Registration:
Signing up via Active, registration for the Disneyland Half Weekend events is more difficult than running the event itself! Selling out in minutes, it’s wise to organise a reminder or alarm for the on sale time to avoid disappointment.

Expo:
RunDisney certainly know how to put on an expo, with a range of exhibitors selling clothing, sparkle skirts, shoes, race food - in fact, anything you can think of. The packet pickup was located underneath the Disneyland Hotel Convention Centre and then followed back upstairs straight to the T-Shirt pickup.

New Balance shoes were certainly a drawcard at the expo this year, and runners were encouraged to sign up online for Thursday/Friday purchases and walk ins were accommodated on the Saturday.

RunDisney Ambassadors were also scheduled to give hourly talks at the main stage, which separated the expo with the RunDisney Merchandise booth.

Swag:
Included in the race cost was a t-shirt. For the 5K it was a unisex plain cotton tee with Stitch on the front and the Disneyland 5K logo. For the 10K, Half and Dumbo Double Dare shirts they were gender specific Champion technical tees - true to size and feel amazing on! The colours and images were great this year and definitely something that I would wear again.

Course:
The Half course again started outside the Disneyland Hotel (as all three races did), RunDisney certainly did well to create interesting and different courses for those who ran all three races over the weekend.

There were significantly more corrals in the Half and they were letting them go two at a time before corral G. It seemed that these back corrals (G-J) were also the biggest.

The RunDisney pulled out all entertainment for this one with multiple schools lining the course, as well as classic cars and dancers. Additionally the Anaheim crowd came out in support, providing runners with tasty treats and cool sponges to combat the heat.

There were a huge array of characters out on the course from Cars to Villains to Darth Vader, with lines for all when I came through.

You do run through the plaza (with supporters each side), Main Street (with ChEAR Squad supporters) and Sleeping Beauty’s castle. If you were to do one race during the weekend it would be this one as you get the best all the other two courses.

Once outside the park it certainly felt like the start of a new race as we set out on Disneyland Drive to Ball Road. There is a freeway overpass incline, but this again shouldn’t prove too difficult to the average runner. It is pretty flat until the Santa Ana River Trail where there is another slight incline up to the Angels Stadium Car Park.

Angels Stadium is the only other bottleneck as runners try to get their pics running through the stadium. Local scout groups fill the lower stands to cheer on the runners, it certainly is an amazing atmosphere to experience!

There were plenty of water stations and portable toilets along the way, although the Disneyland restrooms are also open along the course in the parks. There is a Gu spot just before you get into Angels Stadium where 4 different flavours were available.

Medical stations were also scattered throughout the course.

Post Run:
Once finished, the run is really organised - medals are collected immediately and then runners are filtered off to Coast to Coast collection (Half), Dumbo Double Dare wristband/medal collection (10K/Half) or straight through to the Finisher’s photos. The further you walked down the chute, the less of a line there was for pictures the whole weekend. At the end of the Half there is a couple of backgrounds for Dumbo Double Dare finishers.

Once pictures are done you walk through to collect your sealed runner’s food box and banana. Finally you walk through bag check (which was next to no line) before being spat out at the main holding area - with streaming of the finish line.

All walkways back around the resort were well marked, and volunteers were able to advise the route to walk. Downtown Disney is really only affected after the 5K and the 10K, while it is clear for the Half (as runners are directed behind Paradise Pier hotel).