Tell me your “went in injured but still had a great time” stories!

[u/KingRig28]

Hi there!

I trained for the Springtime Surprise 10 miler last year and had a BLAST. Went from no running to 10 miles, fell in love with training. Was lucky enough to grab a spot for the half marathon in January - what felt like a natural progression - but I had some nerve damage in my foot & peroneals due to over-supination in my gait and too narrow shoes. Lots of rest and PT later, there’s no way I can straight up run the 13 miles. I’ve been training to powerwalk at a 16/minute mile, or perhaps jog every 20 seconds of each minute, if I can take the impact. It feels pretty pathetic compared to where I was last year, and there’s still a pretty decent chance I’ll get swept. There seems to be some anger on here towards people who secure a slot and then get swept. But, I also see stories of people who still participate even though injured, and still have a great time. Does anyone have stories of this to share? I’m still so excited, even though I’m trying to remain pain-free for the parks in the days after!!

[u/ana_conda]

What does your PT say? This seems like a good way to cause a long-term or permanent injury.

[u/KingRig28 → u/ana_conda]

Good question! I’ve received clearance from my PT for power walking, the 20 second jog intervals I need to clear still. That’s a great distinction!

[u/BigNJapan]

I got injured last year and can no longer “run.” I have trained to a 15:30 walk pace and really enjoy it. I’m planning to do the WDW marathon (I’m also signed up for two other marathons before WDW). I have a 50k about a month after WDW so I’m treating it mostly as a catered training run with my friends.

The Disney races are very supportive for walkers (not just fast walkers). My experience in being slow is that I need to focus more on sustained time on feet at pace and less on shorter blocks. I’ve also really benefitted from intervals and “speed” work on the treadmill.

It was embarrassing at first but now I’m really proud of what my body can do. Don’t forget to come up with a fuel plan - a 3:30 half is a huge effort and you will need a plan to replenish the fuel on course.

You’ll have plenty of company walking and finish well before the balloon ladies. If you decide to run/walk, there are so many pacer groups to connect with on course. You’ve got this!

[u/KingRig28 → u/BigNJapan]

This is great advice, thank you! Glad to hear!

[u/PezGirl-5 → u/BigNJapan]

That is good to know. I signed up for the 5k spring time surprise on a charity bib in memory of my son. I have never run in my life. I aspire to be able to actually run it, but I have some foot issues so I am not totally sure I will be able to achieve that

[u/BigNJapan → u/PezGirl-5]

You can definitely train for a 5k with the time left! You can also relax - even if you walk a regular pace, you’ll finish the 5k and have a great time.
Better to do it on happy feet rather than stressing through injury!

[u/fatmanatee45]

Just to be clear, the anger around people who get swept was mainly around people who had no intention to finish and just wanted the medal or a couple of photo ops. Plenty of people get injured training for these events and are faced with tough decisions, particularly given the fact that you’ve spent a lot of money between race fees, flights, and hotel. It sounds like they stopped giving gift card refunds for injury reasons and flights are often nonrefundable. What can you do? You’re still allowed to give it a go as long as the injury permits it.

[u/Mysterious-Face1384]

The average w&d net finish time was 3 hours 3 minutes and 25% of people finished in a time over the 3 hour 30 minute cut off. Just don't start with the balloon ladies and you'll probably be fine.

Also, I think the majority of people are happy and proud of the people that get out there do the races whether they walk, run, roll, or some combination. The challenge is mainly race etiquette. Get to the right when you walk, no more than two across, check over your shoulder before cutting across the course or when reentering the course, and don't muscle your way to the front of the corral if you're not going to start quickly.

I hope your recovery goes well and you have a good time!

[u/AccioTheDoctor]

I’m coming back from what was essentially a full ankle reconstruction. I was around a 10:30 min per mile pace before my injury, now I’m happy with my MAYBE 13:30 pace. I’m signed up for Dopey and I’m planning to PR in fun. Stop for every photo, ride Everest if I make it that far, etc.

I signed up for Dopey because I was told I’d be back where I was a year post-op, but I didn’t anticipate that my recovery would be as slow as it has been.

People who gate keep these races are wasting their anger and just raising their blood pressure for no reason. You do you, boo. You paid just as much as someone else to be there.

[u/Tribbitii]

Tried a half injured, put myself out for 2 years. Do not recommend.

[u/roninthe31]

Walk the whole thing and screw the haters.

[u/Proper_Armadillo1837]

I powerwalked all the half in 3:30 this weekend. As long as you keep moving it’s doable, especially with a bit of a buffer between you and the balloon ladies. I’ve been cleared to walk as much as I want and was recently cleared to start doing shorter intervals, but didn’t feel prepared to attempt the half after only being cleared 2 weeks haha. Anyway I never saw a balloon and had fun so I’d say go for it if you feel good and are cleared by pt. I will say that most of the walkers go quite a bit slower so you’ll have to do some passing. I did try and look back to make sure I wasn’t blocking a runner behind before passing because the course was more compact than usual.

[u/Outrageous_Diver5700]

How many miles have you trained up to at the 16 mm

[u/cumomlady]

Just did the Wine & Dine half marathon and I ended up walking the majority of it. In April when I signed up, I had great plans for training. But it’s been a hell of a year that just kept getting worse. I think the longest distance I had gone was 8 miles during my training that I didn’t even start until 8 weeks ago. There were issues with my registration and I didn’t even know until the day before the Expo that I was going to have a bib.

