This post is part one in a three-part series on the 2014 Kansas City Half Marathon. Part one covers the course preview, including Virtual Run feature. Other posts in this series include...
If you're looking for a great run that tours the city's best, this is it. With either the full or half-marathon iterations, the Waddell & Reed Kansas City Marathon Weekend gives participants a tour on-foot of the neighborhoods and landmarks that puts KC on the map. With the half-marathon alone, runners get to trot through the Power & Lights District, Crossroads Arts District, Crown Center, the World War II Memorial, Old Westport, the Country Club Plaza, Nelson-Atkins Art Museum and Frank A. Theis Park, Hyde Park, Beacon Hill, and the 18th & Vine Jazz District. All in the half-marathon! The full marathon travels further south, including parts of Loose Park, Ward Parkway, Mission Hills, Historic Brookside, and UMKC Campus central to Kauffman Legacy Lake. And, of course, all runners get a healthy dose of the Paris-of-the-Midwest's many fountains. And yes, there will be barbecue/BBQ afterwards. On to the course preview! Course Preview The Google Maps route can be found HERE. Intro For this course preview specifically, the half-marathon distance will be covered. Maps for the full marathon course, full marathon relay course, and even 5k course can be found using the links right here, or at the marathon's official website, which is linked at the top of the page. Of important note, this year's course has been altered due to construction downtown. The changes are minor, but if you're used to running the 2013-and-previous route, you'd be tempted to take a wrong turn. Beyond the downtown sections, the southern half of the full and half courses are pretty much the same as before. Also of note, and I've noticed this in the past, though the "shortest route around the course" method produces something lik 13.1 miles (for ex., the full marathon is actually a Boston Qualifier), this course -- out of all of the half-marathons I've done just this year alone -- is the furthest from 13.1 on-foot. By the map, this course runs 13.41 miles. On foot (last year), the course ran closer to 13.5. Be expecting that going in. The following stats also reflect the "by-the-map" metrics. Course Basics/Metrics Here are the basics for the 2014 half-marathon route...
There are 7 climbs on-route that are "rated" (I use my own rating system for running climbs), which basically means seven climbs that are over 30 feet of climbing. Here's how they stack up.
Virtual Run (All Images credited to Google Earth Street View) Again, this covers the half-marathon. The full marathon, including marathon relay, has the same northern half as the half-marathon. The only difference is further runs along the Plaza and south on Ward Parkway. Once making the way back up, the full marathon route meets back up with the half-marathon route. Click on any of the links provided above for the full marathon map. For the 5k, the route is completely different. A link for that map is provided above as well. Start to Mile 1.00 -- All routes start in the same location (although, the 5k starts later in the morning), just North of Crown Center Plaza, on Grand, in front of Washington Square Park. The course begins North on Grand Boulevard towards the Power & Lights District. Right ahead of the start chute is the City's main railroad tracks. Once that bridge is crossed, the very first climb begins ("Grand to PNL"), a mile-long, gradual, 2.3% grade ascent up to the Power & Lights District and around the North side of the Sprint Center, where it peaks out at 13th & Oak, about 1 mile in to the race. Miles 1.00 to 3 -- Of equal descent is the run South on Oak back towards Crown Center, passing first through the Crossroads Arts District centered at Oak and 18th Street. Once the bridge over the same train tracks is crossed (at Oak and about 20th), the second major climb begins up the famed Hospital Hill. Although this section technically runs up over Hospital Hill, the alternate entrance on to the hill cuts down the overall climb -- usually the climb begins out of Crown Center and on to Pershing Road. Either way the hill remains steep, and is bound to wear ambitious runners a bit thin. Hospital Hill peaks at Longfellow Park, after over half a mile and 104 feet of climbing. A right-hand turn pushes runners West along 27th Street, eventually spilling on to Memorial Drive, and another famed climb, Memorial Hill. This route puts runners already halfway up the climb, which normally also begins down on Pershing Road. The 3-mile marker hits at the entrance to Liberty Memorial Park. Take a deep breath and enjoy the view -- at this point on course, the sun is just now showing