2018 Dopey Challenge: The 10K
Another day, another early wake-up call and another really cold morning. I grabbed
@FFigawi from the Beach Club lobby, we went over to the Boardwalk to collect the rest of our crew, I pretended like I didn't see the parking official telling me where to go and we parked in the Epcot parking lot.
The 10K has always been my favorite race course and I'd originally planned on going for time, but given the cold and my heel, I decided today was the day to stop for all the characters and generally try to have a good time.
(I'll come back and add a collage of all the character pics later because it will take up all my picture capacity for this post).
The 10K was the race where I felt the most ill-effects of the large corrals and mini waves. Because you aren't required to enter a PoT for the 10K (only Dopey participants are slotted by PoT), the course got slow and crowded PRETTY quick (I started in the second wave of Corral C). For example, here is what I ran into at the switchback after Mile 1 ... I think? JUST SO MANY PEOPLE:
Whitti's Mom started in Corral B, and my initial plan was to catch up with her and then we'd finish the race out together (she'd had surgery on her rotator cuff before Christmas and hadn't been able to really do much training), so I set out to do that. But with this insane crowding, at some point I'd just flat-out passed her. Also, everyone was so bundled up because of the cold, it was hard to find people - usually we wear costumes and things that make us identifiable to people, but that just wasn't happening with this weather.
I finished the race and headed straight to the beer cart in the parking lot for my "Reward Beer", and then I went to find Whitti and Mama Whitti. We waited for a while, because Mama Whitti STILL hadn't crossed the finish line ... and we started getting nervous. FINALLY, we see her come through Gear Check! We were so excited - she was so worried about this race and almost didn't run, but we're so glad she did!
As we started the slow trek to my Tahoe, we asked her what she needed:
Mama Whitti: I need a DRINK.
Me: Here - have some of my beer.
Mama Whitti: I don't even like beer, but I'm gonna drink it. (*Big Gulp*) Man, this tastes GOOD.
(More walking)
Mama Whitti: Gimme more of that beer.
I dropped Team Whitti back off at the Boardwalk (they'd be moving to BLT later today), and then went back to BCV.
One and Two were supposed to be waiting outside of Beach Club handing out mimosas to fellow runners this morning. I figured they stayed inside because it was cold.
But upon arriving back to the room, I opened the door and heard One shout "Have a great race! We love you!", to which I responded "Um, I'm already finished ...". Those two slept through the whole thing! They're the worst (but also the best).
I shed my layers upon layers of cold weather gear, warmed up and hopped in bed for a nice, long nap.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I woke up around Noon, and then set out to start preparing for the REAL event of the day - the Hurricane Hannah's Happy Hour meet-up!
I walked over to Hurricane Hannah's around 1, which (of course) was still closed because it wasn't yet above 50 degrees yet that day.
My back-up plan was to host the meet-up indoors at the Ale & Compass Lounge, which has ample space for a large group and a really great beer, wine and cocktail list. So, I went over there to let the bartenders know that there would likely be around 50 or so crazy runners from a message board coming to meet up in just an hour or so, and how I wanted everything to work.
@FFigawi swung by HH around 1:40 and it was STILL closed, so we made the call to host at Ale & Compass. I ran into
@BikeFan and his group first, so we all made our way back to Ale & Compass ... and I started messaging people and waiting for everyone to show up.
At some point,
@croach messaged me and asked where I was and why the Hostess wasn't there to personally greet him (what a jerk, amirite?) ... which was like, what? I've been standing out in front of Ale & Compass for 15 minutes looking for people!
I walk outside and look across Stormalong Bay ... and sure enough, the garage doors at Hannah's are up and there's already a group of people forming that I was CERTAIN were my loyal RunDisers! So out into the sunshine we went!!
It was SO AWESOME to see everybody at the meet-up - so many people came, I felt like HH's opened JUST for us to hang out and enjoy a few minutes of warm sunshine while doing some good work running up the bar tab for John and I.
Look at all these happy RunDiser faces:
Thanks again to everyone for showing up. This has become my favorite race weekend event to host because I just love the chance to catch up with everyone off the boards - and this one really special because SO MANY of you jerks took opportunities to give me s#!+ about whatever you could, and I just loved it. I can't remember the last time I laughed that hard. So thanks again for everyone showing up - I'll gladly buy your drinks every time around if I get to have an afternoon like this one!
After that, it was catching up with my friends, dinner and then a cupcake purchase for breakfast the next morning (I'd forgotten an Uncrustable, and they were both the same price at the Marketplace, so the cupcake won out):
And then it was off to work on my heel and get ready for the next day ... the jump to the big course and the Half Marathon.
Up Next: Next-to-Last Race Down Main Street?