runDisney expanded Walt Disney World Marathon weekend by announcing new race distances- the Minnie 10K- and the new and official Dopey Challenge (5K, 10K, half and full marathon all in the same weekend).
Concerns about what this means to corrals and placement have been voiced, and runDisney is answering!
Registration for these races started this week with Annual Passholders, Disney Vacation Club members, and Disney Rewards Visa cardholders. On the registration forms, there was also a welcome (mostly welcome!) surprise regarding proof of time for corrals.
From a Facebook posting:
I just emailed about corrals because I was deferred and wanted to see if I would still be in the same corral after deferment or if I’d have to resubmit a newer time. The response was this:
We do not actually handle the timing and corral placement. A third party named Track Shack handles the placement. We are adding more corrals to spread our participants out and avoid crowding. You will probably still be toward the front, but with our new proof of time scheme, I am not sure which corral that lands you in.
Aha! More corrals. To avoid crowding. Ding Ding Ding! We have a winning answer!
Insiders have also said that the November 1 cut off is due to the need to verify all proof of time submissions. Sounds like they are taking this corral thing seriously, yo!
What do you think? Will this work?
Let us know in the comments!
Patty Holliday has been running Disney since 2011. She knows just about every tip, trick, and hack there is to cover the runDisney Magical Miles at Disney World and Disneyland. She knows every mile isn’t *always* magical- but with training, tips, and a little bit of pixie dust, they can be a lot of fun! You can also find her at noguiltlife.com and noguiltfangirl.com
Longhorns2
Sunday 7th of April 2013
They did. 7 min between this year. And you saw how well that worked for PHM!
What I'm guessing- and it's a guess for sure- is that we will see many more smaller corrals. Instead of A-H (8 corrals for PHM) I suspect it may even double- 16 corrals. But they won't space them at 7 min apart. It will be more like 2-3 min max between waves, similar to what RnR does for their races. So you have ~1000 runners leaving at 3 min intervals instead of ~2200 leaving at 7 min intervals.
ex: If you start in D corral instead of B corral (just due to smaller corral sizes) then you leave 9 min after A instead of 7 min after A. A little longer if they use 3 min waves. If they go with 2 min waves, you'll leave sooner than you did this year. Just depends on what time they use between corrals.
If they go with shorter waves, I also wonder if we will still have fireworks at each one. No idea on how quickly they can set each one off!
Summer
Sunday 7th of April 2013
I know last year they added corrals and made the starts closer, but I thought this year they went back to 6-7 minutes between??
Longhorns2
Saturday 6th of April 2013
You won't have to wait longer Summer. At least you shouldn't. More corrals will mean less time between starts. It won't be 7 min waves- more like 1-2 min between starts. At least that's how RnR does it in the big races.
Summer
Saturday 6th of April 2013
Honestly I think my ego will take a hit with these changes. I worked hard to get in corral B and now I will be moved back to C or even D, where started at, which also means even more waiting before I get to start the race, which is one of the main reasons why I wanted to get into the earlier corrals to begin with.
Longhorns2
Thursday 4th of April 2013
That's a good point Sarah- she seemed satisfied with the answer she got online. But I focused on what it meant for us- lol.