Wine & Dine 2015 and PRO Compression Giveaway Winner!

Hey, guys! First things first: I have a winner for my PRO Compression Giveaway!

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Congrats, Ken! Please shoot me an e-mail at thefinalforty at gmail dot com with your mailing address and shoe size. :)

In other excellent news, I mentioned in my recap of last weekend’s St. Paddy’s Day 10-Miler that Todd and I will both be running the Wine & Dine Half Marathon this year!

I ran the Wine & Dine Half Marathon on my own in 2013, and I have been DYING to do it again. 744611-1082-0001sI ran that year’s race as part of a family trip to The World to celebrate my parents’ wedding anniversary…because it just so happens that their anniversary fell on the same weekend as the race. Oh, what a shame that was. ;)

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I also ran the Jingle Jungle 5K that morning with my sister (a.k.a. Eeyore) — it was her first 5K, and we had an awesome time!

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This year’s half marathon sold out in an unprecedented 35 minutes, and I was honestly surprised by all of the posts on Facebook/Twitter in the days leading up to registration by runners who were worried about not getting in. I’ve never had trouble registering for a runDisney race before, so whenever that happens, I assume it’s passionate runDisney fans such as myself just getting themselves worked up over nothing.

Apparently, I was VERY wrong. Lots of runners were shut-out of the race because it seems there may be some sort of new(ish) system in place that throws registrants into a “queue” based upon when they begin the registration process…so by the time it’s your turn in line, all of the available slots could be sold out. There were apparently a bunch of people who could only register themselves but not their spouses, or only one of their children, etc., before all of the slots for the half marathon, 5K, and kids’ races were filled up. So, needless to say, there has been a bit of drama on social media about the registration process this time around.

I was already set because I deferred my Tower of Terror 2014 registration (which was cancelled for this year…BOO) to this year’s Wine and Dine, so luckily, I only had to worry about getting Todd signed up. We had both of our laptops ready to go, and I started refreshing the Active link about 8 minutes before 12pm. I got right in when registration opened up early (by 11:55) with no problem, and he had his confirmation e-mail by 12:02.

In any case, I don’t know if it’s just because I started refreshing early (I always do!), or we’re just lucky, because we didn’t have any problems at all. I can completely understand why these races are so popular, but I hate that registering becomes more and more difficult (and stressful!) every year. When I registered for my first half marathon and runDisney race — the Princess Half Marathon 2013 — I didn’t sign up until the end of July…and there were still plenty of spots open! Ah, those were the days.

Anyways, I am SOOO excited to run Wine & Dine with Todd this year! I know he will enjoy it very much; our two favorite things are running and eating, so what’s not to love?!

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This Polish girl looooooves her some kielbasa/pierogies!

We’ll be spending lots of time at the Food & Wine Festival, of course, but best of all, I already have a Little Mermaid room booked at Art of Animation! I may or may not have gone ahead and booked a room “just in case” as soon as we came back from our trip in January for WDW Marathon Weekend, lol. I’ve never stayed there before, and The Little Mermaid is my FAVORITE.

We also plan to get tickets to Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party for the next night! I ask you…is there ANYTHING more magical than Disney World at Christmas?!

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What can I say…we’re one of those strange Disney families. ;)

Granted, the Wine and Dine Half Marathon will be the weekend after the New York City Marathon…so it should make for an interesting race experience for both of us. I’m sure it will not be our finest performance, that’s for sure. But, either way, November is going to be pretty freakin’ awesome! :)

Who else will I be seeing this November?!

What’s your favorite part of the Wine & Dine Half Marathon? The course, the entertainment, THE FOOD? :)

Comments

  1. Ooh! Ooh! Me! Me! Thank goodness for annual passes and fast computers. It was a team effort to get one of our friends in and thank goodness it worked. The comments that were burning up FB got a bit heated and ridiculous in my opinion. Maybe they should make registration over a number of days at different times??

    • Jennifer says:

      YAY!!! Hope to see you there!

