Marathon #3 incoming

It's going down Sunday morning in Walt Disney World. In a way, my
entire distance running effort has always been aimed at making it to
this race. I was running regularly before our first trip to Disney
World (as parents anyway) in 2015. I'd done the Patrick Henry Half
Marathon in 2013 (injury got in the way of me running it in 2014, damn
calves). That 2015 trip was the weekend after marathon weekend. I had
never heard of the Dopey Challenge before that weekend. I read about
the races while laying in bed after we turned out the lights so my
kids could sleep. I wasn't so sure about the Dopey Challenge (I don't
really have any desire to do it, getting up that early 4 days in a row
would be brutal), but I was very intrigued by the marathon. I ran the
Patrick Henry again that year (I was actually just recovering from the
injury that prevented me from doing the PH in 2014 while during that
Disney trip). I wasn't as fast as the first time I ran it, but I felt
like moving up to the marathon was the right next step.

I ran my first marathon a couple of years later, the RIchmond marathon
in 2017. I just looked at my Garmin data from that race. I ran a great
first half but really struggled in the second half. I was reasonably
well trained but had no idea what I was doing and really struggled in
the second half. Tiffany and I did the half marathon at Disney World
in 2018. It was a great trip to Disney, but the race was less than
stellar. It was very cold when we were standing around for a couple of
hours waiting to start the run (in the middle of the night) and
Tiffany was not really in half marathon shape. The race was very
stressful. It was not the experience I really wanted. My big lesson
from the 2018 WDW half was that it pays to submit a time to get up in
the starting corrals. Lots of people do a run/walk combination at
those races. That's not really my style so I always planned to make
sure I had a good qualifying time to ensure that I could get out of
the mass of run/walkers if I did another runDisney event.

Getting a good time for the marathon sounded like a good idea, but the
logistics were a bit of a challenge. I ran my second marathon, the
Marine Corps marathon, in 2018. I paced myself better, I didn't
collapse until after mile 20 versus about mile 15 for the Richmond
marathon, but I did not fuel very well. I just had nothing left in the
last couple miles of the race. I was very grateful for the snack boxes
that they handed out at the finish line. My time was just over 5
hours, which really wouldn't have done me any good for the WDW
marathon, but I left that race really wanting to figure out how to
complete a marathon feeling strong. The logistical challenge for
getting a time for the marathon was the timing of these two marathons,
which are the marathons closest to where I used to live. They are both
in the fall, October for the Marine Corps and November for Richmond.
That is after the deadline for submitting times for the Disney race.

Logistics for getting to the Disney marathon got much easier when I
moved to Florida. The parks are a 2 hour drive away now. I can work
all week, like I did this week, and head to the resort on Saturday for
the marathon. No flights, no day long drives. Just a short drive and
I'm there. It won't really surprise me if this doesn't become an
annual thing. It's just so close. My running is always better when I
have something to train for. The big block for me in marathon training
are the long runs. Anything over 10 is just a real struggle. My
primary motivation in signing up for the WDW marathon, aside from it
just being a long standing bucket list race, was to get back to
training runs longer than 5 miles. I've accomplished that so I have
achieved one marathon goal. Having a marathon in the distance will
give me a reason to put in longer runs every week.

My goal for Sunday's marathon is simple. Finish. I would also like to
avoid injury. If those things happen, that's a win.