I am sitting in bed getting ready to sleep and be ready for the half marathon tomorrow. The 10km race today was in a way more what I expected. I enjoyed some bits of the run but overall can’t say I loved it but I love having done it. We overdid the walking round the parks yesterday. We did well over 20km over and above the race and we really should have rested. We went to the Pasta in the Park party and it was good for grabbing some food but they were laying the music so loud you couldn’t talk to other runners anyway and we were so tired that we left as soon as we’d eaten and even skipped watching the illuminations from the reserved area. We will try and go back and catch them another time though.

when I woke up this morning I felt nervous and scared. I wasn’t looking forward to it. I was worried. It was raining too so the space blanket thingies they handed out yesterday were really useful to keep the worst of the rain off. We boarded a bus about 3.40 and got to the start. We sat ourselves in one of the tents and stayed dry and warm. We ate our bananas and about 4.45 they opened the way through to the corals. D again for this one. We went to the loo just before we entered the coral and then waited in the rain for the 5.30start. We crossed the start line about 6am.

The plan was to take it easy but to run the first section to get out of all the major congestion. That worked pretty well and we ran the first 8 minutes or so and then settled into our 2 minute running, 1 minute walking intervals. I was finding it much harder than yesterday. It was much more humid and my legs were tired. The first 3 miles were along roads and there wasn’t much in the way of entertainment or support. I was just about to slip into that negative cycle of finding it hard and the thinking I can’t do this anyway when we ran past a screen showing Diseny cartoons and playing music and I found myself singing along ‘I’ve got a feeling…tonight’s gonna be a good good night..’ And things felt easier. Shortly after the 3 mile mark we entered Epcot and running through Epcot was again enjoyable. I belted out frozen’s ‘Let it Go’ and marvelled at the fact that I could run and sing at the same time. Mile 4 came and we ran along the Boardwalk, an area I hadn’t ever been to before so it was interesting to look at and there was quite a lot of very vocal support and I suddenly got all emotional and jogged along balling my eyes out for about 3 minutes. No idea why but I was just completely overwhelmed for a few minutes. Mile 5 came quickly after that even though my breathing was lol over the place. We decided to run the last mile. After about half a mile though my tummy gave an almighty gurgle and bubbled dangerously away to itself. I asked for a walk break and we took the next 2 as we ran through the final bit of Epcot. A bloke running much faster tried to cut in front, possibly for a photo op with an official photographer but he misjudged the gap and bumped into a woman, slipped and fell on his backside knocking into me in the process. He got up and sped off. The incident had kept my mind off my tummy and running and then suddenly we’d passed the 6 mile marker and then we could see the finish line.

Just as we turned into the straight leading up to it the Star Wars theme tune started playing and it was so so hard to to sprint but just keep it steady. Our official time was 1.20.36 which means we were running well within ourselves and gives me confidence for tomorrow, particularly as we both felt comfortable at that pace with those intervals.

We collected our medals, snack box, water and another space blanket and headed off to get the monorail back to the hotel where we had a breakfast reservation. It turned out that we’d been told the wrong time for the start of the monorail but after a bit of walking backwards and forwards (yeah, thanks for that) we were directed to the monorail and one was started early. We got to our room in time to quickly get changed which was good because my clothes were all soaked through with sweat from me and with rain. No time for a shower though.

After breakfast I felt much better. We’ve tried to take it easy today. We’ve done some yoga, we also washed and dried some of our running clothes and went to the Magic Kingdom where we went on a few rides and sat and watched one of the parades as well as people from various tea and water stops. We had booked an early tea so were back at the hotel by 7pm. I’ve laid out my half marathon clothes for the morning and packed my bag to take with comfy clothes to change into.

I am tired and will curl up and sleep now (it’s about 8pm). I have again done well over 20k today all in but I feel more rested than I did yesterday and though tired my legs are generally ok. I’m also hopefully going to get a little more sleep so I am looking forward to the half marathon, to seeing what entertainment they have on the course, to running through the Magic Kingdom and Epcot and to getting this thing done!