I had a blast running the inaugural Tinkerbell 10k over the weekend! I had so much more fun this time around without the pressure of the Dumbo Double Dare looming over me. Not to mention the weather was so much nicer this time verses the Disneyland 10k, which was really humid and uncomfortable. Just like September, I got super sick in the weeks leading up to this race but recovered enough to enjoy the race.
The weekend actually started on Friday when I drove down to Disneyland to pick up my bib for the race on Saturday.
Even though I don’t have any kind of spending budget right now, I had to go to the Expo and check out some of the goods. My first stop was checking out the new New Balance + Disney shoes. They sure are pretty.
I love looking at all the medals for the year … so many! I can’t believe there are people who do them all. $$$$
Next I headed into the official runDisney merchandise area. It was all confined to a partitioned area this year, which made things a lot more organized and a lot more crowded.
{New this year (or at least they weren’t at the Disneyland Half) – official runDisney tutus}
{Official Tink Half race shirt – super cute}
{Always my favorite merch item – the half marathon wine glass}
{This was the only shirt option for the Tink 10k}
{Luna bars had this booth with cute sayings on the wall}
This time around I stayed at the Hilton to save some money. Their hotel is very nice but it’s about a mile walk from the corrals, and also their rooms are NOT sound proof!! I can hear all kinds of noises from the hallway and I’m a super light sleeper. But with my earplugs and a sleeping aid (I hate doing it but I’ve learned I’m too excited to sleep otherwise), I slept just fine until my alarm went off at 5am. I showered, changed into my Minnie running costume, and headed out!
One nice thing about the Tinkerbell 10k, at least for me, was the race direction was reversed. This meant I was walking towards the starting line instead of backtracking around to it, which was nice for me. I think maybe they moved the starting line farther up Disney Way so as not to disturb the hotel guests who were not there for race weekend. I always felt bad for the guests who were trying to sleep past 5am, since the starting line for the Disneyland races have always been RIGHT OUTSIDE Paradise Pier Hotel.
My friend Nerissa met me near the corrals and we walked up together. We got there right at 6am, as the race was starting, but our corral was not going for another 20 minutes. So we stretched and chit-chatted until it was our turn to go!
Once we got started, we turned into the backstage area of Disneyland almost immediately, which was different from last year when we ran the first two miles through the streets of Anaheim before entering the parks. Going through the narrow entrances in such a large grouping this time caused a lot of bottlenecks all through the Disneyland portion of the course! I’m not sure that was very well planned out, and if I were going for time I would have been very upset.
{Entering Fantasyland next to Small World}
{Going into ToonTown – look at those crowds!}
{The bottleneck trying to leave ToonTown! It didn’t help that the Mile 1 marker was RIGHT THERE and people were stopping for pictures.}
{Entering Disneyland again, this time in Critter Country behind Splash Mountain}
And then something very cool and unexpected happened … we turned the corner and saw two rare characters: The Haunted Mansion Bride and Tighrope Girl! I had only seen pictures of Tightrope Girl from Holly Madison’s wedding, and I had never ever seen the Bride before! The line to get a picture of them was out of control, and there were security members shouting for people to keep moving (I’m guessing this area became a trouble spot early on). So this blurry photo was the best I could do!
We turned into Fantasyland from Frontierland and suddenly the sun was very bright!
The course didn’t run through the castle this year, which is always my favorite part (like, chills and watery eyes, you guys). So we stopped for a quick photo op when we ran by from Tomorrowland.
{Runnin’ right down the middle of Main Street USA}
{Leaving Disneyland – always the saddest part of any race}
{Nerissa’s husband was waiting in the spectator area outside the gates and snapped this picture of us! I love it!}
And straight on to DCA!
{I can’t remember if we ran through Bugs Land in September … but it was pretty cool!}
We excited DCA next to Tower of Terror and had two more miles through outside streets before the finish. It was pretty boring but we actually ran a lot and chatted some (mostly about runners’ creative costumes!) and the time passed pretty quickly. Before we knew it – Mile 6 marker!
From here we made a sprint to the finish – the best part of the race!!
My official time was 1:40:39
Pace 16:12
This was 7 minutes faster than September, but I also took waaaaay less pictures.
After the race I walked back to the Hilton where Mr. BFT was still in bed *insert side eye emoticon here* and I showered and changed and we walked back to Paradise Pier Hotel because there was only one thing I wanted after my race – MICKEY WAFFLES.
And I was paid a visit from two of my favorite ladies.
After breakfast we headed back to the hotel, packed up, stopped at Trader Sam’s for a victory Ka-blue-ie, and headed home! Another successful race weekend! I really love 10ks … I’m sore enough afterwards to know I did something substantial, but not so sore I spend the next week icing my entire lower body. See ya in September, runDisney!