{"id":21471,"date":"2024-03-05T08:29:30","date_gmt":"2024-03-05T16:29:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.johnremus.com\/blog\/?p=21471"},"modified":"2024-03-05T08:29:30","modified_gmt":"2024-03-05T16:29:30","slug":"ten-years-of-princessmen-and-three-races-again-for-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.johnremus.com\/blog\/ten-years-of-princessmen-and-three-races-again-for-me\/","title":{"rendered":"TEN YEARS of #PrincessMen – and three races again for me"},"content":{"rendered":"

I can’t believe it’s been TEN years.<\/p>\n

Wayyy back in the summer of 2014 I was training for my first Ironman Triathlon and pitched the idea of dressing up for the Disney World Princess Half Marathon to my friends. And here we are, a decade later, still running it!
\nAnd it’s continued to be an amazing experience that is now filled with tons of friends we’ve met over the years. And 2024 was another race weekend filled with people coming to say hello and laugh about years past when they’ve seen us, or showing us old photos they have with us from the last time they were at the race several years ago!<\/p>\n

And this year was another triple-race-weekend for myself, and this time for Chris and Naidymar as well!<\/p>\n

So let\u2019s just jump right into my recap of 2024 PHM Weekend!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Wednesday<\/strong><\/h2>\n

I’ve come to definitely prefer a Wednesday travel day for myself these last two years. Coming all the way out from California is a long day in general. And since I’m flying in from Orange County, California, there’s aren’t really direct flight options unless I want to drive out to LAX… and that’s just not worth it for me.
\nSo I flew in that day, with a night arrival. I picked up our rental car for the week – this year it was a brand new Toyota Sienna minivan hybrid – which honestly was pretty damn great for the whole group and getting around this trip. And then late that night I picked up Kellie from the airport after her night flight landed.<\/p>\n

Thursday<\/strong><\/h2>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

This year for race check-in I didn’t drag my friends there first thing in the morning like I did with Naidymar in 2023. My day started with hitting Starbucks and then Waffle House with Kellie – she had amazingly never been to Waffle House even though she’s from Florida. So obviously that’s the breakfast choice to start our day for some eggs and toast.
\nAfterward we went and got checked into the Hilton resort I had booked for our whole group – same place we typically stay at. And Naidymar came over to join us and hang out while we waited for Chris’ flight to arrive.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

While it took just slightly longer than Chris expected for him to get out of the Orlando airport, he eventually made his way to us and we were able to get over to Wide World of Sports to do our check in and pick up our bibs and shirts.
\nThis year I wasn’t as excited about the artwork or anything like last year’s Jasmine designs and theming. But we still had to hit the expo and checkout what merchandise looked like. I always buy an event pin (to add to the box of them i have at home and STILL haven’t done anything with, of course). But I was shocked to find that at 2:30pm, on Thursday, the first day of the Expo, all the Event Pins were sold out! I had to buy it on Ebay from a reseller!!! And I was there the first afternoon of the Expo!\u00a0<\/strong>It had only been open like four hours! Oh well. It cost me 29.99 on Ebay. So that’s like, what? $9 over retail?<\/p>\n

That evening was pretty low key with the four of us grabbing some wings for dinner, and then just relaxing at the resort while Biggs and I got our costumes laid out for the next morning. We had an early morning ahead.<\/p>\n

The funniest part of the night, though, was that outside our building was one of the resort pools… and they were having karaoke going til about 9:30pm. And the singers were definitely not great, hahaha! Fortunately they did end right at 930p as scheduled, since we had to try and get some sleep at least.<\/p>\n

Friday \u2013 5K Race Day<\/strong><\/h2>\n

3:00 AM, and a chilly start to the race weekend<\/strong>
\nA new course route this year compared to last, with a full run around the World Showcase.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

As soon as I woke up, just before 3am when my alarm was scheduled, I heard a door close in our hotel room. It was Beau arriving from driving all night to get into Orlando. He got there right at 3am, said hello, and went right to bed!<\/p>\n

