I arrived on Thursday and went to the expo really quick to pick up my bib and shirts. I didn't get to enjoy it much, so I went back on Saturday and went to more booths. Disney always puts on a great expo. It's fun and has a lot of vendors. There's always an excited vibe.

Morning of the race I had to get up at 2:45 am to make the 3:30 am bus requirement. My fiance and I got on the bus and arrived at the parking lot where the start was by 3:45. The first wave wouldn't even start the race until 5:30am. We got in a huge line for bathrooms, then a huge line for coffee then I went to the bathroom about 45 more times before they released the first wave. My wave wasn't released until 6:20ish.

While on the course they had several character stops, and cool stuff. I liked how they set up lights and lasers on the course and played music and sounds. It made the race a lot more fun. They had a lot more things like this on the course, than the half I did in Disneyland. They had a lot of water stops too. It was super HOT and HUMID, so I'm really glad they had plenty available.

I really enjoyed this race, it was a lot of fun. The really great thing about Disney races is that they are pretty judgement free, the focus is on the fun. Tons of people dress up in crazy costumes and there's a lot of stuff to look at and experience so you aren't so focused on the struggle. I definitely recommend RunDisney races for beginners to elites. There's definitely something for everyone.

What I think they need to change and work on:
1. Start times. Having people who won't even begin running until after 6:00am shouldn't have to be there by 3:30 am. That just doesn't make sense. It definitely takes away from the fun, especially if you are doing multiple races and have to get up that early three days in a row. I think this could be staggered according to actual race start times. Then the lines wouldn't be so long for photos and bathrooms when you arrive.
2. Proof of time/waves. - I submitted a crappy proof of time because that's all I had for the qualifying distance. That meant I was in a corral in the back. I was in another RunDisney race, but I was able to fight my way upstream. For this race that was impossible. The entire course there were so many people in front of me only walking. They didn't follow the stay to the right directions they took up the whole course. People would just stop in front of you and walk the whole way all across the course. You had to waste a lot of time and energy weaving around people the entire time. The people along the course should try and enforce the stay to the right rule. There were also groups who didn't follow the rule of two abreast and took up the whole road. This is not fair or courteous to other runners. I understand that this race is walker friendly, but runners should be able to go up the left side. This was extremely frustrating for me to deal with. Even at the finish a group of 6 across blocked the whole road and I had to duck under their arms to even get around.

I definitely recommend these races, but make sure you submit a fast time or you'll be stuck fighting huge crowds the whole course. Be prepared for fun, but also major lack of sleep during race weekend.