Rise and Run
Rise and Run
144: Traveling the True World Showcase with Lindsey Henry
Get ready to be inspired and entertained as Rob from Glenrock, New Jersey, kicks off our show with his infectious enthusiasm for both the Rise and Run podcast and the New York Mets. Join hosts Bob, Jack, John, Alysha, and Greg as they dive into the latest buzz in their running community. Special guests Brad and Maggie from Magic Bound Travel also join us, shedding light on the festive Halloween events at Disneyland, such as the Oogie Boogie Bash and exclusive room discounts.
Discover the recent tweaks to the Genie+ system and get the inside scoop on our eagerly anticipated April 2026 Cruise. Plus, we discuss how the Springtime Surprise event might fit into your Easter 2026 plans. From park reservations to lightning lanes, our discussion will keep you up-to-date and ready for all things Disney.
Disney enthusiast and Travel Blogger, Lindsey Henry joins us, sharing unique insights and stories that will resonate with any Disney lover. This segment is a delightful mix of personal experiences and useful tips for making the most out of an international Disney visit. Explore Disney parks worldwide with us as we share unique attractions and experiences from Shanghai, Hong Kong, Tokyo, and Paris.
In the Race Report Spotlight we chat with Lucy and Carly as they recount their thrilling journey in the Air Race Classic 2024, flying across nine states.
Tune in for a packed episode brimming with updates, heartwarming stories, and practical travel insights!
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3 am again. Why did I ever think this was a good idea? Welcome to the Rise and Run podcast. Join our group of Run Disney friends. As we talk about running at Walt Disney World and beyond. We'll discuss recent runs, training, upcoming races and surprise topics suggested by you, our listeners. Well, the alarm's gone off, so let's go.
Speaker 4:Hello, this is Rob from Glenrock, New Jersey, at the site of the New York Roadrunners, queen's 10K and the home of your future, although apparently distant future world champion New York Roadrunners, Queens 10K. And the home of your future, although apparently distant future world champion, new York Mets. And you are listening to the Rise and Run podcast Happy running.
Speaker 1:Thank you, rob, thanks for leaving the introduction and Rob, thanks for your help. Rob's one of those guys, friends, who behind the scenes, just quietly, because he kind of loves all this as we do helps us out a lot with the race report, building the race report for us. So, rob, I appreciate your help with that. Uh, as far as that future world series champion thing goes, I did see where the mets have won eight out of ten, but the last it's because it's because of grimace bob is that what it is?
Speaker 1:oh gosh, I don't know. Hey, rob, thanks for doing that. Friends, welcome to episode 144 of the rise and run podcast. Thank you for joining us this week. I'm bob and I am here with Jack.
Speaker 6:Hiya.
Speaker 1:With John hey, how you doing. With Alicia, hello. And with Greg, hey, hey, hey, hey, my friends, great to see you. Glad everyone's here this evening. This week, this week, our guest world traveler, disney fanatic Lindsay, joins us in the Race Report Spotlight Something just a little bit different. No spoilers. Lucy and Carly are here with a bit of a different Race Report Spotlight.
Speaker 7:If you enjoyed the Rise and Run podcast, please share us with your friends and introduce them to the Rise and Run family. We want to share in their Run Disney journey. Please follow us on Facebook at Rise and Run Podcast, instagram at Rise and Run Pod, and check out our YouTube channel Rise and Run Podcast and visit our webpage at riseandrunpodcastcom. If you have a question, comment or race report or want to introduce an upcoming episode, call us at 7, 2, 7, 2, 6, 6, 2, 3, 4, 4, and leave us a recorded message.
Speaker 3:We'd also like to thank our Patreons, whose support helps keep the rise run podcast rising and running. If you'd like to join our Patreon team, please check out patreoncom slash rise and run podcast. Uh, I did some work with the the patreon page this week. I got a a couple of backlogged episodes of our zoom calls in podcast format and you definitely want to check out. Um, this past week's zoom call a lot of fun because we had so many friends, including bob live from the polynesian, waiting in line to get dole whips. So if you're looking for some exclusive on-the-ground Disney content in terms of those Zoom calls, be sure to check that out on our Patreon page.
Speaker 1:Greg, thank you, that was a really nice couple of days. That was a lot of fun with our friends and, yeah, it was a fun Zoom also Friends, the Rise and Run podcast sponsored by our good friends at Magic Bound Travel, and we are pleased to have with us this evening Brad and Maggie. Hi, guys, good to see you. Hi, thanks for having us back.
Speaker 8:So glad to be back home with you all.
Speaker 1:Always a good time. Thanks for joining us. Hey, what's new kids? We've got a lot of things going on. Let's see where should we start. Let's start at Halloween in Disneyland. What's new on that event? The Halloween race in Disneyland.
Speaker 9:So if you're listening to it as soon as it comes out, a lot of us are going to be online trying to get our Oogie Boogie tickets for the September 3rd or the September 10th event night, adding a little extra stay to our racecation at Disneyland. And we're going to try to get the third because we're hopping over to Universal Hollywood.
Speaker 8:This is a first for us. We've actually never done the Oogie Boogie Bash, just personally, so we're excited about experiencing that and we'd love to experience that with other other folks I hope your experiences can be better than uh.
Speaker 9:Disneyland registration was oh, yeah, uh yeah, well it does seem like because we we often will help our booked guests get their oogie Boogie tickets as well. It does seem like every year there's some major crash. Nothing goes right with the system.
Speaker 8:But it's a different system than run Disney's, and so I have a little bit more confidence than what happened previously.
Speaker 9:And so still on the Halloween half, wanting to remind people, we're probably going to have to give some of the rooms back middle of July if we don't have them filled, but we do still have a lot of rooms left in our discounted room block. We've got three hotels that we're contracted with, so Element, which actually has really nice suites, so every single unit there, even if it's just for two people or they've got them up to 10 people, they all have a kitchenette, kitchen, um, and then they also have free breakfast on site, and then we also have cambria yeah, and then cambria hotel, which is really close by, it also has breakfast included and um, and it also has a really awesome little water park for kids.
Speaker 9:So if people are bringing their families cool, come cheer with them and then just kind of swank, um. But actually our most affordable is the Viv and it is just a little bit further of a walk. We've had folks stay there and they said it was maybe 10 minutes from the race start. It stayed there for Disneyland half and extremely affordable. So we still have those and I want to give one last chance for people to take advantage of those before we kind of close out what we haven't used and give those back to the hotels.