      I completely agree. I don’t know how to remedy this problem, but I feel like there HAS to be a better way!

  2. I saw that queue process really isn’t new, and it’s not an rD issue, it’s Active. I couldn’t believe the remarks on FB but these slots are first come, first serve. If people didn’t get tickets to the Super Bowl, would they be complaining that much?

  3. Congrats on getting into Wine & Dine! That’s on my 2016 race calandar! ;)

    I stayed in a Little Mermaid room in January when I ran the Disney Half and it is SUPER cute, and it was SUPER special being I’m a huge Little Mermaid fan as well (and stayed/ran with my best friend of 25 years, and we bonded over Ariel in Kindergarten) lol. You will loooove it on top of everything else you have planned! =)

  4. me me me! I am SO EXCITED! and even better: I am staying at Pop century so we will be close by!

    and it was insane the comments on facebook. I think what happened is people did not understand the queue. I ended up in the queue for getting the commemorative jacket. I saw it said I had a 20 min wait and then I would have 20 min to enter. after the 20 min was up, i thought it would automatically load: NOPE, you had to click a few buttons for it to take you to the site. I wonder if that tripped people up.

    I always do AP reg and have never had a problem (knock on wood). it always opens at least 5 min early and I usually have my email by 9 when it officially opens.

    • Jennifer says:

      Oooh, awesome! All the more reason to plan a meet-up!

      Oh, wow — I had no idea! I’m sure that did confuse a lot of people!

      I’m an AP holder, too, and I’m probably going to start registering early. It didn’t make sense this time around since I was deferring and Todd still won’t commit to an AP, but I’m working on it, LOL. ;)

  5. Oh the runDisney registration madness….but I’m glad that both you and Todd are in! My husband and I registered early since we’re both APs, and it was crazy how quickly early registration sold out too!

    • Jennifer says:

      YAY! I know it. Our problem is that I’m an AP holder and he’s not (I’m still working on getting him to take the plunge, LOL) so I’m always concerned that I’ll register first, get in, and then he’ll get shut out!

  6. Glad you were able to get your spots at Wine and Dine. We were not interested this year, but I was shocked by the comments people were making on the internet. They need to get a life…they are not dealing with cancer or they would not be acting that way.

    • Jennifer says:

      YES! My thoughts exactly. It’s not THAT serious, and it’s sooooo not cool to make anyone else feel bad about themselves/their abilities as a runner. Especially over something stupid like registering for a race!

  7. I got in as well! I’m so excited. I’ll be doing the half for the 3rd year in a row (by myself this time) and I’ll be doing the 5k with my parents! I’m so excited, but registration was beyond nerve racking trying to get us all in!

    • Jennifer says:

      Congrats! That’s awesome. It’ll be so much fun to run the 5K with your parents…it’s a great race! UGH, don’t I know it!

  8. We’ll be there! My adult daughters and I were able to register early for the 5K since we have an annual pass and are DVC. We are all new to running so thought we’d start out small. Can’t wait!

  9. I’m glad you guys got in! I wouldn’t worry about running it the week after NYCM, I know multiple people who did and it and they were fine. Even early registration was ridiculous selling out in like 15 minutes or something…or maybe that was for Dumbo, I can’t remember! They were all such registration anxiety blurs! lol

    Either way, Wine and Dine is the best! Looking for to seeing you there! :)

    • Jennifer says:

      Thanks, Kellie! That’s really good to know, haha.

      YES! Same here. Hope to see you in November! And, hopefully, not in the middle of a half when I’m miserable, LOL. ;)

  10. YAY for Wine & Dine!! What a fun race and overall experience! Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party, too…yes!!

    Reading this made my heart freak out about registering for Princess. I might have to take that day off work! HAH!

    • Jennifer says:

      Thanks, Karen! Ugh, I know…it has become such a nerve-wracking experience to register for these races! I’m fortunate in that I work from home, but I know of a lot of people who DO take the day off work. Crazy!

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