its colors, and with the panorama of downtown Kansas City behind the Liberty Memorial, provides an absolutely picture-perfect backdrop. Miles 3 to 5 -- Liberty Memorial Park provides one of the few truly flat spots on course. Half and full marathon participants will run the entirety of Liberty Memorial Drive, a 0.40-mile flat trek towards and then away from Liberty Memorial. On exit from the park, the climb up South on Wyandotte Street past Penn Valley Park provides the next major climb. At first only 2.5% grade, the latter half of this 0.34-mile climb pitches upwards at a consistent 9.5% grade. Though short, this hill sees many walkers. The descent down Penn Valley Hill, off of Wyandotte, and on to Eastbound 31st Street sees mile marker 4 at Main Street. At 31st, runners turn right heading South on Main Street, which provides a fast and easy descent for three-quarters of a mile. Main Street pitches back upwards at 27th, however, before hitting mile marker 5 and turning right on to Westport Road. Miles 5 to 8 -- Half- and full-marathon'ers descend on to Westport Road around mile 5. The 'descend on' is short-lived, as not long after the turn the next climb in-to and out-of Old Westport begins (for those familiar with Westport, runners enter in through the Northeast, from the side where the Riot Room and The Foundry are). The 2.7% and 0.34-mile short climb out of Westport ends as runners turn West on to 43rd Street. Things speed up at 43rd Westbound, as the route descends, seemingly in preparation for the last set of long climbs. A turn left off of 43rd on to Southeast Roanoke Parkway drops participants in to the Western edges of historic Country Club Plaza along 47th/Emanuel Cleaver II Boulevard. Once again, enjoy the scenery, as the route flattens out all the way through to the front lawn of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (with Frank A. Theis Park opposite). Just short of mile-marker 8, half-marathoners will turn off of Emanuel Cleaver II Boulevard on to Troost. Marathoners will stay straight on Cleaver II until turning south on The Paseo. Given the late-race location, I have seen many-a-half-marathoners miss the turn and continue straight (and many marathoners make the turn instead of going straight). Half-marathoners turn left on to Troost! Full marathoners keep straight until The Paseo! Miles 8 to 10.50 -- This entire section - all 2.5 miles of it - is made up of hill. Off of Emanuel Cleaver II Boulevard, runners hit a quick road-change combination: North on Troost, followed by a next-left going West on Brush Creek Boulevard, and an immediate right on to Gillam Road going North and Northwest. This combination marks the beginning of the Harrison Boulevard Climb, a massive 1.82-mile ascent up 137 feet -- not steep, but quite long. Along the ascent, runners are privy to miles of parkway, including Gillam Park and -- once Gillam forks eastward on to Harrison Parkway -- Hyde Park. The Harrison Parkway climb peaks at the intersection of Harrison and Armour, although, in reality, this entire section is really one longer hill. The second half of the incline begins nearly immediately once runners are turned Eastward on Armour, followed by a left-hand turn heading north on The Paseo. If history proves correct, for me at least, it's around here that attention wanes, legs cramp, and motivation suffers. But at the top of this Gillam-to-Harrison-to-Armour-to-Paseo climb, only 2.5 miles remain -- all of which are downhill. Mile 10.50 to Finish -- The trek North on The Paseo brings about all of the glory you would expect from the Paseo (hah-hah). Even though the remaining miles of the Paseo are largely downhill, this stretch feels immeasurably long. However, the payoff begins only 2km later, at only 1 mile to go, when the route turns West on to 18th, edging along the Western corner of the historic 18th & Vine Jazz District. Under the 71-highway bridge, the final miles begin to trickle down, and the motivation begins to inch upwards. 12.0mi: The route turns West off of the Paseo on to 18th Street. This view is on 18th Street, with The Paseo crossing from left to right. If you were to look left as your were turning West on to 18th Street from The Paseo, this would be your view: The 18th & Vine District -- home to some of the best jazz in history. A turn left at Grand, runners will find the final quarter-mile laid out before them. Soak in the cheers and final painful steps. Cross the line, collect your hardware, and revel in your accomplishment. ...and think of those poor saps miles that are only halfway finished. Information on Expo & Packet Pick-Up to follow in Part II on the afternoon of 10/16. Once the race is complete, a Part III will be posted the following week.