Speaker 9:So you all might remember, disneyland is always a little slower. They don't roll out the entire year like Walt Disney World does. So typically Disneyland those three property resorts they don't actually start selling the next year until like late summer. So as of today, nobody travel agents or general public can book, you know, pixar Pier or Disneyland Resort or California Adventure past the first of the year. We're hoping that that's going to come out sometime soon, but in the meantime, if people know that they definitely are, they're waiting to get their race registrations, they know they want to be on site.
Speaker 9:Um, you know, go ahead and get your your quotes into us. But we also, you know, we can book all those other hotels in the area. So like, let's go ahead and get you something at the west end or the, you know, the, the um, or the element, or the video, or the cambria, and just so you're one less stress, so you're secured, you know to know you've at least got a place to stay and we can always change that later on, that's right yep, now, there you go, friends.
Speaker 1:It's not too late, but it's getting there, so let's get working on that. Hey news today. Come back to florida news today that genie plus is on the way out.
Speaker 8:Putting. Genie back in the bottle. Back in space. Which we have been waiting for that to happen and we're so excited and this all rolls out in less than a month. I mean it all rolls out on July 24th. It's going to be active for Walt Disney World. We haven't heard anything. This isn't really a big change for Disneyland.
Speaker 9:Disneyland, disneyland. What we heard today is everything is exactly the same.
Speaker 9:It's just a name change, right? So again, nothing you really need to worry about doing in advance. You can, we add it to tickets all the time in advance. You have that ready, but nothing can be actually scheduled until you've actually tapped into the park and you've walked into california adventure, you've walked, you know, on the main street of disneyland and then you just do that, as as you use one, then you make the next one, you use one, you make the next one. It's a very, very easy. Absolutely the exact same thing. It's just instead of gen Plus, it's now going to be Lightning Lane Multipass, but then at Disney World. I think this is wonderful.
Speaker 9:We do still have to get up early in the morning for a few reasons, but this is also giving us a lot of extra time back and it's giving a lot more extra perks for people that are opting to stay on property. So it is. You know, we had fast passes, then we had fast pass plus, then we had genie plus. Now it's lightning lane multi-pass where we will be able to, if you're staying on property seven days in advance of your check-in date, we can get online at 7 am and actually make up to three ride attraction return times for the entire length of stay. So similar to the way we do advanced dining reservations where, 60 days in advance, the perk is of staying on property. We can log in and you can actually make dining reservations for your entire length of stay.
Speaker 9:Same thing's going to happen with this, and you only have to get up early or have support from your travel advisor one time the week before. Um. Off-property guests are still going to have a perk, they still get to do it in advance, but it's only going to be three days before, and it's similar to the way dining reservations are done. Now too, it's not for the length of stay. So let's say you've got your stand at an Airbnb off-site. You've got a four-day ticket. You're going to need to three days before, which do the math you're going to start your vacation.
Speaker 9:Three days in advance and you're going to be waking up for your vacation and you're going to be making your ride reservations for four day, three days out. So a lot of overlap there, um. But I'm glad that they are giving an option for off off property guests to have that. And then the single pass really is just a renaming of the individual lightning lane purchases. It's the exact same top five rides and attractions that you know are in the most demand.
Speaker 9:There's going to be a set price for those and thankfully that's again something we'll be able to do seven days in advance for your whole length of stay If you're property, three days in advance, day by day if you're off site. But at least you'll have some of those done and we think it's a lot of information to digest on the website and I'm sure we'll get a whole lot more before it starts. But it does sound like it will have the ability to modify, to change and actually to see make your selections first and then press pay. So it's not like Genie Plus where you have to buy it and then you're at the mercy of whatever is available when you get in line. This time you'll actually be able to get in. Look at your dates ahead of time, figure out what those three are going to be and then press purchase. Who knows, it might be like run Disney and you get to the purchase thing and it's like sorry, no longer available, please choose again.
Speaker 5:We don't know. Quick question on that. So seven days in advance, if you're staying on site Now, that's with a general ticket or AP ticket too, because some of us have APs it could be AP as well.
Speaker 9:It really is more connected to do you have a hotel reservation that's active for those dates and do you have an active ticket?
Speaker 5:And I guess we would need an active reservation in that park.
Speaker 9:Correct, right. So if, if you have the ticket type that needs that, so you know, if it was something where, like a military ticket or for a resident ticket, or something where those park pass reservations are still required, then yeah, john, you would. You would need to have all of that in place If it's just your general pass or your tickets that are part of that package, or even a standalone ticket. Right now we've got all these great ticket offers and so what we do with a lot of people is say, okay, well, to get you the best value, we're gonna get you the room discount here as a room only, and then we're gonna get you the four park magic tickets over here. As long as all that stuff is.
Speaker 9:In my disney experience, the system is going to be like okay, you have permission to, you have clearance, you have clearance, you have access I understand that you make these selections and I won't get too in the weeds of it, but it's if, if, if listeners, if you have, uh, had experience with the old fast pass system, it's going to be very similar to that. We'll have a lot more details coming out, but it's also all on the. The website is it's going to have those like group one, group two selections. So it's going to prioritize.
Speaker 8:It's going to say you can pick one of this like top demand selection of rides at magic kingdom, and then you can pick two from group two, which is the much longer list and just to clarify that this is for guests staying at any Walt Disney World resort hotel, as well as Shades of Green Walt Disney World, swan and Dolphin, so those also receive the perks hey, maggie, I just want to go back to something you just said about tiers. Yes.
Speaker 3:And that is the tier system only applies, and correct me if I'm wrong here. The tier system only applies on the pre-booking, but day of it's just like it was before you can go gangbusters and get whatever you want, regardless of whatever the attraction is correct after you've used your first one after yeah
Speaker 9:correct yep and then we okay. The other big elephant in the room is nothing has been said about price. We have absolutely no detail of what this is going to cost and, if you recall, when they brought out genie plus, we kind of got a little bit of a teaser like, oh, oh, it could be a range of $15 to $35. It's date based. So you know, I don't know if that, if they're going to give us any more of that detail in the next month, but I I would expect that it's going to be as high, if not higher, than what we already see.
Speaker 9:My also our big hope is that it will be that price regardless if you're, if you're just going to spend one day in a park, or if you've invested in a park hopper, because you've already invested more money in a park hopper, or you've invested more money in a in an annual pass that allows park hopping. But that's the other thing is that once you get there, you're making your first three for a particular park. Once you get in and you use that first pass, you can then change. You could finish out those two, you could hop later in the day you could use that one and then say, okay, well, you know it's 10 o'clock, we're hopping on, we're hopping over to animal kingdom now and make one for animal kingdom.
