Inaugural Tinker Bell Half Marathon - Part II: The race

Race Course

Pre-race

I went to bed at 11:00pm and woke up at 3:00am.

My Tinkerbell racing outfit

I picked up a shuttle from the hotel lobby at 3:45am. It left me at the entrance of the parks. I walked to Disney Downtown to the Disney Grand's Californian Hotel where I was meeting my friends from the "Embrazy the Crazy" group. On the way there, I noticed that Jamba Juice was open.

They actually opened at 3:30am for the runners. How nice! I grabbed some freshly squeezed carrot and orange juice. Ten minutes later, I was with my friends, the "crazies" at the hotel reception.

We walked together to the staging area which was located by the parking lot adjacent to Paradise Pier. We took a couple of pictures and only few minutes later they asked Corral A runners to go to the starting line. I gave hugs and good luck wishes to everyone and headed to the corral. It was just a few minutes walk. To be honest, I was really surprise to be assigned to Corral A this year.

"Corral A is for Awesome" - per announcer Rudy

We were there for 30 minutes but they went by really fast. We were greeted by Disney characters in their running outfits.

Photo Credit: Run Disney

What else can you ask for? Oh yes, after the national anthem there were fireworks.

To my friend Jen, if you are reading this. Noooo, it doesn't happen at every half marathon ;-) Only at Disney races. They know how to put on a great run. By the way, there were fireworks at the Disneyland Half Marathon as well but I didn't get to experience them this close before. I was in corral C. Check out my Disneyland Half Marathon race recap,

My strategy for this race was to take it easy and have fun. After all, my legs were hurting a little bit. Also, I remember that last time, during the Disneyland Half Marathon, I stopped a couple of times during the race to take pictures with the characters. There lines were very long. I waited 10 minutes to take a picture with Darth Vader which never took place. This time around, I would stop but only if the lines were short.

The gun went off at 5:45am. I was running at a comfortable 9:00 min/mile pace for the first mile. It was nice not seeing too many people in front of me. Well, it didn't last long :-) Also, it was nice that the route was completely different than the Disneyland Half. The first two miles were in the streets of Anaheim and the Disneyland's backstage area. Nothing special there. Then, we entered the park and looped around. This was the fun part.

I skipped the first two character greeting points, even though the lines were short. But decided to give it a try when I saw Captain Hook and Mr. Smee with nobody around. I gave my iPhone to the Disney crew. It was still dark outside and they didn't know how to use it. Hence, this beautiful picture.

But that's not all, the person that took the picture accidentally pressed some button that put my iPhone in idle mode for the rest of the race. I tried rebooting but no luck. I had no music and no Nike+. Bummer! You would have thought I learned from previous experiences, right? A phone is not a camera. OK, I told myself. My Garmin is still working. Don't worry about it. It's just 10 more miles. Have fun. At least your legs are not complaining.

We were in the Disneyland park for a few miles and then returned to the streets of Anaheim. I liked this area better than the streets surrounding the Angel Stadium. There were at least 4 cheerleading squads cheering for us.

Photo Credit: Melissa Armstrong Heinemann

They gave me a lot of energy ( I could hear music again!) before entering the park again at mile 11. Once in California Adventure, I was exhausted. I just wanted to finish. I knew I was very closed so I gave it my all. We left the park with half a mile left. The final stretch. Yippeee!

I finished in 2:11:57. It's not a PR but it's not bad, considering I was not able to run for the whole week leading up to the event and everything just went foobar at the race.

Race Stats:
Finishing time 2:11:57
Distance HALF MAR
Clock Time 2:12:06
Chip Time 2:11:57
Overall Place 1215 / 9386
Gender Place 1215 / 9386
Division Place 269 / 1799
Age Grade 51.3%
5K Split 30:16
10K Split 1:01:34
15K Split 1:33:45

At the finishing line

I met some friends at the family reunion area.

I waited for my friends, the "crazies", for 90 minutes but we didn't find each other. Oh, here they are :-) All happy faces! Congratulations to everyone, especially to Jennifer and Katie for finishing their first half marathon! Yahooo

Check out Tinkerbell Half Marathon: Part I for Expo and Tinkerbell Kid's race.