, or when this clip will be used, but we were interviewed that morning and asked about why we race and our personal bit of history doing the Princess Run. It’s been great to continue to be so warmly welcomed by Disney year after year.

Edit: So I sat on finishing this blog so long that this video showed up in runDisney’s social media about the Princess Race! we’re at the very beginning right after the opening clip!

The race itself had its own differences this year, our group got split up pretty quickly on the course in the first couple miles and we completely lost Chris/Mulan until the last 3 mile stretch. But all in all another great race weekend.

I’ll leave the rest of my thoughts in the photos below, as always.

Look forward to seeing everyone next year!

The Weekend Begins

At LAX and ready to head out!

The only downside of long legs is the limited room on planes…

Got in to Orlando Thursday night and ran over to the Expo with Joe

Almost no one there since it was about 25 minutes til close

Check in was pretty quick…

Group One! Waddduupppp!!!
I run fast qualifiers purely for the front start corral placement. haha

Joe would just be doing the Half this year with us

We bumped into Theresa at the Expo! Which worked out great cuz we grabbed dinner after and had extra time to catch up

So Chris got in suuuuper late that night, like 1am.
The next morning Naidymar came and picked us up to get breakfast and start our vacation

McDonalds, about to be torn down with this whole area off 535.
Yearssss ago when we were lifeguards at Typhoon and Blizzard we would grab lunch at McDonalds during our orientation and training days. Good memories all over Orlando from college

Heading to check in

Lookin’ for their digital check in forms… i think?

Oh we will

Later that evening at the time share, Biggs started prepping his multiple costumes

Biggs’ wig was probably the most impressive part.

Race Morning – 10k

What a horrible hour to have to wake up for these races. Seriously.
I don’t get up this early for an Ironman – and those take me like 10x longer than it takes me to run a 10k

“someone zip me up…”

My Nike slipper style shoes are totally my favorite part of my costume though

Tired, but just about ready

I had three wigs that I brought. You never know ordering them online, and they’re one-and-done typically because they get ruined running

I’m always amazed that Beau will crack a Monster before our events. LOL, I don’t even do that

Alright, NOW we’re ready!

Heading to the car. I think we were talking about the 2020 race that was FREEZING when we left

Arriving for the 10k was so far pretty similar to last year

Except this year they had a new main entrance for the race at Epcot entrance

Now the long walk to the corrals to check Beau in

Theresa found us!

Getting checked in since Beau got in to town around 10pm the night before

Good to go!

Lorren and Amanda found us!

Another Jasman! yasss!!

And we’re off!

lessssgooooo

Beau and I already lost Biggs

Running through MGM this event was actually pretty cool

Throwing in some Photopass shots to the mix!

And all the parks look cool at night with the lights on

The only upside to the nearly super-early start times is seeing everything lit up

Made it to Epcot for sunrise

“What do you guys do on your trips?”

Well….

I don’t know Elizabeth.. but Beau and I made her finish line photo way better. haha!

Biggs and Theresa crossing the finish

Done!

Found a dad runnin’ as a princess too!

And dude as Ariel!
We’ll have to call this guy up since Aaron doesn’t run with us anymore

Sydney the Service Dog stole the show though

Another medal for the pile. haha!

Fresh fit from Beau. He got us all shirts

Joe has arrived!

Biggs look like one of those 80s metalhead dads that still jams, but also has to take the kids to soccer practice on weekends

Princess Half Race Day

FUCKKK… Even worse start time than yesterday!

The timeshare on race weekends is aways costumes and wigs strewn everywhere. It makes me laugh every year. And really appreciate my friends

Starting the morning with cramped legs is never fun

Another change up for Biggs

Adding to the collection of weird photos we have

Yassss!

For some reason Naidymar still tolerates all of us after all these years

And we’re ready!

One-car’ing it cuz we’re pretty sure it’s going to be a MESS

Yeah they clearly had little idea how to run the new setup for parking

The longest walk EVER to the bus stop

THEN we had a thirty minute bus ride. THIRTY. MINUTES.

After arriving at the bus stop at Epcot we then had a long walk to the corrals

Girl Beast!

Heading into the corrals

We found a dude dressed as Cinderella! So we had to go say hi and get photos

Making our way to the start

here we goooo

At the gates. We had already lost Biggs at this point.
We thought he was behind us but apparently ran past us around the time we were taking this photo and we didn’t find him til mile 10