Speaker 3:But you have to have, you know, you have to have the kind of ticket that's going to let you hop to another right I will say the one thing that I am kind of happy about with these changes that got rolled out on tuesday is that you know, back in the old fast pass and fast pass plus system you weren't able to start using that rolling fast pass until you used up. You know all the ones that you had pre-booked where now it's you just got to. You know, regardless if you book zero to three, once you use that first one you can essentially start that rolling fast pass.
Speaker 3:Yes, I know, even though they got rid of the 120 minute rule, which is now going to essentially eliminate, you know, stacking throughout the day and everything like that, I think this is a nice little change. You know, a new little perk that they, that they threw into the pot with this one.
Speaker 8:Still based on availability, so that would be. I mean, the proof is in when, when we actually experience it come July 24th, to see how it really works and functions well. So my curiosity is upon is there any increased availability? What are the options If you have an early one that's already booked? How will that kind of roll out? So exciting things to see. I'm glad for the changes, but we'll see how it actually functions.
Speaker 1:One last thing before we let you go. Yeah, we've teased it a little bit. We're talking about a cruise, maybe in April of 26. What kind of developments do we have on that?
Speaker 9:OK. So the big thing that we're hanging out for is to find out when springtime surprise hanging out for is to find out when springtime surprise 2026 is going to be, because, as we've talked with the the gang, it would be ideal if this was like an end of season celebration. So we've wrapped up the run, disney season, we literally leave for magic kingdom. We can even charter a you know a bus. We've got a great company that we work really closely with down there, fernando would pick us all up, have a party bus out to Port Canaveral and then hop on, you know, hop on the Utopia of the Seas.
Speaker 8:Royal Caribbean.
Speaker 9:Yes with Royal Caribbean. We'll say we internal conversations we've looked at. Of course we would absolutely love for this to be on a Disney cruise. Wouldn't that be perfect? We could make our own little castaway key challenge. But even looking out at those prices, everyone on here probably knows everyone interested in this would be paying probably two to three times more, probably more, like three times more overall price and after finishing a run Disney season a lot of us have already invested a whole lot.
Speaker 9:So the way we think about it is this is going to give us enough time to that. People really can map out there what the run Disney schedule is going to be in the race calendar for the whole year. They can budget for that. They've got plenty of time to save for that. Keep the price point really reasonable with you know, either having your own roommate assignments bringing your, your significant other, your running buddies, or, if we need to do some, you know arrangements of of pairing people up to make those costs low but would have, you know, just lots of time. The group benefit is great because we can actually get different spaces on the ship. We can have group dining coordinated. We could have group excursion.
Speaker 9:We'd have room availability if we wanted to do some kind of awards like all kinds of options. They really take really great care of groups.
Speaker 8:And we'd love for you to take action now, because something that would be helpful for us is to know who's really interested in this. So we're putting out just an interest form of just gathering people's name how many you think they're potentially in your travel party, what kind of cruise state room are you interested in? Some just bare bones information that helps us. Once we are locked in on some dates and once one, we can keep you updated on things, especially as we have your email and we can just be in communication with you. So we're going to send that link for it to be posted on Rise and Run Web Web page as well. It'll be posted on Magic Bounce, magic Bounce Travel dot com, and so so we'd love for people if you are interested remotely this noncommittal, this is just kind of hey, I'd love to keep abreast of what's going on.
Speaker 3:Then that's what you can do now, and we'd love for you to do that Well, according to the Google. Easter is April 5th 2026. So if I had to take a guess, I think springtime will probably be after Easter. You would think.
Speaker 8:But then look what they did to Halloween. I was totally pushing, you know, one and nine the next week and saying there's no way that they would double up on Halloween, and I was wrong. So it really. I mean, yes, I hope they avoid Easter, but at the same time, you know, who knows? We'll see until the dates are out there.
Speaker 1:Brad Maggie, magic Bound Travel. Magicboundtravelcom is the site. Thanks for joining us. Look forward to seeing you. We look forward to talking with you again in the near future.
Speaker 8:You guys are awesome, thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you guys.
Speaker 8:All right.
Speaker 3:Talk to you soon. Well, we want to thank Brad and Maggie for giving us all that wonderful information. I will say it's very serendipitous that such major Disney news drops and we just happened to have them on the schedule for this week, so we got really lucky there. But before we move on, I received a text from Maggie. Apparently, disney Travel Company dropped a webcast as we finished that recording, and Maggie does have a few corrections that she wanted me to pass along to everybody.
Speaker 3:The first is for off-property guests that have a date-based ticket which doesn't require an advanced park reservation. You'll be able to start doing all of your lightning lane planning three days ahead of time, um, and you know, and then be able to plan everything with that specific ticket. But in anyone with a ticket that requires an advanced park reservation so whether that's an annual pass holder coming before 2 pm, military, uh, maybe there's like a special florida resident, um, you know, discounted ticket or something like that um, not only is the park reservation needed but they can also only pre-plan only three days in advance. So I think the rule of thumb is, if you have a resort reservation on disney world property, you're good to go. Start all this planning seven days in advance.
Speaker 1:Everybody else then is three days in advance okay, okay, I don't think that's a drastic change from what she said, greg, so I just maybe a little bit of clarification there.
Speaker 3:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:I appreciate it as well. Speaking of clarifications and I haven't done apologies and alibis in a long time Remember when I asked you if you knew what Benton Arkansas was famous for? Turns out, I don't know either, because Bentonville, arkansas is the home of Walmart, not Benton Arkansas. I'm surprised I didn't get beat up on that online.
Speaker 3:I mean especially since you're a Target guy and not a Walmart guy.
Speaker 1:Well, you know who I figured I'd hear from. Who's our Arkansas native son? Joe, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but either he didn't listen that week or he missed it. Maybe he's a chef at Walmart, maybe. Maybe I got to figure. Everybody in Arkansas knows that Bentonville is where I think it's where it originated and it's certainly where their corporate headquarters is to this day. All right, hadn't done one of those in a while and, believe it or not, I listened to the podcast. I was driving to disney world last week for the aforementioned trip and I heard it and I went benton. That's not right. Let me look it up. Yeah, it's not right.
Speaker 1:Hey, let's take a look at the training schedule. Disneyland halloween. My friends, we can now count the weeks on two hands. We are 10 weeks away. We're getting there. 70 days from today is Expo Day, advanced Dining Reservation Day for Disneyland Halloween. If you're arriving on Expo Day, so you can back it up from there is the 7th of July, so that's coming up pretty soon. Also Speaking's coming up pretty soon. Also speaking of coming up pretty soon, by the time we are visiting with you again this time next week, the galloway training plans for wine and dine weekend and for the walt disneyathon weekend, we'll have started.
