Happy Haunted 5k Recap

So even though I'm not much of a runner, I am a runner, and now I'm the kind of runner with 2 races under her belt! Saturday the 5th I completed my 2nd 5k race with RunDisney at the Happy Haunted 5k trail run. My previous (first) race was the Royal Family 5k back in February during the PHM weekend. This was much different! This race started a little later, so since I'm local, we only had to get up and out by 5:45am. We arrived at the Wide World of Sports around 7am, giving me plenty of time to take a potty break in the real restrooms & get a few photos before I turned into a sweaty mess.

I made my way to my corral (signed up so late for this race so I was dreading my start in D) & waited. We had entertainment & I heard Mickey & Goofy were there but I was at the very back of my corral so I couldn't see all the festivities. We did get to see an awesome hot air balloon lift-off though!

The Headless Horseman also made his way to the stage, bringing a message to stay on the trail!

Apparently Headless Horsemen do not go over well with 2 year olds, I don't believe she even saw him but I guess since the DJ's were making a big deal out of it, my husband texted me that our 2 year old was trying to climb out of her stroller in holy terror! We Facetime'd for a minute so I could blow her a few kisses (too noisy to hear what she was saying!) & the race started!! I was so happy with how the corrals moved, and I really hope this is a trend with Disney, I've been hearing they are adding more corrals and shorter wait times. In D, I started at 13:30 so about a 3 1/2 minute gap in between. We rounded the field and were in the woods! This being my first trail race, I didn't know exactly what to expect. Well, now I know -- trail! 

We ran the majority of the race in the woods around the ESPN Wide World of Sports complex. Very cool part of this race, and I believe a hot selling point for any Disney fan -- lots of rare characters on the race path! The only one I skipped was the first character stop, which was the Big Bad Wolf, I got in the line and there seemed to be some sort of camera malfunction at the beginning so I stepped out and moved on. Next stop was Prince John & the Sherriff of Nottingham -- rare to see these guys and I do love Robin Hood!

Then we rounded a corner only to come upon an oversized swarm of buzzy bugs, complete with sound effects.

Right around the water stop with AWESOME volunteers was Briar Bear and Briar Fox, and then not much longer and we were literally out of the woods!

I totally dug the next character stop, The Haunted House Gravediggers! These guys didn't crack a smile the whole time I was waiting, but they added some awesome poses to all their photos.

 We ran around the track, which was a nice change from the dirt all over the back of my ankles, and came across some football and viking zombies -- can anyone tell me if they were part of RunDisney? I couldn't decide!!

After that it was around the corner and FINISH LINE!

I believe my actual finish time was 49 minutes, but I did spend about 10 minutes in character lines. That was the one thing I promised myself after the Royal Family 5k -- no PR's during Disney races! I want to stop for all the characters & have lots of fun!! All in all, I love all Disney races & think this one was fabulously executed. I personally probably won't run it again now that I have the medal because I didn't love getting my pretty Brooks all dirty! But I did like that it didn't seem to be as crowded, whether that was new RunDisney cut off regulations or the fact that it wasn't a huge race weekend, I'm not sure. Kids races & ToT Expo will be coming soon!