Until then, keep R/B/S-ing. -tds ~~__o _-/<,_ @/ @
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This is part two of my six-part series on the 2015 Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend. Part two covers the history behind the race series, as well as step-by-step instructions how to register (for the 2015 event).
The event's official website can be found HERE. The event's official Disney Event Guide can be found HERE. Welcome back! Now I'll walk through some background on the event's history, followed by the registration process point-by-point (which often feels like a daunting process). Onward! Background on the Walt Disney World Marathon Surprising enough, other than results and records, the history of the Walt Disney Marathon is few and far between. The WDW Marathon's first running was in 1994 with just short of only 7,000 runners. Over the next two decades, the Marathon Weekend would actually struggle to meet registration quotas, forcing Disney Parks to reconsider. In 2012, Disney offered free admission to the parks on the Monday following the event for participants of any of the events of Marathon Weekend, which did help boost sales. 2013 marked the 20th running of the WDW Marathon, and, despite the incentive being removed, saw its largest registration year in the Marathon's history. Though official numbers for 2014 have not been released yet (that I know of), given the quickness with which registration filled up, another record year seems almost likely. Due to the rise in popularity of marathons and half-marathons, registration across the US have spiked in the last few years. Not surprisingly, to match the rising demand, runDisney now hosts 9 event weekends at their two US parks. All races have kids-specific races if the offered 5k's may be too much for the little tykes. At the Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida, runDisney hosts the following, as of 2014 (and 2015):
Finally, the focus of this race report series, the Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend. For the WDW Marathon Weekend, eight running events are offered...
Again, this is the oldest of runDisney events, and one of the largest. The Health & Fitness Expo itself is a large draw for many, and given the nice beginning-of-year placement, is often great opportunity for health and fitness companies to roll out new products for the new year (I will be eyeing New Balance's runDisney Special Edition Shoes -- more on that during the Planning and Expo posts). That's it for the background. Let's get in to the actual race (or at least, let's register for the damn thing). For those that will be registering for the up-coming Tinker Bell and Princess HM Weekends, this should provide a great cheat-sheet on the registration process, as runDisney uses all the same portals for registration. Registering for the Walt Disney World Marathon Registration for any runDisney event is a popular demand, so spots fill up very fast. Sometimes, spots for the more popular events will fill up within minutes (seriously!), so make sure you are online as they roll it out. There are also some finicky website things that are important to note going in, so be sure to read on. For the 2015 Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend, scheduled for January 7th through January 11th, registration was set to be open on April 22nd, 2014, at 11:00am Central Time. I made sure to set an alert on my Google Calendar with a link directly to the Marathon Weekend home page. To get to the specific event, all runDisney events are centralized around their runDisney website at rundisney.com. From there you can use the "Events" tab at the top of the page to find the specific event you are interested in. Be it the Disneyland Prices Half-Marathon, or Disney World's new Start Wars Marathon. I, obiouvsly, opted for their oldest-running Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend. I would run the half-marathon. Once you arrive at the WDW Marathon Weekend page, you get a nice little ticker right at the top, including how full each of the offered events are at the present moment. Clicking the "Registration" tab will take you to a list of each of the events (and combination of events) offered, with hyperlinks highlighting those that are still open to registration (aka not sold out). Now...here's the tricky part. Registration opened up promptly at 11:00am CENTRAL TIME on April 22nd, 2014, for the 2015 running. These are very popular events, so you can imagine that right at 11:00am, site traffic skyrockets. Clicking on an event may not work the first one or two (or twelve) times. I recommend clicking on the event, and if (and when) it displays an error message, just keep clicking Ctrl-R (to refresh the page) until you get through. Do not assume waiting for site traffic to slow will help! By the time site traffic clears, your chosen event may already be sold out (yes, they sell out that quickly). After about 10-or-so refreshes, I finally got through to the registration portal, run by popular registration management website Active.com. I clicked in the "Register Now" button, Again, you may hit site traffic here. But don't worry -- once you finally get on the pages where you enter your name and registration deets, you shouldn't hit any more brick walls. After signing in with my Active.com profile, it's time to select my event -- for me, the half-marathon. Any events that are sold out will be noted here. Then you got your "we're not responsible if you die" agreement. Also known as the participant waiver. Then, having signed in to Active.com already with my user credentials, most of my personal information (name, address, etc etc) is already filled out for me. If you sign in as a guest or are creating a new profile, presumably all of this will be empty for you (at least, I hope). After your personal info, you'll have a few additional quiz items to attend to, the most notable being previous half-marathon history. In order to set up corral assignment, you must provide an anticipated finishing time, along with info on a previous half-marathon finish (or a marathon, if you chose that event), including the name of the race, the official distance, the city and state, the date, and the finish time. If you've never done a similar-distance event before, just enter N/A and move on. Likely, you'll be assigned to the last few corrals. Then you got your common quick questions, such as t-shirt size, and you're ready to pay. Once finished, you should receive an Active.com email within 24 to 48 hours (I think it took about 8 hours for me). If you don't a confirmation email within two days, email the event organizer using the runDisney home page's information...there may be a problem. Additionally, you may receive two emails that look similar, but in fact are not: One is your transaction confirmation, the other is registration confirmation.
And that's it! Print off the confirmation and bring it to the packet pick-up and expo. Electronic copies work, too, but you can never trust that you'll be able to pull it up on-the-spot. But all of that stuffs will be covered in my Packet Pick-Up and Marathon Expo post on race weekend. That's all she (or I) wrote for now. Keep posted for Part III next, including info about training & planning. That will likely go up in a few months (late October-ish) once my training gets underway. Keep R/B/S-ing. ~~__o _-/<,_ @/ @ This is part one of my six-part series on the 2015 Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend. Part one is an introduction to the series.
Part 2 (Background of the Race & Registration Process) can be found HERE. Part 3 (Training & Planning for the Event) can be found HERE. Part 4 (Course Preview with Virtual Run) will be posted mid-October to beginning of November. Part 5 (Travel, Event Expo, & Pre-Race) will be posted on Race Weekend. Part 6 (Race Day & Post-Race) will be posted after Race Weekend. The event's official website can be found HERE. It was after only the first race of the Heartland 39.3 half-marathon series that I, along with my sister and brother, decided to finally take seriously what we'd been wishfully toying with for a couple of years now: to run the Walt Disney World Half-Marathon. Growing up, as a family, we'd frequented Walt Disney world nearly every year. Regardless if experiencing it as young children or (relatively) fully-grown adults, Disney World has always been The Happiest Place on Earth to us, and despite our almost-annual visits, experiencing it over again and again always brought a renewed and shared sense of adventure and imagination. As odd as it would seem, Disney World would almost become an unofficial second home to us, always greeting again the familiar sights, sounds and smells upon touchdown in Orlando, and looking back with homesick nostalgia upon wheels up. For 2015, it would have been nearly three years since we'd been back. So what a better way to re-experience our second home by running through it. Over just the last few years our family has rallied around its members' newly-formed passions for all things sports (be it as a spectator or participant). Combining one family interest with another only seemed natural. Plus: what a cool way to experience Disney World! In researching for detailed info about the Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend (and one of the many things that triggered me to start blogging about racing), I was surprised at the scant amount of first-hand experiences with the race. Some were about the expo, most were about the race itself. In the coming months through to the end of race weekend (and beyond), I will be covering -- in immense detail -- one of the top-ten most popular marathon events in the world. Because of the detail, and the breadth of the event itself, blogging about the WDW [Half-]Marathon will have to come in several smart parts, likely using the following format...
With that, look for Part II: History of the Race & the Registration Process. By the time you're finished reading this, Part II should be finished and posted. And, of course, thank you for reading. Keep R/B/S-ing. -tds ~~__o _-/<,_ @/ @ |
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