Speaker 3:Absolutely wild.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if you're a Tuesday Thursday person, they start on Tuesday and that's kind of an exciting time too. We'll talk more about it next week, but it is an exciting time. Our buddy, mark, who does the wonderful job with the training schedules, has all of those that he has posted into the Facebook group so you can take a look at them, download them and do whatever you need to, because they're really terrific, and we appreciate Mark and all the help he gives us. We have a lot of folks who help us out behind the scenes and we greatly are thankful to them. Since we're on the subject of training, I think the big training topic this week, at least amongst the gang, is another one of our sponsors, stoked Metabolic Training and his Summertime Challenge and his summertime challenge. We are all in right, guys.
Speaker 9:Yep, we are.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. Anybody having trouble lifting their arms over their heads this morning?
Speaker 7:A little sore, but not too bad.
Speaker 1:Not too bad. I agree with you, Alicia, Not too bad it was. I'm fortunate our rec center has a small but decent weight room with a couple of machines and a full set of free weights and racks for the free weights, so I get to go over there and use those. I have not used free weights and I'm pretty sure this is correct. I haven't used free weights since I was in high school.
Speaker 3:So that was just a couple of years ago, so it's tough at that point.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was just just a couple of weeks, like I don't know how many thousands of weeks it was. It's over 2000 weeks, Anyway. Um, first thing that I observed was I forgot how heavy the daggum barbell is.
Speaker 7:The full-size seven-foot barbell.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, holy cow. I went to do the first set of exercises where box squats involved a barbell. I said I'm not putting any weight on these, I'm just using the barbell as it is. I looked it up, I guessed that it weighed 40 pounds and Mr Google says it's between 40 and 45, kind of depends. So those are the numbers I used.
Speaker 7:One thing I really appreciate about this. Well, two things. One Tom is gracious enough to let us start early for those of us who have signed up and he is working through all of the lovely people who have signed up. But secondly, he has it so you can say if you have like a home gym or if you have access to a full gym, so it's more personalized to you. So that's really cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I agree, the response was staggering, I think. When we started it I thought, well, this is neat, maybe we'll get 25 or 30 people to sign up. I was chatting with Tom last night, as of last night, and I know there's been more since 107 Rise and Runners have signed up for the program.
Speaker 3:You know I got to. I gotta say, bob, none of this shocks me, but by any means whatsoever. I mean when we started the podcast and we started talking about, you know, coach, twigs and customized training and jeff's plans. You know the number of people that you know since that time have joined customizing. I know coach has mentioned several times on the you know the weekly zoom chats that he has to buy more notebooks because you know there's so many people that have joint customized that he needs more pages to write down his notes and everything. So you know, hearing this number for Tom, you know, just goes to a testament of you know the work that he does. But then also you know just how many people in our community really want to, you know, try out this transformation and have it be just a great kickstart to. You know their summer running training.
Speaker 1:Yeah, greg, I think you make a good point. It's not that I underestimate, but sometimes I'm still a little surprised. And it's really impressive. I do hope that those of you who signed up put a full faith effort into it. I and it's it's really impressive. I do hope that those of you signed up put a full faith effort into it. I think it's going to be worthwhile for you. Uh, one of the big things I've learned and you've heard me talk about it the last couple of weeks is you got to do more than just run. And if you're doing this with Tom, I think that's great, I'm certainly doing it and I'm excited about it. But if you're not doing that, take a look at, uh, uh, fitz's. Take a look at Fitz's page. Or our friends, uh, devin and Kristen. Absolutely Uh, so, or whatever, but do yourself a favor and do something other than just running.
Speaker 6:It's just great to have cross training in general.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Yeah, I think it'll save you some injuries and, uh, I think it'll be very worthwhile for you in the long run. Meanwhile, I see a lot of folks running in the heat and it's not going to get any better for a while Just and I also see folks taking our advice and taking it easy. And that's what you need to do. The times will come, the speed will pick up. If you do this training in the summer, it'll pick back up in the fall. You'll be happy. All right, my friends, let's visit with our guest for the week.
Speaker 3:One of my favorite memes or videos that I see on social media are those of people traveling around the world to see a famous site, and then there's a family or friend off to the side that says you know, they have this in Epcot right page. Not only has she traveled around the world showcase many times, but she truly has seen many of those same sites in real life. It is our pleasure. We would love to welcome our next guest, lindsay Henry, to the Rise and Run podcast. Lindsay, welcome.
Speaker 10:Thanks y'all. I'm so excited to be here. It's going to be fun.
Speaker 3:We're really looking forward to it. So, before we dive into traveling and all of your world travels, I noticed via your Instagram page and your bio that you used to have a career in broadcast journalism. As a TV news nerd myself, who also thought I was going to go down that path, what led you to choose that career before travel blogging?
Speaker 10:You know it's so random actually. So when I went, when I was about to go to college, I had no idea what I wanted to do. My mom had just become a nurse and so I thought, oh, okay, I'll, I'll become a nurse, why not? And then my freshman year of college, I was sitting at this pizza joint and, um, my mom's hometown in Joplin, with our extended family at Christmas break and my aunt's like what do you like, what do you enjoy? Like she's really trying to get me to like think about it even more, cause I'm just, I'm just kind of easy, go with the flow. You know.
Speaker 10:I'm like, oh, yeah, I love the idea of being a nurse and I do love helping people, but anyway, I'm like, oh, I love history and writing and reading and photography and shooting videos and everything, and uh, which was different obviously back then as to how it is now with HD video and iPhones and things like that. And um, she's like, well, have you ever thought of journalism? I thought, oh, no, no, I never thought that I could do that. So I ended up getting a job that semester as a productions assistant at a TV station, and then that turned into another internship and so on and so on and then eventually I became a reporter. So yeah, it all started with a conversation at a pizza parlor, but it was a good one and it led to a really exciting career for about 10 years. That's awesome.
Speaker 3:I have to ask because my best friend started off in the 183rd lowest ranked market. My first job offer was a technical director for the NBC affiliate in Bismarck, north Dakota. Thankfully I never took that job because they wanted to pay me less than $10 an hour. But what various markets did you work in before you decided to call it quits?
Speaker 10:So actually, I got really fortunate with my first market, but it turned out there's a story behind this. I have to tell it, but I'll try to make it as brief as possible. So I graduated in college in 2011 from Sam Houston State in Texas, where Dan Rather went so good.
Speaker 3:Very nice.
