AJ and Erika: Whether you've taken on the Dopey Challenge before, you're thinking you might want to do it one day, or you never plan to even consider that craziness. Today's episode is going to be fun. We have some friends on the pod who are all perfect dopeies. Hey there, friends. Welcome to episode number 52. This is the season two finale. Dun dun dun. Dun dun dun. And we've got some guests on the podcast that Eric, like Erica said, they're all perfect dopeies. And that's fun and exciting because to be perfect dopey means you've done this now 13 times in a row. Wow. And so we're gonna ask them all kinds of dopey questions. ⁓ we, Erica, we're wrapping up season two. And someone asked me the other day, how are you defining that? Like why, why, what what does even season two mean? Like you don't take a break. Or whatever. And I think the way we what we did is we did six months when we started to marathon. Right. And that six months we just called season one arbitrarily. Right. Yeah. Then season two, when we decided to continue the podcast, became I think the next six months. Right. Right, right, right. To where now season three is the launch of the next marathon cycle. Right. So I think the seasons are now defined by six months. And that's how we're going to do that. So Today's gonna be exciting. We're gonna wrap this season up in a big way and start in a big way. Yes, we are. Next week. It's gonna be good. Can we do our few housekeeping things? Yeah. ⁓ of course I always love to say thank you to our crew who make this whole thing possible. We're having a great time with that. ⁓ lots of bonus content. The after show has been tons of fun. And so if you're interested in supporting the show, that's been great. Thank you for those of you that already do. And then ⁓ another thing we really appreciate is reviews on Apple Podcasts. Would you mind reading this week's Apple Podcast review? It comes from Mama Riri. Yes, I saw that. She says, In a previous pre-kids life, I was a runner, but haven't done a race or run a ton in seven years since having three kids. I missed a sub two-hour half marathon by less than a second and have always said, someday after kids, I need to do another half. After falling into the Disney obsession with our kids, I signed my husband and I up for the wine and dine half this fall, knowing little to nothing about Run Disney. This podcast has been so helpful in preparing me for all the Run Disney things I need to do and making me even more excited for the race. Thanks for all the tips and tricks. Wow. One second. That's so hard, but the perseverance and the not give upness and the way to get after it. Finding Run Disney, you're gonna love Run Disney. So much fun. ⁓ especially a wine and dine like ⁓ you know, we have our favorites and whatever, but wine and dine's a really good first time experience for sure. So I hope you have a really great experience with that. And thanks for supporting the podcast ⁓ by listening to it and for leaving a review. Yeah. Thank you so much. ⁓ awesome. So ⁓ one of the other things I wanted to say here at the top was I wanted to thank everyone for joining and engaging with us. Yeah. Through our personality series. Totally not a running I mean we tied it to running. Right. And it was, I feel like very, you know, it fit perfectly. But I know that's not why you signed up to listen to this podcast. That's not why you hit subscribe, right? And so we did that for three weeks. I had a great time. You had a great time. It was so much fun. I I believe it was really well received because of the feedback we got. We won't do that kind of thing very often. But if you, you know, don't know your personality type that's on the Enneagram and you want to, you know, dive into that a little bit, I think it's totally worth a listen. ⁓ if you knew, if you enjoyed that. Let us know. Like we'd we'd love to know what's your number. Did you change numbers based off of what you heard? Like, not change number. Well, you know what I mean. Like did did you think you were a this and now you realize, ⁓ no, we're discovered you're not discovered another number. Perfect. ⁓ so we had a really good time with that. And so thank you all for joining us for that. ⁓ it was fun. Yeah. Let's talk upcoming topics. Next week marks exactly one year from when we started the podcast. So we're kicking off season three with a Big time guest. Big time guest. You guys are gonna love this one. And before we dive into that, I actually wanted to take a look back real fast at seasons one and two. Fine. And so we're gonna do that really quick. And when we come out of this, we're gonna dive straight into our time with the perfect dope. Because you're gonna recognize a voice. Matt from Team Rundis has been on the podcast. He brought friends with him. So first, before we dive into that, let's take a look back at where we've come from. All right. Are you ready, Erica? Let's do it. Just trying get everything situated. Yes, I'm a little nervous. From a tech perspective, everything is set and ready. Video's good, sound is good, lighting's good, scripts are in, like everything's good. Now we just need to have fun. We set out to help y'all feel prepared and inspired going into whatever your race is, right? And I gotta tell you that we felt that come to life. ⁓ my gosh. At Marathon Weekend when we got to meet so many of you in person. I have cried more about the people that we've met and their stories and what they've said that we meant to them than I have about not finishing the marathon. To be able to actually see somebody face to face on the course who's telling us like, I didn't know if I was gonna be able to make it. Like I had such a hard time with training, but like what you guys have shared and encouraged, like it encouraged me. And so that was just so cool. Not like, ⁓ my gosh, you're like you're a celebrity. I can't I can't believe I'm gonna meet you. They like, no. Your podcast means a lot to me and this is my training. And I'm like, there okay, there it is, right there. AJ, can you believe we've made it to the tenth episode of the podcast? ⁓ did we really? Did you know that most podcasts don't last past episode seven? Very funny. I was like, this is when everybody quits episode seven. And we passed it. And then we hit ten and now this is twenty. Yes. I am so excited and we're celebrating in a big way. We have big time guests on the podcast today. We are so thrilled to have Kristen from Running in Makeup on the podcast with us today. Thanks for having me. We have the Rise and Run gang. Welcome to the podcast, guys. ⁓ hey, hey. Doug and Michelle are from the podcast Rope Drop on Deck. Excited to be here. Yeah, we are very excited. Thank you. Have Amanda from Once Upon a Marathon with us today. So excited to be here. Thank you for asking me to join. The DCL Duo. Welcome to the One More Run podcast. We are so excited to have you. We just adore you guys and we're so happy to be here. ⁓ just love what you're doing. We have Devin from Zippity DTs and I am so excited. I'm honored to be in such good company. This was so fun. We have the incredible honor of having Chris Twiggs on the podcast with us today. Thank you for having me and thank you for trusting me. We are so excited to have Run Disney Race announcer John Pelke on the show today. Hey. We are so excited to have Fireman Rob here with us today. ⁓ my gosh, this is amazing. The two two guys, welcome to One More Run the Podcast. What's up? How are you guys doing? Thanks having us. We're gonna have an interview with a very special guest. Yes. We have our 19-year-old daughter. She is actually over on the West Coast right now. Taylor, welcome to the podcast. Yay! Thanks. Erica, how does this feel to have Taylor on? It's good to see her. I appreciate being your first guest. Thankfully you liked me enough the first time to bring me back. I am so excited. It's good to see you guys again. Without you guys, I never would have signed up for it. I'm so excited to be here and excited to talk charity. Thanks for having me. Excited to be here. I would love to welcome the Poke Running Club to the podcast. Welcome to the podcast, guys. Yeah. Erica, how in the world did we make it to Feast? I don't know. It's crazy. Hey everybody, welcome to the podcast. This is episode one of the run crap. Hey everybody, welcome to the pod. ⁓ the bloopers you're going to have. ⁓ what? You're gonna jump in and talk about Ethan. I was, I'm waiting for you to breathe. That is exactly what it feels like over here 99% of the time. How was that? Was that AJ level enthusiasm? I did my hands, I did the pauses where you want me to. You're normally the one that's like, ⁓ let's jump to. And then my mind starts going, crap, crap, crap, what was I gonna say? What was I gonna say? Registration season. That's hard to say. Registration season. Red Disney registration scene. ⁓ Registration scene. Registration scene. Totally. Okay. Y'all are getting like the behind the scenes of how the podcast actually gets recorded. I love it. Me choking, ⁓ stumbling over AJ's notes. Okay, here we go. I have loved watching your podcast journey, and I'm so glad that the two of you are part of this family now and be able to spread positivity and joy. When we started this podcast, I thought, you know, we're gonna have like ten friends that listen that, you know, we've convinced to sign up for for Ren Disney. I know. And it turned into this community where people were writing us emails and sending us instant messages and stuff and ⁓ just talking about how they didn't think they were gonna be able to do it. But For some crazy reason, something that we said to them through the podcast, like encouraged them to believe that they could do it. To be able to encourage them in person, that meant so much to me. And that that's the best part of every race weekend for me now is to be able to meet people and encourage them in, you know, face to face. We try to ⁓ hold ourselves accountable that we don't want this to become about us. And when it does, we hope people gut check us on it and make sure that hey, we're doing it for the right reason. It brings me so much joy to see someone succeed. Run Disney is not. just anymore about the medals and the pictures and the outfits for us. It should not be about us. It should be about those around us. Next week is the launch of season three and that's gonna be so exciting. Erica, we the can the journey continues. Yes it does. You still having fun doing this? Tons of fun. All right, Erica, this