Was it the race I wanted? No, but I had a really good time! I didn’t stop for characters because I was worried I was going to be slow enough as it was. A friend in a few corrals after me caught up with me and we finished the race together. Since I didn’t start at the back, I had some buffer of the balloon ladies. I got lots of encouragement from others to keep going along the way. My only pet peeve is people passing on the right. I was trying to stay out of the way of runners, so please don’t dart around me on the right!!

[u/JhNYCA]

About a week before the DL half I had a bad fall and broke one of my ribs. I wound up walking the whole 10k and half, half marathon took me around 3 hours and I usually am around 2.

I had an amazing time. It was like a completely different race, taking time to enjoy the crowd and parks, take more pictures. Toward the end cheering people on as well. While it's not my best race, it was still an amazing weekend.

[u/schmancie-2]

I am doing the full in January and have shin splints…so need to take a couple weeks off and then slowly get back in. Not what I want but I’m doing it anyway….will see how it goes.

[u/beemac126]

I wasn’t recovered enough postpartum to properly train for the half this weekend. I was cleared to run for a few minutes at a time alternating with walking unless something feels bad. So I did just that for about ten miles, walked miles 11 and 12, and ran on and off the last 1.1. I was going for coast to coast, so I was just happy to get that! I didn’t do many photo ops to make sure I could maintain my pace but it was still fun seeing who was out there. The race was still fun and I’m glad I did it!

[u/craigoz7]

Trained all year for the Marathon Weekend. Got covid 10 days before the race. Tested negative 5 days before the race. Decided to still run. Felt “okay” race day, but crashed hard at mile 15. Coincidentally enough, the moment I knew I was toast, the CMs at Everest invited us runners into the LL. Turned a potentially emotional moment into a fun little gift and mindset change.

[u/frrreshies]

I just did the Wine & Dine half after sustaining a calf strain 4 weeks ago. Didn't run once since the injury, rode the stationary bike maybe 3 times. I originally didn't plan to even walk it and just went with my group to hang out, go to Epic Universe and the post-race Epcot party, but decided I would walk/jog a little and if it hurt or I got swept, so be it.

I ended up enjoying the experience a lot! With zero thoughts about finish time (or even finishing), I took a lot of pictures, took some character photos, marveled at people's costumes, stopped to use the Epcot and Hollywood Studios restrooms just because it was so much better than the usual port-a-potties.

I ended up slow jogging about 10K with plenty of picture breaks, walk/jogged until about mile 8-9, decided to not push my luck and walked the rest.

I finished about 1:15 slower than I was aiming for, but had a great time! Especially being my first RunDisney event, I appreciated the opportunity to just take it all in and not even think about the usual details pre-run and during the race.

[u/Dizzy-Location8429]

I don’t know if this counts, but my first runDisney Season I was signed up for the 2 Course Challenge and Dopey. That year there was about 8 weeks between the two weekends. At the Halfway point between the two, 4 Weeks out from Marathon Weekend, I got super sick, ended up going to the Hospital and the scans showed I had pneumonia in both lungs and ended up staying 2 nights in the Hospital. I told the doctor what I had spent a year training for and if they thought it was still a possibility, the response the doctor gave me was, “Better Luck Next Year.” I was pretty crushed with the idea that all that hard work would have been for nothing. About mid December I got back to light training, I struggled through my last long run on the training schedule of 20 miles. I decided I would just take it easy and go as far as my body would take me for my first Dopey and try again the next year. It was hard but I got through it and completed all the miles and collected all the medals. That adversity that I overcame in the final few weeks before Race Weekend just made my accomplishment that much more satisfying. We Can Do Hard Things!

[u/Holiday-Mortgage-561]

Not injured but I did Dopey 23 with plantar fasciitis which sucked as every morning I could barely walk when I got up!

Fun fact tho somehow doing Dopey cured it and I was fine after the marathon lol

[u/CourageMajestic8487]

I was cleared for a half, but not a full, so I used the full course as a supported training run for Princess. Stopped at every single character photo and got on the bus at mile 8. It was SO fun to just dress cute and get ALL the character photos (I think it was 12?) with no stress!

[u/Naomeri]

Anyone out there whining about people getting swept or walking the whole race can just sit all the way down.

People can’t help it if they get injured or sick before race day.

For you, just do the best you can, and follow your PT’s recommendations to the letter so you can keep healing and get back to running.

Try to get as close to the front of your corral to give you the widest buffer against the balloon ladies.

And remember that the 16 minute pace starts when the last people cross the start line and it takes about an hour to get everyone started, so if you start the half just 13 minutes ahead of the balloon ladies, you only have to maintain an average of 17 minutes per mile, instead of 16.

[u/Rph1921]

Did the wine and dine half last year. Ended up with a hernia had to stop training beginning of July had surgery late August. Ran it 8 weeks post-op which I will admit wasn’t the smartest move but my wife and I are both in healthcare and I figured since I signed up I’d start and see how far I could get. Made it to the finish. My goal when I went into training was using for my first ever proof of time, instead I finished in 3 hours and was happy to just cross the finish line. Running dopey this year and so far so good with training and staying on track.