Speaker 10:Well, yeah, I love Dan Rather and, and I had graduated, I had applied to like 50 something stations, didn't have a job, had like, talked to a few. I mean I was calling nonstop like trying to get a job, any anything. Calling nonstop like trying to get a job, any anything. Um, and then the tornado hit Joplin, missouri, and on May 22nd of 2011. And, unfortunately, my family was impacted by that, and so, um, my mom had been talking to me like, oh, do you want to do something for graduation, since you don't have a job yet? Do you want to go to Disney, do you want to like? And I basically said, no, I just want to go help out and volunteer and freelance if I can, but I want to help my family.
Speaker 10:So I went up there and I had not a lot of money because I was a college student, you know, working two jobs, all of college, to help pay for it. And so I just took what little money I had and I bought the cheapest, ugliest brown suit and I chose brown because I was like, oh, everyone will have black, so I'll get brown, just to be different. It was, it was horrible. So, anyway, I went up there with my volunteer bag of clothes ready to like get to work and start helping. But I had a suit just in case I got a job or needed it.
Speaker 10:And basically I landed a story. I shot it on an HD flip cam, which were those were brand new at the time, and so, yep, so that started my news career. I, um, I uh, got a job as a freelance reporter in Joplin covering the aftermath of the tornado. Um, I worked there for a few years, became a weekend anchor, so Joplin's like market one, 60 something, okay. Then I went to Springfield, missouri, which is like 75 or so back then. Then I went down, but to cover politics, so I went to Jefferson City, missouri, which is part of the Columbia market, then Fresno, california, and eventually finally to Houston, texas.
Speaker 3:It's really interesting to hear that story about, essentially like being in a place during, you know, a really horrific incident like that that story actually reminds me of, and I remember getting to see this video a couple years ago. You know a legend in the run disney community, um, our friend gerald resnick um. He also used to have a career as a um, as a tv journalist, and I think he was visiting family in pennsylvania or in new york when 9-11 happened and even though he was working in an orlando market, he essentially just, you know like, picked up everything and got into the city as quickly as he can and worked with freelance you know photogs and everything like that to start covering um, you know, covering the aftermath of 9-11 for his station down in Orlando. So it's really interesting, serendipitous in a way, of how you know you can get this story just by being sometimes in the right place in the right time or the right place at the wrong time, you know.
Speaker 3:it's really really interesting.
Speaker 10:And that I can't imagine 9-11.
Speaker 10:I still remember that and it's just the most horrible, you know time.
Speaker 10:But yeah, for us it was a really I'm saying it in hindsight like quickly, but in the moment it was really scary.
Speaker 10:I had three like kind of my grandparents are divorced so I had, you know, one grandparent up here, one grandma down here in the step, papa in the middle, and so, anyway, you know it was hard at the time. We didn't know if what had happened for 12 hours we couldn't get ahold of them because of cell phone signal, and so, yeah, it was definitely a really hard circumstance that our family went through and I went up to help and then it just happened to work the way it did and I was able to live with one of my grandparents, which helped with the new salary that you were mentioning earlier, and it did. And actually I feel very fortunate, very blessed, that I had that extra time with them during that difficult moment, because I've never lived in the same town as my grandparents at that point in my life More recently, yes, and so it was just kind of nice to get, to have that time with them every day, have meals with them and see them and kind of get to know them as an adult.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. That's awesome. Yeah, well, we'll put the news aside for now and let's move on to your passion for travel. I feel like you have stamped your passport more times in the last two months than I have in the last 10 years, so I'm interested to know where did you get your itch to travel abroad so much?
Speaker 10:My husband definitely helped you get your itch to travel abroad so much my husband definitely helped. And the news when I was in the news industry full time, I never got a. I worked holidays, weekends, early mornings, late nights. I got called in on off days. I rarely ever took a vacation and, really honestly, could afford to take a vacation. And so, and then, so many years into it, when I got to Houston, I was like I'm finally going to go somewhere. I'm doing it. I'm going to go to Italy.
Speaker 10:I'd always dreamed about going with a spouse and I hadn't found my spouse yet, and so I was able to go do that and that kind of took to that urge. I'm like, ok, I've been my number one place. What do I have to put next on the list? And so then when I met my husband, he really loved to travel. He used to work on a ship in Africa for a month off, a month on. Yeah, I know crazy, you know like how guys work on a rig. It's a ship instead of a rig. But he used to do that and in his off time, when he was single, he would travel. I'm like, oh, wow. And he really told me about it, using points, trying to travel for free, points for hotels, points for flights, things like that and so he really kind of taught me the game of how to do all that.
Speaker 10:And then in 2019, we went through a really difficult time. We were living together and we found out his dad had terminal cancer. We moved him in with us to take care of him full time and he ended up passing away only a few months later. And that kind of put into us this thought like many people have when, like you, have a moment of epiphany and realization that, wow, life is so short, right, that we're just like we need to do everything we want to do because, why not? You just don't know what's promised tomorrow. And so that kind of led to us taking career sabbaticals so my husband could take a year off and travel full time and get a job when he which is insane with his company For me, obviously, I had to quit, but I could go back and work at another station, freelance here and there.
Speaker 10:So I kind of did that for a little bit, um, and I'm still open-minded to freelancing, but anyway, um, I, I, basically, you know, with him we had discussed it over and over and over and over again and we finally decided let's do this, let's travel full time for a while, and so we had made a commitment to do it for a year and to come home. We have dogs, so you know, five weeks gone, a few weeks home, five weeks kind of thing, cause we do have a Rover we work with and and I also love my dogs and I don't want to be gone all the time. And so, um, we traveled for a long time and then COVID happened and obviously things got put on hold. So we do travel now.
Speaker 10:I travel a lot solo now, which is also an interesting thing at times, but yeah, it's just kind of, I guess, progresses as time has gone on. My husband's really been a big inspiration for me on wanting to get out and do more and experience more and see more, and then I think the more that you see and the more you learn about other cultures and countries and things like that, the more you want to see and you want to learn, and so for me, liking history and learning and all that kind of just goes hand in hand.
Speaker 3:And then how did the iteration of your blog and then posting everything to Instagram. How did that morph out of all of these travels?
Speaker 10:So I had started with just doing photos, you know, on Instagram. How did that morph out of all of these travels? So I had started with just doing photos, you know, on Instagram. I'd had my Instagram from the news business it was. It was established a bit but not to where it is now and real started coming out and I just kind of wasn't really interested in getting into it, because here I I shoot and edit professionally. You know, on this, on this realm, I shot a lot of my own stories, and to go to Instagram and learn how to edit on an iPhone, I'm like, oh man, I don't want to do this. So then I just kind of realized, actually I really like watching reels. This is kind of fun, so maybe I should put some time and effort into making these. And so, yeah, sometimes people watch them, sometimes they don't, that's okay, I enjoy it though.