is super exciting because you remember when we had Matt on and we were talking all things like telegram alerts and we're talking charities and all that stuff. And he said he was perfect dopey. And I said, ⁓ my gosh, you're perfect dopey. We need to have you back on the podcast. He ⁓ I'd love to. And I s and so I text him afterwards. I said, Hey, would you be willing to bring some friends along? And he said, Yeah, I know exactly who to ask. So he sent some text messages. Next thing you know, we're a couple months later, and ta-da. Here we are to launch our like training season. A lot of people are doing dopey. We have three perfect dopeies on the podcast. So I want to introduce our friends who are joining us. Matt, you guys know he was previously on the podcast. We also have Amelia and Justin. So let's go in that order. Can you guys introduce yourselves? Matt, remind us who you are. Give us a little bit of your kind of just background in running, run Disney, all that stuff. So, Matt, if you don't mind, remind us who you are. Absolutely. I am Matt Marcella. I founded Team Run Disney back in two thousand and twelve. I also created the Run Disney Alerts that people use on Telegram. ⁓ I've been running Disney since 2011, been running since 2000. So I'm into my twenty sixth year running now, which makes me feel really old. Yeah, yeah, yeah. ⁓ just love doing it all and keep on going. That's super awesome. ⁓ Amelia, tell us a little bit about yourself. Yeah, my name's Amelia Solora. ⁓ I've been running Disney since I think around two thousand and eleven also. I am ran Dopey every time since it started. I ran Goofy a couple of times before that, before Dopey existed. ⁓ I ran a bunch of the Disneyland races. I'm a perfect dumbo, which is not currently a thing with those races on hiatus, but I've ran all those. I also run a bunch of other races. I was not a runner growing up. I played soccer and field hockey. Running was the punishment. ⁓ it wasn't until I had my daughter needed to get out of the house with the baby that I could put her in the jogging stroller and get out and decided I loved it and stuck with it ever since. Awesome. That's awesome. I guess it's about five years ago now. I started the women's running community Facebook group on Facebook because I felt like as a female in a lot of running groups, it was male dominated and they tend to no spent no, no. offense to the men, but man's playing problems that women were talking about in running groups. So now we're 85,000 females strong in the running group and it's a great place to go to talk about what sports bras work for you running through pregnancy. So ⁓ yeah, women's running community on that I'm glad you said they're looking for a supportive female community. Very cool. Maybe if you're willing, ⁓ maybe you can come back on the podcast and you and Erica can just talk women stuff and I'll just leave and y'all can do an episode on women's stuff. That'd be really good. Sure. Always willing. Will this stuff? Perfect. And I'm Justin Stone. I ⁓ also my perfect dopey. ⁓ I've been running Run Disney since 2009. ⁓ I actually ran in high school, but for a long time forgot about running until I was an ad agency and my client, we sponsored a 5K in Chicago, and so we all have free bibs. And I ran it and I forgot how fun running was, and then somehow discovered that Disney does running events, and so I've been running every year. at least a Disney event ⁓ since 2009. And that's where I met these folks on the ⁓ on the podcast today. And ⁓ it's been a absolute wild ride. So excited to be here. Very cool. Awesome. Thank you all for joining us. ⁓ we're from Atlanta. Do you guys mind sharing or I'll maybe I'll just generalize it. We're from Georgia. What what where what part of the country are y'all in? I am in Connecticut. Perfect. I'm in Lake Tahoe, Nevada area. And I'm the Seattle area. Seattle, that's where we're from. Excellent. ⁓ awesome. Yeah. No, I've been we've been here ⁓ 10 years. ⁓ that's awesome. And ⁓ yeah, love it. Very cool. Very cool. Well, awesome. Thank you guys for joining us. ⁓ Erica, we love to get to know everybody with some would you rather questions. Like we could learn about where you're from and tell many, how many kids you have and all that. Whatever it's Matt Matt's been here before, he knows how this goes. So, like ⁓ we get to know you. Pretty quick. So here's a first up question. Of course, it's gonna be dopey related. ⁓ you're doing dopey. Would you rather start the marathon in corral A, but you're alone, or in Corral G, but you can have whatever friends you want with you. Which way do you go? Corral A. So Emma and I have known each other for a hundred and fifty years. And this is the first year we ran the marathon together. Wow. And it was actually fun. It was actually really, really fun. So I'm I tend to run alone as well. So I would say Corel A. I put my headphones on and I focus. But I gotta say, there was something about running with friends this year and keeping each other going because I think it was this year was tougher than than than years past. So it's a little could I be like, what's in between A and G? Can you have friends for a little while and then you lose them? Yeah. Yeah. And that's what I'm right like can I have friends? I'll take a C with a friend for the last half or something like that. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And that's what most people end up doing, right? But we're we're we're we're putting you in a full full extreme, right? So that's two Corral A's right there. I'd say okay. All right, Matt. How do you feel? I don't mind running by myself, but it was fun to run with Justin. Yeah. Awesome. I'm gonna I'm gonna go with the same route too. I'm I'm going with Corral A. I've done it with friends before and it is a lot of fun, but I'm the same way. Put my headphones on and just get it done, get finished. And here's the thing about Matt, you will inadvertently see him along the course somewhere. The man in black, so focused, right? He's always wearing your your black under armor, right, Matt. I don't want to take him out of the zone. All right. Next up, would you guys rather run the springtime surprise 10 K and it's ninety-eight degrees, or the Princess 10 K and it's twenty two degrees? ⁓ Princess. I'll take Princess 10 K twenty two degrees. Yeah, totally. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Same thing. That was a clean sweep. Yeah. Okay, so that's two. They all answered exactly the same way. They've been friends for a long time. Which one do you choose, Erica? ⁓ probably the cold. You take the cold? Yeah, I think so. Yeah, there's something about when it's hot, like there's just I can't. You can't, you can add clothes. You just, there's only so many clothes you can take off. Right. Right. Yeah, for sure. All right. Here's our third. Would you rather? ⁓ it's the marathon again. ⁓ you have a free pass to skip Blizzard Beach, the parking lot, or you can skip the Magic Kingdom parking lot, kind of on the course we've done the last few years. Which one do you skip? Hands down Blizzard Beach. Okay. The way that they redid the Magic Kingdom, it's like it's like two miles. Yeah. It's a lot. Yeah. It is a lot of serpentining back, but that Blizzard Beach when it's hot and it's like tw mile 22, it's it's a little bruise. Yeah. No, that's horrible. Yeah. I'm sticking with Magic Kingdom. Yeah. The entryway and exit way for Blizzard Beach just I I don't know how it feels so short when you're driving in it, but when you're running it, it suddenly becomes about five miles long. Like before you even get in the parking lot, it's like, wait, where's the entrance to it? Yeah. And it's just it's awful. Just get rid of that. Yeah. I don't I don't like mile twenty on the marathon, but something about to Justin's point, something about like that Magic Kingdom parking lot, like you've just kind of like crossed like the half marathon point. So you've kind of got this like, now I have to push for the second half of this thing. And it's like, ⁓ you were feeling like you could do this? Smack. You know, like I don't think so. Enjoy this hot parking lot. The sun just came up, you know? Like, ⁓ it's awful. Erica, what's yours? You know what though? I'll take that Blizzard Beach parking lot three times without having to run that out and back out to ESPN, though. ⁓ we've never done it. We've never done that. ⁓ ESPN was brutal. It was brutal. Was like that was the longest 57 miles of my life to get out of here and back again. What I thought it was cute too is you actually ran on the track that they have at Wide World Sports. And so it almost they're like, ⁓ maybe we'll make it feel like you're you know you're You're really in the zone and we're like, Are kidding? I'm like trying not to poop myself right now. It's so far and hot out there. ⁓ my god. ⁓ my god. We never had the pleasure of that one. We did not. Erica, would you rather skip Blizzard Beach or Magic Kingdom parking lot? ⁓ maybe Blizzard Beach. You rather skip I don't feel super strongly about either one, but yeah. Yeah, maybe. All right. I don't know. All right, we got two more. Yeah. Would you guys rather have to eat the baduco toast or sports beans as the encourse fuel during a half marathon? I'll take the toast if I can have water right afterwards. Okay. Okay. Okay. I'll go with the sports beans all day over that toast. That that's Sahara sand to me. Yeah. Yeah, a little bit of dried concrete. Yeah. Yeah. I think when I first started running, sports beans were like the thing because I couldn't do goo. Like I did I wasn't proficient enough as a runner to understand the value of it. So I just ate the beans. But both of those are ugh. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. The beans just don't sit well. I feel like with some water to wash the sand down, I can handle the toast okay. Yes, yes. We've only had one guest on that actually like ate them by choice. Yeah. He tried we were like, You're the only one we know that does that. Erica and I's answer to this question is I'd rather die. You know, like we need to die. Yeah. So the last question, the most important question. Yeah, everyone that comes on the podcast this for a Disney Half Marathon, would you rather run down Main Street or get a finisher medal if you could only choose one? Matt, what was your answer the first time? My answer was I'm taking the metal. That's right. And I stand by that answer. I knew that. I just wanted to make sure everyone heard it again. Yes. Yeah. I'm saying I'll take the metal. Running down Main Street's great, but some of the other courses don't run down Main Street and I'm okay with those too. And I run a lot of other races that are just as fun. And I feel like it's more the people watching than the actual where you're running at the Disney races. Awesome. I'm gonna go with Main Street. And and the reason why the most of ⁓ just kind of find their way in a closet or under the bed. I'm not saying I don't like metals. It's just I like the experience. So there's something that's why I like running Disney. It's soaking in the experience. Plus, you know, hang up with these knuckleheads. That's probably the best part. But it's really finding those pockets where just everybody is making the experience that much better. I do like mainstream. I give it a hard time, but it is a special moment. Yeah. Okay. Great. Thank you all for that. We I feel like we get to know, like now I know, you know, who y'all are a little bit better. ⁓ before we kind of like dive into what it means, you know, like like some advice and some encouragement about being a you know perfect dopey, we should probably define that, right? Like ⁓ and we've said it before what perfect means, but how would you guys, you've been perfect, and I don't even know how l how many dopeies there have been, but you guys are perfect, right? What does that even mean? Can one of y'all or some of y'all define what it means to be perfect and what that means for the dopey challenge? I think at this point it might be certifiably insane as part of the definition. And I I've lost count. I think this next one will be 14. Is that correct? Yes. Wow. Wow. So the classic definition is those who have run every single. marathon weekends since twenty fourteen, twenty fourteen. Every race, every weekend for the past thirteen years. ⁓ but it goes so much further than that because there's all the training that goes into it and all the time that you spend throughout the course of the year. And there's so many miles that go into it that it becomes almost just a a second part of your life that you live to make sure that you make it through all those miles. And you know, that just eats up So much of your year leading up to that big weekend right there. What's the besides like the personal gratification, like, ⁓ yay, I did this, I've maintained this, whatever. What do you actually get? Right? Do you get anything for being perfect from Disney or or anything? Depends on the year. So we got what was it? Yeah. Was it five year or ten year? We got a lunch box. We got a dope. Ten years. With like a we got a with a we had like a cookie inside that some people have still. kept. ⁓ seen on Facebook. It's a cookie. Yeah. ⁓ and and then more. Don't eat the cookie now. Right. Yeah. So they do give over certain years you get a little bit more. And then obviously if you guys want to talk about the lanyards. They so we get six medals total for each dopey race. You get the four races plus a goofy challenge medal and a dopey challenge medal. And then you get they give you an extra lanyard for your dopey medal that says legacy on it. And you have a different bib. It's typically a different color. But yours says legacy. Mine says perfect. ⁓ I it says perfect. Sorry. No, the Dumbo ones say legacy. They say perfect. Sorry. I was like, Amelia's cooler than the rest of them. Just like, wait, what am I missing? Yeah, hold on. Yeah. Yeah. And we do with our perfect red ⁓ as dopey, we get a guaranteed registration. So we get a register ahead of time and don't have to fight the crowds on registration day. Lucky. So for someone new to Run Disney, right? They're They're just like, ⁓ man, I'm signed up for my first whatever or dopey or whatever. How do I become perfect? Right. Like they're they're just exploring all the things. Can you help clarify for for folks? And and perfect can apply to all the different race weekends, right? Like it's not just the dopey challenge, but like, how do you become perfect? Or can I? So that was kind of a surpr ⁓ a springtime surprise, if you will, because ⁓ there was a rumor going around that Run Disney was eliminating any new race weekends from having perfect's. ⁓ And then all of a sudden this past year was the fifth year for springtime surprise. And when people got there, they found they had the perfect notation on their bib. So the trick is, it seems if it's still carrying on that you would have to sign up for the first race weekend of an in-person race and then run all of them up to the five year mark to get that perfect designation. Got it. Yep. If you if you finish them, yeah. ⁓ that's right. And yeah, finish. Yeah. All right. So The thing that I really want to know is what is it about the challenge that you guys actually enjoy, if anything? You never know what to expect from it. ⁓ you know, you think that with a four-day challenge and running that many miles that many times that it's either gonna get boring or like you're not gonna PR or you never know what to expect. And it's surprising because I mean the experience changes every time. You you're going out there, you're seeing different people every time, different characters. Run Disney changes the technicalities of it. You know, we have different starting locations now from where we did a few years back. ⁓ so I mean, you just never know what to expect out of it. And that's what makes it so ⁓ enticing and so much fun. It's less about the races these days, and I'd say it's more about team friends. It's it's about a time to actually unwind. Like you may see as all people are cre are getting into corrals and Carissa's doing her thing and watching music and fireworks and everyone's. Getting excited. You might see like a group of people like hanging in the back at the wallflowers. And that's tends to be like the perfect runners who have done this for so many years that we're just kind of congregating in our space talking to each other. It's so it's the running is kind of like the icing on the cake, but the weekend of just seeing everybody and and having some time just to catch up on each other's lives, I think is the highlight for me. Awesome. I agree with that too. And it's also to show myself I still can, I think is like I've been doing it for so long and knowing that I can still do it. ⁓ because there will be a day that we can't. And also seeing friends and as twisted as this sounds, because I operate on very little sleep, probably a little too much alcohol as we're going around the world at Epcot. And but I almost come home like like fulfilled in a relaxing way, even though I'm sore and tired. And it's just it fills my bucket in a way that other things don't. That's awesome. Do you guys have any advice for someone who maybe has signed up for their first dopey? Like like ⁓ training advice besides. Do the training, right? Like obviously, like we all know, like, yeah, yeah, yeah. If you weren't gonna do this many miles, do the training. And we'll talk about advice for race weekend later, but like any advice going into training, because it's probably starting pretty soon, you know, when this episode comes out. For me coming from the West Coast, I would say I am not a get up at four in the morning and run before work sort of person. So the hardest part for me race weekend is the getting up early. Try to incorporate some of your back-to-back long runs. really early. So your body kind of acclimates to running, A, when it's dark and B, when you haven't had a lot of s as much sleep as you normally would have. ⁓ because I think that's one of the hardest things in training is you can log all the miles, but like simulating somewhat of what the re weekend would be like is probably important too. ⁓ that's great. That's great. I think to M's point, the best thing you can do is just it's not just about the miles. It's about simulating the overall experience because By day three, when you've got to get up early, that's the killer. Like day one, you're excited, it's fun. Day two, at least for me, is my race day. I usually race to 10K. So like my mind's set, but then that half marathon day, you're just like, ⁓ my God. Yeah. We're here already. Like we're nowhere even near the end. So you gotta kind of make sure the the mental is is ⁓ it is attached to the physical as best that you can. Perfect. You definitely I'm I'm about the mileage. Like I I try and make sure that I can handle the mileage. But also with that, there's also kind of that mental aspect of prepare yourself for failure kind of thing. Because when you're going for that many miles over that many days, there's such a huge chance of something going wrong and something just throwing your entire weekend off. And just it's an expensive investment. And when you put that much time and and money into it, just know that there's something that could potentially throw it off, just because it'll make it a lot easier to cope with if it does happen. But just do everything you can to make sure that doesn't happen. ⁓ you know, take the training very seriously, especially if it's a first time. Make sure you put in as many miles as you possibly can for it. ⁓ so many people just go out and think, well, it's, you know, I can train for a marathon and just a couple of warm up runs beforehand and it just seems like that doesn't quite work out very well for people sometimes. So just make sure you're prepared, you know. Yeah. And simulate your if you haven't done goos or what kind of fuel, like work your way trying to figure that out because you don't want to get toward race weekend and like do like one long run with a goo you want to use that you've never used before, like Work on the fuel along with the training the entire way. So you can figure out what is not gonna bother your stomach, hopefully on race day. Totally. I was gonna ⁓ if I could just add to actually both those points. It's something I talk about a lot when people ask me is about setting expectations. So like just set expectations as early as possible so that you know, like we talk about like ⁓ are you going to a bunch of theme parks and racing in between them, or are you going to a race with a bunch of theme parks in between? Right? Because it's a Totally different mindset. And so the set the more expectations of like this is a lot of work. You get up early, you run a long time, you've got to rest, you've got to sit down, you've got to eat, you know, certain foods at certain times. So it's not like you can just go and close the park. ⁓ and if