So I've been back from
Disneyland Paris for a few days now (and still rather jet lagged)! My thoughts on the race...
Expo
Bit disorganised and crowded the first couple of hours when it opened. The ladies shirts were way too small! If I had to do it over I wouldn't have bothered queuing for the start of the Expo but would have gone after the crowds thinned out a bit - I went back on Thursday night and it was so much calmer and nicer then.
5K
I was in Corral C - you could see the corrals stretching all the way around the lake! Thought it was generally a good race and loved the CMs cheering along the way. A couple of really dark areas though which seemed a bit unsafe - what was really annoying was that they actually had street lights in some of those areas that weren't turned on.
10K
I think they put the elite runners in Corral A, and everyone who was doing the challenge in Corral B. I took my time and stopped at characters along the way. I loved how the course was almost all park time!
Half marathon
This is the one I was really nervous about, as I didn't train as well as I should have leading up to this weekend - I knew I could run a 10K with no problems, but wasn't so sure about the half. At home I was even trying to see if I could walk fast enough to meet the 16 minute/mile pacing requirement just in case!
But I think the weather helped a lot. I'm used to hot and humid, so the cool and non-humid weather we had on Sunday was perfect and I could run for faster and longer!
I got a really good pace for the first few miles then decided to stop for a photo with Mickey and Minnie. I got a fantastic photo, but the wait meant that I spent the rest of the race regretting it and trying to see how fast I would need to run to still get in at under 3 hours! The last couple of miles were terrible as I started to realise that I would have some bad chafing (not enough Body Glide apparently), and I was getting tired, and I really had to drag myself through them. But I made it in 2:59, so I was pretty happy about that!
Course wise - I liked the fact that there was plenty of park time. Hated the bit around the lake in the middle with the gravel path, kept feeling like I was going to slip and fall there. Liked that it ended back in WDS!
Overall thoughts
This was my first runDisney event, and I thought it was really fun! Where else do you get to run through Disney parks and have Disney CMs cheering you on and get to take photos with characters along the way? The CMs along the route were fantastic - I loved the Crush's coaster guys who had signs that said "Just keep running", and they had lots of really rare characters out on route including Merlin and the Fairy Godmother together!
I really liked how they had lots of bottles of water, Powerade, and milk at the end. The food boxes were really nice too and it was a nice selection of snacks!
There were/are quite a few organisational hiccups though. This started with the bib-only registration which was delayed. Then them taking forever to process registration and medical certificates. Then they sent me an email saying my registration was incomplete right before they sent an email linking to the vouchers! Also of course the fact that they ran out of T shirts in some sizes and ran out of medals for the 5K/10K/kids races! And right now, photopass pictures that were meant to have been released today (6 days after the last race) have now been delayed a few more days.
I was also really surprised and annoyed by the amount of pushing and shoving there was during the race itself. The one that I got the most annoyed with was one of the runners who was with one of the wheelchair runners, who actually stuck his hand on my shoulder from behind me and pushed me out of the way - not hard, but enough to give me a shock and make me stumble.
I don't think I'll be back next year though. While I enjoyed the races themselves, I didn't enjoy the parks anywhere near as much as WDW. Didn't help that I was in WDW earlier in the month so I couldn't help but compare the two. Would really like to do another runDisney event in WDW/DL though if timing works out!