Speaker 5:Some questions. Here is the favorite cities you have visited so far and what's on your bucket list to complete your travels.
Speaker 10:My top favorite major city I say this a lot on Instagram so people probably get tired of hearing it, but is London. I love London so much. Many reasons lots of free museums, public transportation is easy and cheap, which is great. So once you're over there, a lot of things are accessible. And I just I love West End musicals, so I think that's kind of fun and you can take day tours out to other cities. So London's my top major favorite big city. Like massive city, I love Edinburgh. It's really great.
Speaker 10:I like Luxor, egypt. Some of the best temples and ruins in the world are in Luxor. Everybody thinks Cairo and the pyramids and Giza and the pyramramid, you know. But I like Luxor and unique places. I like Ubud, bali, because it's just so different from what we're used to. It's, you know, a mix of a jungle and nature, like just people living in that realm and just embracing everything and being so at peace and kind to each other. And so, yeah, I've got.
Speaker 10:I've got a lot of favorite cities. It's kind of hard to choose, but, um, on the bucket list I. It's hard because I feel like I've been able to tick a few things in the last few years. I will say next year not city wise, but next year we're going to the Galapagos and I'm so excited. Yeah, I'm so love wildlife photography and so I cannot wait to go do that. I'm so grateful that we have that experience lined up for us. Other places I want to go visit Gosh. I would like to go to Botswana and Zimbabwe really, really badly. I just love Africa in general, the whole continent, and I'd like to do more wildlife photography, so pretty much any country in Africa. I'm just dying to get to.
Speaker 6:So earlier on you kind of talked about how you traveled in terms of getting the points and doing that free travel. Can you give us some tips on how to do that, Because I want to travel more.
Speaker 10:Oh heck, yeah girl, I am like oh, the points guy and all that, I love it, I love learning about it, because I Brian Kelly is a god.
Speaker 10:Oh, I know, I'm like how, what? I mean they're a whole nother game because they're using points to get like business class flights every week. I'm like, yeah, I'm on maybe economy plus um, if I'm lucky, or an exit row, you know Um, but anyway no. So I had not grown up with this way of thinking either. To Kurt, he didn't travel like that when he was growing up. We're both kind of, I mean, we did road trips and stuff galore and we went to Disney all the time and I love that. But you know, out of the country it was just kind of, oh yeah, maybe for a honeymoon or something. You know, just that was my thought process on it.
Speaker 10:So when Kurt and I met and he had kind of explained everything, it started off with a few conversations that were kind of difficult because I had just savings and a checking account and I think I had a Southwest credit card that I basically never used but I had it. So, um, but anyway he said, you know, right before we got married and he's like you need to get this credit card, because if you get this credit card and you spend X amount of money and we can spend that money on the wedding easily. Then you'll get 85,000 points and we can use that to get both of our round trip flights for our honeymoon. And I'm like, okay, well, I'm getting married to this guy, so I trust him. But, like, telling me to take out a credit card is not exactly good advice in my mind. You know, yeah, but I'm like no, no, we're getting married and he's right. Like we have a lot we have to pay for him, so, ok, let's do it. So that conversation kind of led to more questions and more conversations and saying OK, so what are the exact benefits of this credit card? Like, we have this credit card we use for travel and restaurants and this one is for you know shopping, let's say or you know shopping, let's say so the travel credit card. I use the Chase Sapphire Reserve card. It is the best card in my opinion. We get priority pass lounge access with that. So that means anytime you go to the airport and they have a priority pass lounge, you get in for free. That means free meals, free drinks and in a lot of countries, when you have a layover like, say, you're going to Thailand and you have a layover like, say, you're going to Thailand and you have a layover in Tokyo you can shower in the lounge for free, yeah, and some in, let's say, doha and Dubai, there are sleeping pods and stuff too. So that's kind of a unique thing that you can do for free with that lounge access. So anyway, I love that credit card. It's got a high.
Speaker 10:A lot of the travel credit cards have a high yearly rate, right, but they give you so much back, like, let me give you an example and I'll just be fully transparent. The card for two people is 500 a year but you immediately get $300 back in travel credit. So say, I book a round trip flight to Disney for a race or two round trip, you know, depending on what airline. Then I get that 300 immediately put back on. So then I look at the real cost of the card and I say, okay, it's $200 a year for two people. We get priority pass lounge access. So if I paid for a meal for me and I pay for my meal for my husband at the airport times, how many times we fly per year, we're getting X amount of meals for free, basically because of that Um, and then we get points.
Speaker 10:So if we say, put that travel on that credit card or just dinners or things like that. Then we build points to get those free flights, free hotels, et cetera. So last year I was a little bit better about it, about using the points, because we have to be selective. So when you're using a point system, you know you have to decide. Okay, if it's if this hotel for the week is a thousand dollars but the points cost is $1,500, it would be better to actually put it on cash, pay for it and build the points off of that, because that's $500 in points you'd be throwing away. So anyway, it's a long story Like and there's a lot.
Speaker 10:I could go on like a whole episode of like exactly what to do, um, but it's, it's a whole system. Last year a majority of my travel was free. So I'm talking about flight hotels, not trains, not food, but we buy food back home. You know you have to eat regardless, so but yeah, it's an interesting system. I will say there are a lot of different travel credit cards out there and I'm never recommending for somebody to get a card if they don't think they can pay it off immediately. That's another thing like pay it off that next day or a week from then before the balance carries over, so you have a zero balance. Then you get the points without having to actually pay any interest, which is great. So, yeah, it's a whole system. There's a lot to learn.
Speaker 6:Man. I just you know what. What's that Mandalorian saying that he uses during the show?
Speaker 3:This is the way.
Speaker 6:This is the way. This is what I feel like. I need to learn more. You need to have a book. Wait, you have a book and I just didn't realize it.
Speaker 10:Well, I know you have a blog but, like what, I do have a book I've written, actually, but it hasn't been published. So maybe one day I'll find a publisher willing to publish it. But yeah, I don't know, girl, I'm still learning myself, so I don't know if I'm the best person to give advice, but I feel like there's so much to learn about the point system and it's a great way to travel. If you can, why not? And I'd say, if you can learn this and you want to and you want to take the time to do it, it's a great way to get a do and see more without having to pay for it.
Speaker 6:So, with all this budgeting using these points, do you use any of these points to also book excursions, or how do you go about that when you plan for a trip.
Speaker 10:Most of my excursions I don't, so I have a few different apps that I like to use and I use them for certain reasons. So, and then, another thing with points also is you can do non-refundable or fully refundable, and fully refundable rooms or fully refundable flights obviously costs a little bit more than the non-refundable, but from experience and experience that I'm currently going through, I would say get the fully refundable ones, just so you can get those points back. Just keep that in your mind for later. Okay, but excursion wise, there's two websites I really love Viator and Get your Guide.