you do, then that, you know, there's a give and take. The more you give at the theme parks, the less, the more that the the course is going to take out of you when you run. So you got to think about what's the thing I really want to do. Like I mentioned the 10K is my race. So I really try and focus on the 10K and then the 5K is like fun, high five, the half is is enjoying the sights and scenery of the of the parks, and then the marathon's like trying to survive. So if you can set those expectations of like, hey, I I'm not going into PR or I really do want to PR and therefore I've got to make sure I'm focused on this race and all the things that I need to do to get this race ready, but understand there are three other races that are going to affect that in some capacity. It just makes you kind of wiser. I think I think we've all gotten wiser and a little dumber as we as we run these things, just about what to do, how to how to set those expectations up front. Yeah. And that way we're not ⁓ we're not shooting ourselves in the foot by the time we get there. That's good. Yeah, I think ⁓ and ⁓ I think a good way, like you and you've all said this, like the training is you're preparing yourself. So you're not gonna be ⁓ not to mess up words here, but you're not gonna be perfect in the beginning. You know what I mean? Like it's gonna be progress, right? You're gonna hit problems, and that's a great thing. Because it's great to deal with a problem at home 20 weeks before marathon than dealing with it there. So like we're we're we're not there yet, right? We're gonna get there. ⁓ and I think that's what training is for. So yeah, y'all y'all are per you all said it perfectly. ⁓ it seems like some people take on dopey maybe before they're ready, probably because of peer pressure or FOMO. What are some reasons that you guys have that would be like a reason not to do Dopey? Yeah. Not to do the Dopey challenge. I my I Feel like I talk to a lot of people where Dopey is also their first full marathon. And to me, that would make you hate the whole experience at the end of it. I feel like your first first full marathon is hard mentally, but you have that experience and you know it's so so much different mental game than even a half is. ⁓ that I couldn't imagine that being my first full at the end of three days in exhaustion. Like I feel like you're setting yourself up to be miserable. And like we're miserable running dopey, but it's in a fun, miserable sort of way, as opposed to ⁓ I'm never doing this again. This was horrible, or like really injuring yourself physically or mentally at the end of all that. I think if you're preparing isn't just the training, it's also the mental game of what it takes to get through it. It is without a doubt the worst half marathon you will ever run. There is nothing worse than day three for me. I hate the half marathon morning. You're not even halfway through your miles. You start doing dopey math where you're like, okay, wait. So if I finish three races, I still have 10 more miles tomorrow to get to the halfway mark here, even though I've woken up three times. Like the mental part of it, like Amelia said, is just such a horrible thing sometimes to overcome that you really want to make sure that that's something on morning three of waking up at two o'clock that you can handle. And then do it again tomorrow too with the most mileage that you're gonna run the entire time. And if you're competitive, the the the mental effect of somebody who's fresh starting that race and you're two or three days in and you're you're kind of if it's your first time, we've kind of learned to kind of understand like it's it's no longer like emotional, someone's gonna pass you, or like, okay, whatever. But if you're really competitive and you see a fresh set of legs going past you. you can't catch up because you've been running already. That's a huge mental suck. Yeah. Right. Like everybody knows about getting past when you're racing and how much people by someone dressed in a full costume and tutu and tiara and light up wings. Like that's hard. And they're like, ⁓ this is wonderful. Yeah. And we're like, ⁓ God, you know, five o'clock shadow. The other thing I was going to say too is financial. Like this is overlooked a lot, but Dopey's really expensive. It's like $900 now. Yeah. So you take that. Then you take having to h spend more days at Disney resorts, which aren't cheap, right across the board. And all of a sudden you're going, like, did I spend so much money to get this medal, a series of medals, which is no, you know, like can congratulations for anyone who wants to do it. I would never dissuade anybody, but I would ask the questions. Yeah. Like, are you sure you're ready for this? There's a there's a lot to take into consideration. There's mental, there's obviously the physical, and then there's the financial. Which ⁓ which, you know, ⁓ I think all of us ⁓ sacrifice in some capacity throughout the rest of the year to make sure that we can do this. Like our kids' college funds, right? Like throughout the sure what's that? Yeah. My kids better get their D1 scholarship. Yeah, that's right. They're they're screwed. Well, I appreciate you guys saying all that because I think we all see on TikTok, you know, like someone's like, I'm doing the Dopey Challenge, come with me. And they just show like all the positive signs of doing the dopey challenge, right? And it's like, you know, and you get six medals, and it's like Yeah, you get six medals, but though there's a lot of cost, financial, emotional, physical. And so thank you all for sharing some of that. It's funny you mentioned that because and I know this is going to come up later, but I think we've all noticed that Run Disney has gotten way more social than it's ever been before. It's been very, it's it's very much more like they're way more costumes than I've ever seen before. It's much more of like, yeah, the the the influencers' guide to Run Disney. And sometimes you watch some of these things and you're like, ⁓ my God, they have no idea what they're talking about. Like these people are. Not not everybody. Some are very good. Then I want to be clear about that. But some are very much like, yeah, I I get up and I'm fresh faced and I run Adobe Challenge. And that sets the wrong precedent. And so I think obviously I put out YouTube videos too, so I want to be careful about this, but but the stuff that you want to make sure is this the stuff you're paying attention to has some substance to it. And it's not the flash and glitter and all that. I mean, that comes. Yeah. But that's not just the I mean, that is like this much to this much of It makes it look really fun and easy when these people are dancing in front of every mile marker and it's within a two-minute clip and they look great because but you don't see them dying between each mile marker and then they're like, Okay, let's make this video, put on their happy faces and dance in front of the mile markers. No. But they see us behind them. Yeah, yeah. Here we are. Or after they get that shot and then they put their phone away and immediately Immediately their face drops. Right, right. And they look at the potion they're running with and like, ⁓ my gosh, I'm gonna die. You know? Or they're walking to be tweeting and pull their camera out to run for the 30 seconds that you see them and then put their camera away again. And I I'm I think it's great that the community is getting so big and more people are experiencing it. And I love the energy of it, right? But I want to set real expectations, right? Justin, you were setting saying that earlier. It's like I want people to understand, like, this is totally worth it, worth the accomplishment. I think it's worth the financial investment, right? But not if you're trying to go get more Instagram content, right? Like you need to do this for something bigger than that, in my personal opinion. And cancel me if if if you feel like that, I I cross the line, you know? In fact, I would ask people who are saying I really want to do Dopey. I would ask them, okay, remove Disney World, remove the fanfare, remove all that stuff. Would you get up in your local town, run four races back to back to back to back? Right. Then now there is this kind of incentive of of all the magic you get. And I think that Does play a big part in people getting across the finish line. Of course. But but it's not to a degree to which the physicalness of this event, like it that can't carry you all the way across. So if someone can say, Yes, I will get up four times and I will do this at home, running down the sidewalk of my local town or all that, then I then I think a lot of people are ready to do it. Which we did COVID year for a perfect. I ran almost all 48.6 miles on my treadmill and it was horrible. But Like it was COVID year. It was canceled. So it was that they did it virtually. And I they I think they granted people not like perfect status even if they didn't do that. But to me, I'm like, I'm not perfect if I don't do it. So I'm like after 30 something miles on my treadmill, it was a s of snowstorm outside. So I wasn't gonna go do it outside. I was like, this is horrible, but I'm gonna get it done. But I don't like that's a question you ask yourself. Like Again, like if you remove Disney World, is this something you still want to accomplish because you feel like you want to accomplish it, as opposed to the glitz and glamour and the magic of the of the whole thing? Cause that won't again, that won't carry you 48.6 miles. No, and day four is brutal. Okay. Well, that was sort of the question I was trying to remember. Like Matt, you said like the half marathon day is hard. In my mind, because I've n clearly never done this, like I would imagine that it gets worse like as each subsequent day goes on. Is that true? Or like is the half marathon day bad and then it like and then you like a bounce back of energy for marathon day? Justin knows that I love half marathon day. ⁓ total opposite. See, I it's the worst. Like the 5K, the 10K are great. It's a nice little early morning. 