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My very first race was in 2010, the inaugural Wine & Dine. On a recent I run was reflecting on where my running was this time last year compared where it stands today. I started to think back on how naive and nervous I for that first race 11 years ago.

Going into 2019 I knew I wanted to run the 10 year anniversary Wine & Dine, a race I’ve thoroughly enjoyed in the past. I loved that the weekend kicked off the Wine and Dine festive. I loved the fact the race took place at night and made me appreciate Animal Kingdom in a whole new way which turned in into my favorite park. I loved that in 2011 I was at the 40th anniversary of the Magic Kingdom and Walt Disney World. Some of my most cherished Disney memories have taken place during the Wine & Dine weekend, shocking considering how times I’ve been to Disney. After running that race the first three years I’ve been away, partly because of Marathon Weekend — which also plays an important role in my running, but mainly I didn’t like the race changed to November with a morning start.

None the less I was back, this was the first time I stayed at a value resort in sometime. I stayed at POP Century, and loved it, minus the food court. It was a great room, and I was an equal walk from the Skyliner station and the buses. The only down side was when the Skyliner was my last ride, a storm halted service as I was heading back from EPCOT to catch the Magical Express. We got dumped at the Riviera Station with no direction on where to go and wait and waited and waited for a bus. Nothing except packed buses to the Animal Kingdom, Magic Kingdom and EPCOT. Finally an empty bus arrived which was headed to the Studio’s. They say buses run approximately every twenty minutes between resorts and parks. Studios is basically across the street of my resort and where I currently was my assumption this would be two quick bus trips. I was wrong, I waited at the studios for just about an hour and early missed Magical Express. Oh, yes one other downside to the trip, no oatmeal cookies!

Official Chip Times (with strava link)

• Wine & Dine Half Marathon — 2:30:34
  • 5k Split — 33:06
  • 10k Split — 1:08:54
  • 15k Split — 1:45:13
  • Clock Time — 2:42:43

Not my best race at all. I didn’t have a good training cycle I wasn’t ready for the race, I hadn’t done just enough to get by. I didn’t have enough long runs and runs in warm weather in general. I had no plan which is evident in two places; the initial mile where I went out way to fast and then between mile 5-6 where I wasn’t able to recover from taking the previous mile extra slow making my way around Animal Kingdom. Long term I’m not going to remember much about this weekend when it comes to the race itself. The memories of this trip will be from riding the Skyliner, my stay at POP Century, and how little I cared for the new night time shows.

Thoughts on 2020

I was on a track run run Dopey on the even years, when I elected to run the 2019 Wine & Dine I knew I wouldn’t be down to Disney for 2020 Marathon weekend. I was going to wait until after Wine & Dine weekend to deiced if I wanted to run Wine & Dine in 2020 or something for the 2021 Marathon Weekend. As Marathon Weekend approached, I was slightly sad I wasn’t down for the weekend, as such I was heavily leaning towards doing Wine & Dine in the fall. As the registration was drawing near I started having major concerns about an impending global health criss. I was right in my concerns and opted not to register. When the criss finally did hit I shied away from any form of physical activity partly out of fear and partly out of an abundance of caution. Now today an average run is pushing 2 miles, with a long run being around the 4 mile mark. My goal for the rest of the year is to run some and work towards fixing some unhealthy habits I’ve slowly been picking up over the last 4 years. If I’m about to finish the year working towards making those changes I feel I will enjoy running in 2021 more than I’ve the last 2-3 years. First thing first, remove negative & depressing events… eh…