Speaker 10:Get your Guide is probably my number one used app. It's amazing and there's affordable excursions you can do in literally every city. The app Get your Guide is so easy to use. So, say you're going anywhere. Like I live in Houston, you could type in Houston. Say you want to go to Dubai, you can type in Dubai, then it will show you a whole bunch of excursions. They're all ran by local companies and then it will show how many reviews. You can filter by recent reviews and you can sign up for, like, a 12-hour day tour for 55 bucks. You know things like that where it's like oh, a whole day of entertainment at a very affordable rate and you'll be put in a tour bus or something like that with a whole bunch of other solo travelers. So when I do a lot of solo traveling, I like to use Get your Guide, because then I get to meet other solo travelers and I feel like I'm safe, I'm in a good setting where I don't have to drive necessarily. Somebody else can teach me about where I'm going.
Speaker 10:And another thing I like about that app particularly too, is that you can cancel within 24 hours or 24 hours and a minute. So say, something happens, you book it and you have to cancel your trip. Well, as long as it. If it starts at 7 am tomorrow, as long as it's 6.59 am the day before, you can cancel it. If it starts at 7am tomorrow, as long as it's 6.59am the day before, you can cancel it. Get your full money back, which is great because you know a lot of people invest so much into their vacations I mean like thousands of dollars and if something happens and they didn't buy trip insurance, they're out of luck. But with something like that, then you can get your money back, which has happened to me before where I've had an emergency happen and I need to cancel things. So, yeah, get your Guide is the best in my opinion. Viator is great and there's a few other websites, but those are my top few favorites.
Speaker 3:All right, let's combine two things, now that you love International travel and Disney. I saw you just after Springtime Surprise, you did a big trip over to China and I noticed that you got to visit Hong Kong Disneyland and Shanghai Disney. So my question is how are those international parks? What did you love and what did you not love as much?
Speaker 10:Oh, my goodness, I love them so much. I I'm so grateful we gotta go. I've been to all the disney parks. Now I've not been to all disney destinations like vero beach and, uh, yeah, ulani. I'm dying to go to ulani.
Speaker 3:Y'all like oh, I want to go you've done all of this stuff and you haven't been to a lot yet I, I know I'm trying to convince my husband, but he's not as big into disney, okay I was just there a couple of months ago. We'll chat offline and we'll convince him to go.
Speaker 7:I'll create a power. Amazing. Even if you're not a disney person, it's amazing yeah, please, please, help me.
Speaker 10:Or if we want to do like a friend's trip, I'm down there we go no, I, I'm just dying to go there.
Speaker 10:But, um, yeah. So the parks were super cool. Let's go. I was at, I was at Shanghai Disney first, so let's talk about that one. It was awesome, big, obviously the biggest castle, so that's really cool to see up close. They have the new Zootopia land you can. So I will say, like the, the daily ticket rate is very affordable. It's something like 65 bucks, it's something, and that's around the world. The international parks have a more affordable day rate, but there are a lot of add-ons that you can do.
Speaker 10:So I saw that there was like an hour early early park entry. It was about 20, $25. You could pay for it to get in an extra hour early and I heard, because of that new Zootopia land, that it was definitely worth it. So we did do that. We went to Zootopia first. The ride was so cute. But one thing I didn't realize is that we should have spent more time in that area after, because later in the day there was actually a queue to get into that area of the park. So imagine you're going into Tomorrowland, right, and there's that big rounded archway and there's like a line for two hours just waiting to get to the entrance of Space Mountain.
Speaker 3:I just saw this on a recent video from Ordinary Adventures and I was blown away that there was a way to just enter the land. Yeah, wild stuff.
Speaker 10:Oh yeah, just to walk around. So in hindsight I wish I would have spent a little bit more time in there in the morning because I was so excited. I'm like, oh, let's go to Tron. There's like a 10-minute wait. I couldn't believe it. You know, no virtual queue, and you know, of course, we're having a lot of food and snacks too. So, um yeah, the park is really unique.
Speaker 10:Pirates of the Caribbean is kind of one big ride that's they're super famous for. And one thing that's unique about that one, if you haven't been there's this one scene where the boat, your little boat that you're in, goes in between two giant ships, like you know, our, ours at Walt Disney world in Disneyland. We've got the ship to the side. It's shooting over at the land. There's some water that periodically comes up. It's awesome and it has that feeling like you smell the smells and you feel the feels and you're like, yeah, pirates. Well, that pirates is just so incredible. The animatronics, everything. It's just really out of this world. So we wrote it multiple times because I just I enjoyed it so much. Then let's see the hats and ears. That was a really unique thing because there are a lot of headbands where you've got the little baubles of the different characters.
Speaker 6:I love that.
Speaker 10:If I wasn't there with my husband, I would have probably bought like all the little baubles I'm just kidding, but I behave myself. I only got a few, but I really, I really enjoyed just the different hats and stuff, because that's something that's really unique. Like, right, we have ears and they're big, but the hats there you might have like an entire plushie on a headband there and I may have bought one of those because they're just so fun. So, yeah, I would say the merchandise is incredible. And then I really liked the different ice cream bars Lena Bell you know there's Duffy and Friends, right, lena Bell is like the pink fox-like character. I think it's a fox, fox cat, I'm pretty sure it's a fox and it's adorable. And they had this Lena Bell ice cream pop and y'all, I'm telling you it was amazing. So, yeah, so good.
Speaker 10:And then Hong Kong Disney is different, so unique Hong Kong, and where it's set there's trees everywhere and it feels so tropical and it's an island, right. So you kind of have those island feels when you walk into the park. The castle was redone so many years ago and so I hate to say this and cheat on Orlando, but I might have a new favorite castle. Really it's so beautiful, the colors are so unique, so I really enjoyed seeing that and it's got little bits and bobs from so many different Disney movies hidden on it. So I think that makes it kind of extra special, because there's so many characters that don't have a castle so they've got a little representation there, which is neat.
Speaker 10:They don't have Haunted Mansion, they have Mystic Manor and other parks like Disney Paris have different names for the Haunted Mansion type ride. But this ride is totally unique and different. It has a totally different storyline. There's basically this guy that collects things from around the world and his best friend who's a monkey, and the monkey opens this mystical box and all sorts of things come alive in this house, and so it's so different and unique and it's on one of those kind of magnet tracks that we this house, and so it's so different and unique and it's on one of those kind of magnet tracks that we see for a Mickey and Minnie's runaway or rise. So that's a fun ride and yeah, just how beautiful that park is. I really enjoy it and the frozen land super cool as well. I will say the big ride there. I can't even remember what it's called the sled one.