5K is great. You finish up, go back to your hotel, you can still even get a little sleep sometimes. But once you hit the half marathon morning for me, it's like my energy is just shot and it's like least with the marathon, it's the last time waking up. So I kind of feel that little bit of boost from it. And I just want to get it done. Just give me the twenty-six miles and let me just, you know, get my medal and I'm finished. Okay. For the marathon, but it's tricky because to Matt's point, you get the boost in the morning. And so from like mile one to six, like, you know, you're you're kind of getting through it. The stiffness is starting to leave your legs a little bit. And then like seven to twenty one or twenty-two is like just the march of death. Like nothing for me at least can carry me. And I'm just like looking at my watch and I'm like, okay, if I if I do a 10 minute, then I I'll be here. Like when you start doing the math and the miles in your head, like the game's over. But when you get to like 23, what I at least for me personally is you start to think about like, ⁓ I did it again. I'm starting to think about like the the gospel choir at the end of the race that's that sings to you. So you start to kind of get a a little more, at least for me, I get emotional during that time. Obviously, I just run all these miles. So I'm like a cry fest. ⁓ because my body's like, you're going through all this stuff. But ⁓ so it's I think it's waves. I don't think it's a specific race. I think it's because we look at it at 48.6. So I don't think we look at it as like 3.1, 6.2, 13.1. At least I don't. And so you kind of as you're doing the math, I think there are there are waves throughout it. ⁓ we look at it as a as a long race of 48.6 miles. And there are bits and bobs and pockets within it where you go, just let an airplane fall from the sky and just land on. Like, why can't that happen? And so the times you're like, I don't want this to end. I literally don't want this to end. A half marathon is my favorite distance. I love it. And I don't know what it is about half marathon morning. I think it's because I know the distance, I know the course, I know what to expect. And as long as like the weather's not viserable or anything, knock on wood, ⁓ I'm like jazzed, I'm dancing to the music, I'm singing along. I don't know why the third morning isn't as bad for me. Like morning two and morning four for me are the toughest to drag out of bed. And so, like this last year, I think most of the years, I'm like in Justin's face dancing and he like literally looks like he's gonna punch me in the face. Like he puts in his hair paws and just sits there staring at me like, you need to shut up right now. And I'm like, I just feel like it's really fun to dance my way through that one. And it tends not to be as painful because I know what to expect. the morning of the full marathon I have been knows known to doze off in the corrals, like it's that morning is tough. ⁓ but I also like I know to go get it done. Like I know I can kind of break it down into getting through Magic Kingdom that span from the parking lot out past the sanitation plant that smells god awful and over to Animal Kingdom. ⁓ that part is the march of death for me. And then from then on, well, and now there's like the span out to Blizzard Beach and all that. But it's like I know what to expect and I know mentally, like I'll just start singing to myself or singing along with the music. ⁓ people watching helps keep me going. But yeah, I think morning. Two getting up for the 10K and morning four getting up for the half or the full. I don't think it's the distance so much as the lack of sleep though. Yeah. Have any of y'all ever been injured during dopey training? Like I imagine doing it all these years, you would at some point have to have an injury. Yeah. I think it all gives. Yeah. Yeah. And you just like power through? Yes. I'm like, I luckily I haven't been injured enough where I'm like out on crutches, knock on wood or anything like that. But I have I have, you know. The IT band one year. This year I had an SI joint issue. I'm still suffering through things like that. Yeah. 2013. This is the goofy, so it was pre-dopey, but my at mile six of the marathon, my calcaneo bone broke. ⁓ Holy shit. So my my Achilles and my calcanes snapped or they pulled in different directions and it created a a ⁓ quarter inch ⁓ stress fracture up my heel at mile six. And so I got to mile nine and I was like, I'm done. And they're like, well, it's gonna like three hours until the sag wagon can come get you. And I was like, what else can I do? And they're like, I'm like, can I walk back? And they said, No, this was right as you were getting into Bear Island Road. Yeah. So the the first aid person put a maxi pad in my shoe and I walked the marathon. I walked the rest. ⁓ and then gosh, then got on a flane for Boston for a job interview that night. It was the worst pain I ever felt in my life. One of my pictures, it shows that the the you know, the this the photo pass or whatever it was back then, I don't have photos, and I'm just absolutely bawling. with like a huge ace bandage around my ⁓ my gosh terrible but it's like ⁓ and they're like why are you why did you finish it I'm like I already bought the I did a t-shirt That's funny. ⁓ my gosh. Yeah. Okay. But Matt, you just got hurt right? Like two years ago? A couple of years ago, yeah. I I had a run in with a lawnmower ⁓ right in the middle of dopey training right in June. And ⁓ my foot got caught up underneath it and I thought I was like, ⁓ my God. The first thought that went through my mind is, ⁓ my God, I wasted all this money. Like I'm not gonna be able to run now. Yeah. But ⁓ Did you think, ⁓ no, my perfect status? Like that would have been my thought. Yeah we all do. Yeah. Everybody does. Yeah, like every time we get I'm like, can I still run? Like, right? Yeah. Okay. I am gonna get back on track. Sorry. I just I didn't want to forget all these questions that have. Okay. So what have you learned about yourself from all these years of training for so many miles? It's just resil I mean, resilience is big. It's it's It's expectations and resilience. It's like you know what you're going into it. Like you you there's there's a formalness to it. You you run four days specific miles, like that's the given. ⁓ unless there's weather. But to Matt's point earlier too, it's like things change all the time. And if you stay so rigid to what you expect it's gonna be, you're gonna have an absolutely awful, awful time. So it's trying to figure out like how you can be resilient in the face of adversity or the face of something you just didn't expect. Right. You gotta keep keep ⁓ keep that your wits about you with that, otherwise it it just doesn't it's just not fun. Right. I've learned that I can operate on very little sleep, like I can do which has played a part in like my whole life too. like the that I can do really hard things and I don't need as much sleep as I should have in order to do them and still If we're calling it thriving in that situation, I can still thrive because I'm done and finished and I'm upright and with a smile on my face at the end. So Yeah. I've learned that there's some very creative ways to cure boredom because I do all of my training miles on the treadmill and ⁓ it's a lot of miles on the treadmill. So there's a lot of different ways to try and overcome that boredom. And ⁓ thankfully like Disney Plus is a great place to go on YouTube. Wow. And ⁓ it's it's it's a long time spent. running there, but the payoff is totally worth it. I mean, having that at the end and knowing that that's getting there for ya. That's being in Disney World, there's nothing better. I've back to Matt's point, I've I do most of my miles on my treadmill also and I could re I've learned that I can read my Kindle very easily on my treadmill. I have like a little shelf and that's impressive. Books are a lot harder 'cause like I almost fall when I'm going to turn the page sometimes, but my Kindle I can easily read on the treadmill. And I finished over a hundred books the last couple of years while training on the treadmill. What's up with this? Is this a weather situation or a safety situation or what? Like what preference or part partially weather. ⁓ my husband was sick for a long time, so I needed to be home and training on the treadmill was made sense. ⁓ same with my daughter. And it's yeah, I think between winter and like our summers are really hot and our winters are really cold. So Matt, do you just enjoy it or what's up? Why why why the treadmill so much? ⁓ I like need that extra push. keep me going to try and keep my pace where I wanted to be. I I am miserably bored if oddly enough, if I'm off the treadmill ⁓ and I try and run just on roads and stuff. I can't focus and my pace just falls apart. So I needed to kind of help keep me where I want to be when I'm training. Didn't you also run a full marathon in your backyard though? Like wasn't that something that you did? I like speaking of boredom like I did. I did the New York City marathon, the virtual in my yard. I ran it I think it was 200 and something laps around my yard. ⁓ my gosh. It's insane. That's awesome. ⁓ okay, so any race day advice. We talked training advice earlier. Any race day advice, and this can be like super, you know, not that deep if you don't want it to be, but you know, like bring my lard, like like whatever it is. Like, what's your training advice specific to dopey? Not training, ⁓ race day advice specific to dopey. If here's your first time, do this. Pack for everything. With when you're there for four days and you're packing ahead of time for the four days. Florida weather, like you can look at your weather forecast and it'll be completely different. And it's happened to us yeah. Pack everything. Pack for rain, pack for sun, pack bylaws, pack gloves, ⁓ pack ch different options of clothes. ⁓ my also biggest thing, because I've been doing this since my daughter was a baby and now she's sixteen, is prepare, like set expectations with your family for what your race day in time looks like. Cause like when they were little and they she wanted to go in the parks and like It's exhausting. So if you're coming with your family or if you're coming with friends, discuss ahead of time what your sleep looks like, what your food looks like, how much you need to be off your feet. I'm completely guilty of being in the parks way too long on my feet in between. But if you're new to this, I would recommend being off of your feet for a good quality of time. Perfect. Don't let other people dictate your race. And this is also something that I've kind of started to believe myself when I say it is that. If you're new to this and any one Disney race and it like Disney puts on a show, that's what they do. They're not a race organizer, they're sh they're an entertainer. Yeah. So