2014 Cinderella Royal Family 5K Re-Cap

Note: This post originally appeared on my Blogger account.  In the migration to Word Press, the spacing did not come through as I’d hoped.  I’m working on fixing all the older posts, but this takes time.  Thanks for your patience!

The last time I ran the Royal Family 5K at Walt Disney World I was 6 months pregnant with #OhLucy.

That was my first runDisney experience and I joke that it was the gateway drug to my addiction.  I haven’t run the Disney 5Ks since because frankly, if I’m getting up that early, I want some real bling.  Cold, hard, heavy BLING, yo.  This year it still wasn’t the medallion that convinced me to run, though it was super cute.  I got suckered in by the shirt.

I know I am not alone as I DisBroad Kristen also signed up for the Royal Family 5K … because of the shirt.  It’s just as adorable in person!

DisBroads Suzanne and Kristen were also up for the challenge that morning.  Sure, what’s another 3.1 on top of 19.2 right?  I gotta tell ya- it’s not the miles, but the early morning wake up 3 days in a row that will kill you.  But I loved running this race with the girls.  We were joined by our friend Wendy and we all planned to pretty much walk this one.  You know me, I’m all for a walk in the park!

I dressed as Gaston for this race and was delighted to discover that all 3 of my running partners were dressed as Belle.  It wasn’t planned that way, but I loved how it worked out.   Gaston was a big hit and I loved saying “No onnnneee…. photobombs like Gaston, run/walks like Gaston, no one plays in the parks like Gaston!”

You get the idea.

It probably got old to people around me, but I amused myself for all 3.1 miles.

We obviously weren’t adhering to a 16-minute mile, but as you can tell by the people behind me, no one was being swept from the course at this point either.

I believe they do have their limits, however, so don’t think you can take 3 hours to finish the 5K races!  But runDisney clearly makes this race a little less intimidating by keeping the sweep team a lot farther back than you might expect.

As I mentioned before, I typically skip the 5Ks but I’m really glad I ran this one.

We had a blast on the course and finished with huge smiles.  Since we planned on going pretty slow, it was not surprising that we finished in 1:31.  Yep.  We really got our moneys worth out there!

I’m re-considering my game plans from here on out.  If the characters are your thing (and you know they are mine!) and you don’t want to worry constantly about standing in a long line worrying over the sweepers, the 5Ks might be for you.  I never felt the need to sprint to get to the next point or worry about balloon ladies right behind me with this race.

And the medallion and shirts were totes cray cray adorbs.  Worth my $65!

Did you run the Royal Family 5K last weekend?  Do you typically run the 5Ks are Disney races?  Don’t you want some REAL bling for these races?