Having run in the 5k last year with Amanda, I knew what to expect in terms of ease-of-arrival and parking. However it also became clear that the “new” checkin\/entrance to the races being at the entrance of Epcot that they introduced in 2022 was definitely a permanent change. So, just be ready to walk all the way to the entrance regardless of how good you might think your parking spot is.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

This year I was once again running with Amanda, who brought back her Rajah outfit once more! And Chris was here, too, as Mulan, with Lorren joining as Mushu! Naidymar was running the race too, but she did it at her own pace and didn’t dress up. Me and Amanda kept a casual jogging pace through the course that was enough to stay warm-ish, and still be able to have a conversation.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Back at resort we got Beau up, everyone showered and changed for the day, and we headed out to IHOP and then back to the Expo so Beau could check in.<\/p>\n

The rest of our afternoon\/evening was spent hanging out at the resort relaxing.<\/p>\n

And that night we grabbed dinner with a few of my co-workers from my team that were in town for an industry event.<\/p>\n

Saturday \u2013 10K Race Day<\/strong><\/h2>\n

3:00 AM, again, and still chilly
\n<\/strong>Challenge, Day 1, for me, Beau, Biggs, and Naidymar!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Heading out for the 10k was another chilly morning. Not as bad as it could have been, but it definitely felt a tad cooler than the day before.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The 10k is another great race course to do, though. Passing through both the Studios and Epcot you get a lot of great photo opportunities in both parks. And of course there’s sunrise over the Boardwalk and World Showcase to enjoy while you’re running.
\nThat morning only about 2miles into the race course Biggs got tripped up and rolled his ankle. Not horribly bad, thankfully. And as it turned out, this kinda worked out for the Half the next day with our friend Aaron being injured. The race itself was a lot of fun as always. But there’s plenty of photos of that down below that I’ll share.<\/p>\n

Our race morning was of course followed up by Brunch\/Lunch at IHOP. And then I headed out to meet up with the Lanza family (Belle and Beast) for our usual family photoshoot.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

That afternoon everyone was invited to just come over and hang out at resort with us since we had no real solid plans for anything.
\nAnd honestly, this hour or so was one of my favorite moments of the trip. Everyone was together, in one spot, just catching up on life. It’s so hard to get everyone together these days between work and life. So to see everyone hanging out, moving around the room to chat with different groups of people, and conversation happening was both nostalgic of “the old days” and a reminder that we can still all pull off these moments together.<\/p>\n

Probably the craziest part of that afternoon was when Aaron arrived and told us the story of injuring his back at work a few days earlier – a deep laceration from hip to shoulder that required 100 stitches and staples. So when he walked in and saw Biggs with his ankle elevated with ice on it, he immediately asked if Chris wanted to walk the Half Marathon tomorrow with him.
\nAaron was certain that he wanted to race with us and that walking would not affect his bandages\/injury. So we all decided that we would walk the first five miles of the race to the castle at Magic Kingdom, take our group photo together, and then split from there to regroup after the finish.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sunday \u2013 Half Marathon Day<\/h2>\n

2:30AM, another cold morning for everyone
\n<\/strong>A very different year – a few injuries and plan to do some walking.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Aaron arrived at our resort at 3am exactly. The rest of the group was still finishing up getting ready. Naidymar arrived a short bit later and we piled into the minivan to head to the race.<\/p>\n

The last two races we had picked up mylar blankets at the finish to keep for the morning of the Half – and boy did those help. It was a colder morning and there was a slight breeze. Going through the metal detectors I was once again stopped, like I had been the last two mornings, due to my metal necklace I had for my Jasmine costume. The security lady said “did you get that on Amazon!? you’re the third one this morning!” Haha!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Heading into the corrals we met up with Ric\/Elsa. We were starting in C corral, dead center as usual. A couple people in our group had C placement, otherwise we probably would have started earlier since we had plans to walk the first hour and a half or so.<\/p>\n