there's fireworks going off and and and and characters and all this stuff, and you get really artificially worked up. Yeah. And that's gonna lead to you just taking out of the gate as fast as possible. Everyone does like every year we see it happen, and every year we pass the people who go out way too fast. If you don't stick to your training and you set the expectation, you don't move to the right and let the the people. go to the left who are who are over excited, it's going to have a negative effect on your race and ultimately negative expect on your total weekend. Like nobody races each other. They race the course. They race themselves and they race the course. Sure. And so people are going to pass you and you're going to pass people. It's about maintaining discipline and saying like, well, I'm supposed to be running an eight minute mile and I'm running a 650. How is this happening? And or something to that, or I'm running a 15-minute mile and I'm supposed to be running a 13-minute mile because I'm stopping too much for characters. Yeah. You gotta just make sure you're weighing in what you really want to achieve versus what everyone else is trying to do. Everyone else has their own agenda. Yeah, Eric and I are big on ⁓ what's the what's my why, right? Or we've also done like where we set a word for the race, right? Like, and so we just try and filter decisions through that, right? And so if this race is for fun, this race is only for fun. Why am I skipping my walk intervals? You know what I mean? It's great. ⁓ and so we really try to try to do that. Because, like you just said, all of a sudden you go out of the gate, everybody's running, nobody's walking. You get totally caught up in it. Or if, you know, we've gone for time before, yeah, right. And there's a character I really wanted to see. I totally regret not stopping, but I got the time that I wanted because that race was for that. So I totally agree. Like, you know, rem remember why you're doing what you're doing. Matt, any race day advice for first-time dopey? One thing I would be really careful for people is ⁓ the food and nutrition during the time that you're running because ⁓ Disney food is not like your food at home. ⁓ you know I mean you gotta be real careful by I mean maybe it is maybe I eat turkey legs all the time exactly yeah I I mean it's just it's ⁓ something a lot of people I feel like don't think about as much. ⁓ you know you're you're getting theme park food and If you're not careful of what you're eating, like if you're doing chicken tenders every night back at your hotel, that's gonna come back to you at probably the worst time possible. ⁓ you know, so ⁓ you're stuck in that Disney bubble a lot of times. ⁓ so you gotta be careful about, you know, what you're taking in and putting in your body for fuel because you know, you wanna make sure that you've got the right fuel behind you to last you over the four days, because by that last day, I mean your body's gonna be doing all kinds of things that you know it's not typically used to. And so you want to make sure that it's it's got the right food behind it. So you talked food, which is a big thing on this. We talked cost earlier, which is going to be a big thing on the next question. Family is going to be a big thing on the next question. ⁓ I know there is no such thing as a perfect answer to this one, but what's your go to resort, right, on property that you're like, this works for me. Right. And and doing dope, and I'm thinking dopey weekend or you marathon weekend. ⁓ We found the ones that work for us and they're not everybody's favor, right? But lots of food options doesn't break the bank. Cause you could spend $200 a night or you could spend $900 a night. You know what I mean? Like you could and wildly whatever. And then how busy is that resort? What food options are there? Like it it it's so hard to make a good call. What's your go-to for your needs? Anybody want to share? What's interesting is I think we all have a different one too, completely. Go ahead, yeah. Yeah. For me, I have a large Family of there's six of us, and we usually always come together down there. So we usually pick the cabins at Fort Wilderness if we can get it. it helps as far as having enough space. ⁓ it's great for having a full kitchen and being able to, you know, go back to the food thing, have your own food and be able to get food from off property. We usually rent a car, so we'll go and we'll pick up groceries and that way I know I'm covered there. And it's nice and quiet too. You don't have like Doors slamming or people running through the hallways, kids coming back after fireworks, loaded up with Mickey bars. ⁓ you know, it's you can get that good night's sleep. ⁓ and that way, you know, you're taken care of for something like that. Yeah, that's great. For me, it's ⁓ so I now travel alone, ⁓ because it's just like I treat it as a braces versus a vacation. And so there's sometimes I don't even go to the parks. But when you see my family and I, we would do like wilderness lodge because It's my favorite resort. It's quiet. It's tucked away. Like I know it's a hassle to get to the parks, but I think that's why people tend to shy away from it. So and there's great food. Yeah. And the the bar out in the back's really good. I maybe the last six years, or since I've been going alone, is been ⁓ Port Orleans. Yeah. And it's kind of the same reason. It's a cheaper version. I think the access is a little tricky. So people kind of shy away from it. ⁓ I I agree, Matt, it kind of sucks when people are running through the hall, the the kind of the out Door hallways and slamming doors. But ⁓ for me, it's just nice because even in the morning, it's so quiet. I get up and I run around to to warm up a little bit, or when I get home and I ⁓ from the race and I warm down and I'll run around that a little bit. And so it's just a very easy low cost or lower cost ⁓ option for me. ⁓ when my husband and daughter would come with me back in the day, rooms were also a lot cheaper than like you could get the DVC. Like a one bedroom at Boardwalk that had a washer and dryer, which was nice for ⁓ for marathon week with four races and a kitchen so I could go grocery shopping and have food. And that room would be like two fifty nine a night, and that doesn't cost anymore. I know. So though I don't think you could stay at All Stars for two fifty nine a night anymore. I like so ⁓ I still now in the last few years, my daughter who is now sixteen but has been twelve, thirteen, fourteen, and she's come with me sometimes by herself with me. ⁓ And so we do still boardwalk yacht club, beach club, because we can walk into Epcot, but that way she can come out of the room and see me at mile twenty, three, four, depending on what the course is there. And then I also like not having to get on the bus right after the marathon. I like the walk back to the resort as kind of a shake out for my legs and everything. Yeah. ⁓ also it's a good place to walk through Epcot and get food when I'm hungry after the marathon and get back to the resort there. Yeah. You're hungry after the marathon? I'm I'm never hungry after the marathon. I'm good for now. You know? We just spend the last 10 miles talking about food. I think. Yeah, so do we. We're like Viennapoly. Let's go get the pizza. Let's go do this. And you brought something that we should probably talk about if we haven't yet is the buses. So when you ⁓ if you're not at an Epcot resort and you finish the races, you do have to get on buses to go back to your hotel. And some will do multiple stops. But the thing that stinks is that the buses won't leave until they're full. So if you finish early or you're on a bus where there's only a couple of runners hanging out, you're gonna have to wait until that bus fills up for the most part. Or this year, the 5K, we couldn't even leave because the 5K was still going off. Of course, cross corrals are still going off. But so we we had to wait like 45 minutes, even till all the corrals went off. And so if that happens and you're running the dopey, you stiffen up fast. So if you don't have to get on the bus right away, hang out by the bus, stretch out, like move your knees, move your legs. ⁓ obviously don't lose your like don't let the bus go by. And you're like, ⁓ whoops. But if you can hang out by the front of the bus, instead of sitting in the bus and just letting your your body stiffen up, you're gonna be much better positioned for the next day. Yeah, I'm interested to see now that they've expanded the five K and we're gonna experience you know, see what that happened, how that happens, what that means for leaving. You know? That's what I imagine the course can't cross the bus route. I I don't know how that will happen, but it yeah. Right. Yeah. Well, it was done. Matt, I think you were with me. I we didn't run together, but I think I finished in like twenty-four, I think something and or twenty-three something. And then we were all just they're like, they wouldn't even open the bus because they're like corral, whatever is going off. Listen, Corral A problems, we don't want to hear it. We're we don't want to hear it. Yeah. Well, it's not my usual 18, you know, whatever. ⁓ But I'm just saying it it doesn't it doesn't matter if you're if you finish in the front, if you also finish at a time where a new bus shows up and you're one of the first, right? So we've had that. Everyone run your own pace. All right. Yes. That's not we got on a bus. It was, you know, like the bu bus filled up and the next one pulled up. Do you remember this Erica? We got on and someone, their intestines had exploded in the bathroom in the back. And we sat on that bus just waiting for it to fill up. And I almost got off the bus because I'm like, but I also w I was really done. It was after the marathon. All I wanted to do was go home. And we just sat for for 15 minutes waiting for them to fill this bus. And it smelled awful. ⁓ it's terrible. ⁓ Fun times. So take Amelia's advice. Make sure we have a park pass and just walk through Epcot and walk right over to the boardwalk. Yes. Awesome. We got a couple more questions for y'all. Thanks for giving us so much time today. Yeah. ⁓ Adobe merch seems to be the fastest selling item at the expo every year. is the merch a priority for y'all? If yes, why? If not, how come? I'm not gonna I'm gonna let someone else answer this. I'm not no merch for me. Not It was never really a high priority back in the day. It wasn't a sellout thing like it is now. ⁓ to be honest, I haven't loved the looks of merced to the merch. So there's been years where I haven't even gone into the merch building. Yeah. So ⁓ the little pin that looks like the metal, I tend to like those, but I think you could pre order that now mostly. So cool. I think that's it for me. Yeah, I I tend to shy away from the merch. I I won't even go near that building during the expous? I'm not even bothering with the virtual cube. I also with Dopey though, you get six shirts. So like just getting those six race shirts home that I'm like, do I really need to go get Lorna Stas? Right. Yeah. But this brings up a ⁓ go ahead. Go ahead. No, AJ, please. Well, I'm wondering if this is like a first-time Dopey person or whatever. Like it's a big deal, right? You guys are now going on number 14, where it's like, yeah, you know, I've done this now, right? Like you don't necessarily need to wear all the stuff at home or whatever. I'm I'm wondering if that's Part of the craziness or not? I don't know. ⁓ what were you gonna say, Justin? I ⁓ so one of my tips that I always say is like, don't pack a ton of stuff because you get these six race shirts and then you can just wear the shirts after you run the race. So I purposely don't pack enough. This year, I get back to my room, I put on my shirt, it's incredibly tight, and I text ⁓ I'm like, Does this look tight to you? And she's like, ⁓ my god. They gave me women's women's. Yes. And so it was cut. The way it was cut, and I was like, I mean, I felt beautiful. That's really good. But I did I was popping out of these shirts and I didn't even need other shirt. So then I had to go all in to get like a gift. Shorts and then figures he'll wear the six shirts. Right, right. And that's like a big tip. So every year I say that I'm like, don't pack a bunch of stuff because you're gonna get all these shirts. And this year I was like, ⁓ my god. And they're like, you V cut. Yeah, yeah, like that V cut. Yeah. Yeah. It's and so I ended up not keeping the shirts. ⁓ and I was like, ⁓ do as you know, do as I say, not as I do. Yeah. But you went back to the expo and they couldn't They couldn't exchange them for you. Like it was they didn't have any, like it was a problem. Yeah. So I was like, ⁓ yeah. She's like, Maybe you can trade someone. I'm Yeah, I'm gonna stand on a street corner. I'm like, What's in shirts? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've got six. Anybody need six? Yeah, got it. Yeah, only worn twice. Yeah. ⁓ and I will tell you why. ⁓ my gosh. But anyway, so for this year, it's not only don't pack a lot of shirts, but when you do get your shirts, make sure you check their size. Yeah, yeah, totally. Well. ⁓ two things on on merch stuff or whatever. One, we tell people it's not gonna change your life, right? Like it's wonderful to have. I love my marathon shirts. I don't wear them a ton. I love that I have them right. But like the, you know, I didn't get whatever the specialty jacket thing or whatever was that week. I wanted it, you know, but but it doesn't change my life. And then there's other times I get the thing that I really thought was gonna change my life and it didn't. You know what I mean? It's just sitting in a closet, you know. So we tell people to relax. And then Erica, and I wanted to call this out. She's wearing I was gonna call it out too. You are. And you wanna tell the story? De ⁓ Devon from ⁓ Zippity D Ts did this to us. Yeah, so she sent us this because she wants us to do dopey. We've never done it. We've never done it. And I won't I won't wear a shirt for like a race that I haven't completed. And so I've had it and I'm like, Devon, like maybe in the future, not this year. And you know. And so anyway, when when I Realize were recording with y'all today. I'm like, perfect. I can wear my dopey sweatshirt. But yeah, this is her like subliminal way of ⁓ trying to get Subliminal, not so subliminal. Yes, yes, to ⁓ get us to register. So we'll see. ⁓ okay, so we need to encourage ⁓ some folks, right? And we've talked a lot about dopey, but I actually want to encourage the not dopeies, right? So what word or what could you say to someone who is maybe feeling some FOMO or or ⁓ whatever because they're doing just Marathon this year, right? Or maybe just the 10K, right? They're still all hard, right? But a lot of times, and I've I'm totally caught. I this happens to me. I'm caught up in like dopey is the thing. It's the impressive thing. What how would you encourage our friends that are training for a marathon, you marathon weekend race, but it's not the dopey challenge? I feel like they actually get to enjoy it. And I'm not that I don't enjoy the marathon, but by that point, it's more of the mental, the mental game of like, okay, five miles to this. Like I need just need to get through this. When you're Doing the marathon, you get to go run through all parks. It's all new. Like the first half of the marathon course is the course we ran for the half the day before. So that's kind of just a rerun. Like it's all going to be fresh and new and fun. And you don't have the rerun playing in your head of the rest of the weekend. And you're probably smarter because you're not going to have less chance of injuring yourself. You get to enjoy it. You can go out and spectate the other races if you want and cheer people on, which I always think is also really fulfilling. Like after a race ends, if you go out and watch a little bit of the people that gets you psyched up more for the race that you're running. ⁓ I think the marathon is such a fun course to get a run through all four parks that and you'll can actually enjoy all four parks at that point. That's really good. Thank you. ⁓ like it that's been such a thing for so long that the whole just, like the just thing, but I feel like that's going away now a bit because. There's such a competitive factor with getting into the races as it is that it's like I got into one and that's an accomplishment onto itself that that just is kind of going away now, thankfully. Good or bad as it may be. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. We just touched on the fact that it's been really hard to get into these races lately. Do you guys have any suggestions on other races or destinations that you've done that you'd recommend for people who might be looking to try something else this season or maybe next season? I would always recommend. Cape Cod for a marathon. It is such a great marathon to go to. ⁓ it's in October, so it the weather is usually very nice for it. It's beautiful scenery, running along the beach. It's not very crowded up there. ⁓ I've done it a couple of times and absolutely loved it when I've done it. Can you stay in Boston or like what's the best if you're gonna do that? If you're not from there, what's the like, you know, because it's probably expensive to stay ⁓ you know, out on the on the Cape, right? It's A little bit, but because it's the off season, the prices tend to be a little bit more reasonable. ⁓ so there's loads of ⁓ you know, you get Airbnbs, but there's a lot of hotels that are near where the race is now 'cause it's kind of in a a more city ish area. ⁓ in Hyenis there is like a central point that you can get to. Cool. ⁓ so it's not terrible. And they also have their own version of the Goofy Challenge there. They have the clam chowder challenge, which is you get the half marathon and full marathon there, which is kinda cool. That's fun. For me, my my favorite reason was Chicago Marathon. I love it. I've been running it the last eleven years. But the city of Chicago is like, no, no, no, no. Like ⁓ people come out and they're like six rows deep. People bring like grills. You know, it's like going to like a Packers game or a Bears game where everyone's cheering you're on. But if you can't get into like a a ⁓ lottery, like yeah, yeah, yeah, right. Yeah. I would say coming out to the Pacific Northwest, so run Super Series is the race I just ran yesterday, the super hayek. And then they also have Ancient Lakes, which is a ⁓ an ultra, but you're running in the mountains and it's it's a it's a gradual downhill. So it's like the it's like the 22nd fastest course in the United States. And like every almost everybody BQ'd yesterday. ⁓ I'm nowhere near anything. I just ran a half. But if you want to come out, just enjoy the mountains and the forest, and it's just like you're just really one with nature. And it's not a trail marathon, it's like half marathon, it's a Honestly, God, half marathon. It's just set aside. So I would maybe think about coming out to Seattle, trying one of the races out there. Awesome. Amelia, any races you'd recommend that are not Disney ⁓ for folks that just, you know, they they just can't get in. Gosh, there's a lot of races I really enjoy. I feel like as far as a marathon goes, if you can't get into the majors, the LA marathon's a lot of fun because the crowds and the spectators are really great out there. Like I've ran Chicago three times, I ran New York twice, and those are great, but they're really hard to get in now. And LA Marathon is a good option if you can't get in because it's in a big city. You've got the landmarks, but the crowd support in the different neighborhoods is fantastic on that one. Yeah. And the r like if you're looking for a downhill, all the revel races tend to be in beautiful locations, tend to be in the mountains, and those tend to be fast too. Your legs are a little shot after it, but those are a lot of fun. Excellent. Thank you all for joining us on the podcast. Where can we aircraft? Wait, well, before I ask this last one, do you have any other dopey questions while we have a like a dedicated dopey crew sitting in front of us? I think we answered them all. I think we did too. ⁓ where can we find you all? And Justin, I know I've seen you on YouTube. Matt, we talked a little bit before, but I want you to rehash for ⁓ people who are new, you know, to to our podcast since you've been on. Can you all tell us where to find find you online if they care to follow your journeys and what you're doing? ⁓ would you guys be willing to share? ⁓ I do do YouTube once in a while. They're they're sporadic. I I'm not a content creator. I'm not anything like that. I just feel if I want to film something, I will. It's related to running. ⁓ actually ⁓ and I just did something that we're gonna put out soon. But ⁓ you can find me always running forward on YouTube. But then my local Instagram's just on Justin underscore stone twenty-four. Okay, it's what can we expect if we follow that? Or is it running content? Yeah, it's me in a shower. It's Well, this just took a weird turn. Yeah. Just different shots. Yeah. It's really ⁓ yeah. You people actually pay for me to turn it off. I'm sure they do. Sure they do. ⁓ yeah, for me, I I do I tend around like around November and December. I I will analyze the new course for ⁓ for Disney and get out because I do like I I do want people to participate in it, but I want folks to feel like they my point earlier, a lot of people are like, Look at I'm running through the castle, and then everyone thinks it's it's all fun and glory. And there's a list lot of preparation. So I try and be the dad, I guess. Yeah. So I want to make sure everyone's just prepared and the expectations are set. So that's where you can find me. Always running forward on YouTube. Awesome. Thank you. I'm ⁓ half crazy mama on across social platforms. Mama is spelled M-A-M-A. Apparently, there's a lot of ways to spell mama these days. ⁓ Justin and I actually before this last marathon weekend, we did a 48.6 tips. So there's a lot of tips that we've listed on there. It's four different videos. I'm primarily on Instagram, also on TikTok. And I also have a website that used to be called a blog back in the day where it's half crazy mama.com. We have to get the outtakes out. I think the outtakes were the best part of that. And I know you didn't like a few of them. She's shaking her head now. Okay. Matt, can you remind us ⁓ what you're doing over at Team Run Diz? All right. So we are on Instagram at Team Run Diz. we're also teamrundiz.com. You can find the Run Disney Alerts. You can find our charity tracker, which Gives ⁓ live updates as to what's available for charity registrations for Run Disney. We now also have charity alerts that work through Telegram and Discord that'll let you know when new openings come up for charities, since that has now become just as hot of a place to go. they're just as popular now since the Run Dis alerts really aren't going off as much anymore. so that's become the new go to. ⁓ we also have the training programs for the Run Disney training program. On there, ⁓ we have a tool that will let you just select which weekend you are running and it will give you that day's training right there. You can scan ahead and go backwards. We also have downloadable versions that you can put right onto your device as well. Yeah, that's perfect. Yeah, that's such a good resource. Matt, when I first met you, it was like one thing you were doing, and now you like this whole like ecosystem building. This is like an organization. I'm always like, How does he figure this all out? That's amazing. I was like, dude, okay, awesome. This was super fun. We really appreciate you talking. Dopey step. Telling us the honest truth on some things, giving us reasons we'd want to do it, reasons we'd not want to do it, you know, setting our expectations, you know, properly and all that stuff. So thank you all for giving us so much time and joining us on the podcast. We really appreciate y'all y'all. Thank you. No, of course. Thanks for having us. Erica, I love having guests on the podcast, especially when the guests ⁓ are just like totally willing to share. Yeah. They're open-handed with all their information, whatever, and they're just like authentic. Yeah. Right. Like they're just, yeah, no ego, no whatever. Here's what I've learned. Here's what you know. And I love the part where they just said, here's our reason not to do dopey. Yeah. Like that's honest discussion. They love it. They've done it 13 times, but they're still, yeah, no, this is expensive. You know, make sure your expectations are good. I just love. Good open, honest conversation. So to Matt, Amelia, and Justin, thank you all for joining us on the podcast. Y'all are a big deal because you've been doing this so long. Yeah. And ⁓ and we just appreciate you being on the podcast. Erica, we like to kind of every once in a while share training updates. Do you have any training updates? I have one, ⁓ you know, just a little comment or whatever. But you have any training updates or anything you have been dealing with medical stuff? Yes. Anything, any updates or anything you want to share? Sure. So I think I shared this last week, but I did discover that. The nagging hip injury that I've had since last October was indeed a torn labrum. So I ⁓ am not actually supposed to run his exact words were like, Don't train for a marathon. Did he know that you were training for a marathon? He did not. You just like general statement, like, okay. Yeah. He was like, Well, I mean, you could do like a light jog, but like don't train for a marathon. Yeah. ⁓ for like a month. And you're like, ⁓ excuse me, my training starts on July third. Actually, yeah. So ⁓ So just trying to do some walking these days and all of course all my physical therapy exercises. But I am looking forward to running again. Yeah. So we have the Peachtree Road Race coming up. Yes. What's your plan for that? Because the four weeks, whatever he said, don't run. This falls within that onto the day that we are supposed to do that race. Yeah, right. So ⁓ obviously we've said we do this race for fun. Right, yeah. Right. We don't do it for time or, you know, a time qualifier or anything. What's what are you thinking we're gonna do for the peach tree? Mm I'm thinking that I'm probably still gonna want to run for like the first three miles and then maybe I'll have to walk the last half. Maybe we should run walk like the first mile and then walk. I feel like more than a mile. Think so? Yeah. I mean I am pretty stubborn. So you are. I just want I want I want marathon to be awesome for you. ⁓ yeah, for sure, for sure, for sure. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. We got we got nothing to prove on this one. No. It's for fun. It is. It is for fun. So we've got that coming up. Yeah. How's your training going? ⁓ everything's going good. ⁓ I I ⁓ shared this with our our ⁓ Patreon, you know, ⁓ our crew, we call them the crew. And ⁓ I just got on there because I had this bad run. And I haven't had one in a while, but I had one a very long work week that week. Yeah, and ⁓ just exhausted up till 2 30 a.m. the night before, trying to get work stuff done. Had a long run on the schedule, which is five miles, but it was you know supposed to be a long run. Had a magic mile in it. I was exhausted. I was hungry. I I I didn't have to go to the bathroom, but it was like 800 degrees outside and I was dehydrated. Like it was just all the things compiled, you know, compounded. And I know that you don't evaluate who you are as a runner and all that off of one run. Right. Right. And I would say the same thing to you. Yeah. Like consider all the outside factors. Right. Even if there weren't all the outside factors, one run or a series of runs does not define. Right, right. But it's so hard when it just doesn't go your way. Totally. You know, you just you just feel like, well, it was nice being a runner. You know, and then you just you just think you're done, right? Yeah. So I bring it up to say, I know full well. I knew even when I were chatting with the crew about it, I know that that doesn't define it. I know that next week is gonna be much better when I get some good sleep and all that. I know that. But it's still so hard when you're at mile two and you're like, I'm never gonna make it. Yeah. I'm never gonna should I just quit? Should I just quit now? And then I actually did like you, it's a hard thing where you're trying to decide, do I come up short and just call it because it's not working? Do I persevere? And that, what do you call that? ⁓ discernment is hard thing because there isn't a right answer. Yeah. You know, like necessarily. And so it's so hard to know, you know, AJ, you should have just called it, you know, or AJ, you know, you should, you should push through because you don't quit. Right. You know, and so I I recognize that that's hard. And so I bring it up just to say, hey, training's starting here really soon for Marathon weekend and wine and dine weekend. And you're gonna have them. Right. Like that, I guess is what I'm I'm trying to say. Every run is not gonna be a good run. Don't let it define, yeah, define everything. And I think we've said this before, ⁓ who was it that was ⁓ as fireman Rob said on the podcast when something doesn't go good or whatever, you know, literally just say, Good, great. Yep. You know, now I've learned I've had this experience. I know how to handle this. That's right. Yeah. You know, and so stuff like that's gonna happen. It's not knock on wood, knock, knock, knock. He's having on race day yet. Yeah. But I bet you that happens on a race day one day. Totally. You know, and so anyway, I'm showing myself some grace. I think that's that's the point of the very long story. That's good. I'm showing myself some grace, and you should too. Yes. Perfect. All right. I think that's good for this episode. It was fun talking with the perfect dopeies. Next week is the launch of season three, and that's gonna be so exciting. Erica, we had the continuous. The journey continues. Yes, it does. You're still having fun doing this? Tons of fun. Awesome. ⁓ perfect. Thank you guys for joining us for this episode. There's three easy ways to support us if you ⁓ love what you're what you're hearing. ⁓ follow and subscribe, right? Like that. That's great. That way you can get all the notifications and things. Consider joining our support crew. They get bonus content, they get stuff in the mail, ⁓ early access to stuff. And so if you're enjoying the podcast and you want more, that's a great way to support the show. And of course, leave that Apple Podcast review. That really helps. Other people find the show. Right. So if you're loving it, great. That review really helps somebody know what to expect. And it just pushes it out so that somebody else who's like considering their first half marathon, they're scared to death and they're looking for a podcast. Yeah, your review might be the thing that helps them find the show. So thank you guys for doing all those things and thanks for joining us. We'll catch you next week for another episode of One More Run. Thanks for joining us for this episode of One More Run, the Podcast. If you like what we're up to, be sure to leave a review on Apple Podcasts, subscribe to our YouTube channel, and follow us on Instagram. You can find links to all of that at hmerica.com.