Speaker 10:Yeah, it does go by really quick, it's super fast I heard it's like 90 seconds long or something like that, or maybe less, I don't know people talked about tron being short, but I swear it was like half the length of tron and I love tron, so yeah, but but I will say that area is super cool so it's fun to walk around and stuff. But yeah, sorry to ramble, I just like I love all the parks. They're all so fun and different and I just I, I'm really grateful to have experienced them. I, I would like to go back to tokyo, though. I think that'd be fun. Have you guys been to any of the other parks and have y'all like, saw something?
Speaker 6:you're like, oh, this is super cool and special I went to my first international park this past April for my birthday. It was extremely spur of the moment. We didn't know we were going until like Saturday night. Then we put our name on standby for the flight on Monday night and we found out within 72 hours that we're going to Disneyland Paris and it was so good. I mean, we're trying to go to Tokyo in September. We're not 100% sure. There's still some factors that we're trying to figure out in terms of like time off and whatnot.
Speaker 6:But, um, I actually enjoyed Disneyland Paris and people are going to hate me for saying this more than Magic Kingdom. I I thoroughly enjoyed the castle. I thought it was absolutely gorgeous, and what they did inside it with the dragon underneath, I think the rides over there were just kind of almost like a next level, like to me, the Pirates of the Caribbean, I thought was better than Disney world and Disneyland California. Um, we love the story aspect and how it was just so different than the other parks we've been to and we just really thoroughly loved it. And it was very quiet when we were there, so maybe that just had to be a factor too. The only thing I had to say was the food was just okay, except for the dessert.
Speaker 6:The desserts were good.
Speaker 3:No, I've been, so I have all the castles except for the two that desserts were good. No, I've been, so I have all the castles except for the two that you just talked about. So I have done paris and I and I've done tokyo. But grant, it's been over 20 years since I've been to tokyo and now that fantasy springs is open, I am absolutely dying to get back over there, because I I can't stop watching tDR Explorers videos on YouTube. Yes, there's no words, it's a master class in the imaginary.
Speaker 10:I'm dying to go back to Tokyo. I'm definitely I'm throwing it out in the universe. My friends have been talking May of next year, just saying big run Disney group going taking over Tokyo.
Speaker 6:Disney. You don't have to convince me, Just let me know what date let's do it, so to kind of keep going with all the Disney parks around the world. How would you say for the international parks, how many days do you really need per each international park? Because it's kind of some people say like a certain number of days, some people say you only need like one or two so what do you really think?
Speaker 10:oh goodness. Okay, let's go with tokyo. I and I have not been since the updates. I went in january, february of 2020, right when everything first broke out. I was there when it happened, um, and so I know there's two parks, you know, there's Tokyo Disney, tokyo Disneyland, tokyo DisneySea and, obviously, fantasy Springs area and all that. So I would say I mean, knowing what I know from previously at least two days, at least like a full day, full day. But now, if I go back, I would go for three or four days, just because I really would want to live it up, out of all the parks.
Speaker 10:I feel like my opinion was Tokyo was the best. I mean, they had the best merchandise.
Speaker 10:They had so many unique rides, the food, I mean, they have like 20 different flavors of popcorn alone. So if you're a big fan of popcorn, like me, I my first job was in a movie theater, so I like I'm a big fan, you know. I'm like oh, matcha green tea, popcorn with white chocolate yeah, let's do it. Fun popcorn buckets, so yeah. But Tokyo Disney if I went back, I would say three days at least. Shanghai Disney has one park.
Speaker 10:I think one or two days is probably good. If you were staying at the hotel or something like that, maybe you would have more time for those extra experiences. I did it in one day and felt fine, but it would have been maybe nice to have one more day. So maybe two days, but again, it's just one park. Hong Kong is one park, but we did it in two days and I felt like that was plenty. We got to see and do a lot. Plus it rains a lot there. That's something you have to kind of take into account, because certain rides will be closed and you got to hit them when it's not raining.
Speaker 10:Um, paris Disney has two parks, um, plus the properties and the hotels are really cool. So I would say two or three days, I think. I think I would basically do count how many parks that place has and add one day. I think that would be the best way to do it all. Even if you were talking about Disney World and Disneyland, I think that could apply right, because if you go to Disney World and you have one day at each of the parks and you have one extra day to go back to your favorite or go to Disney Springs or a pool or Disneyland, you know there's two parks. So yeah, I would just I would keep that rule of thumb, I think that's a good rule of thumb.
Speaker 10:Yeah, why not? Because then, if there's something you missed out on, you can try it again.
Speaker 6:What's your least favorite? You're going to hate me. No, I'm not, Give it. Give it to me.
Speaker 10:Maybe Paris, I don't know, I don't know. I just I, I I went alone. I think maybe that was part of it. I think it would have been more fun with friends, so that. Or Shanghai. I felt like the difficulty to get into China with the visas and everything. It was quite a process, so yeah, because I mean in Houston there's no longer a consulate, so I had to get my visa from another state and pay another company to do that for me, and it was a whole thing to get to go to China, and so I would say most difficult one to get to is Shanghai. I do love Paris, though, but I just I don't know, I went alone.
Speaker 7:So maybe I need to go again, maybe I need a friend trip there, yeah, so, lindsay, with all of your travels coming back to the States and doing Run Disney, how did you discover Run Disney and doing those events?
Speaker 10:I discovered it so many years ago via online. So when I was younger I ran in my like more than 10 years ago, like early 20s. I ran a lot and I got into a really bad accident in my late 20s and was in physical therapy for a long time. Didn't run for years and I'd always remembered seeing people online in the run Disney community and be like gosh, I want to do that one day. And I was at the point with my back where I thought I would never, ever be running again For sure. I herniated and tore two discs and my doctors were kind of talking about maybe having surgery. You know, nothing was really working to help my pain and I just felt like miserable. And so eventually I just kind of had that goal in my head during COVID. I was like I'm going to get better.
Speaker 10:It happened in 2017. But really that time, kind of being forced to be at home and think about things and think about your life and what you want to have changed and stuff, kind of really pushed me. And yeah, I remember seeing more and more on Instagram and social media and thinking that's my goal, that's my goal, that's my goal. If I can sign up for the princess half. I'm going to train for it, I'm going to do it. So I started off with walking and after a year or so of just walking I felt like maybe I can start jogging a little periodically just to test, and you know, with talking to my doctor and my chiropractor and everything, and and then kind of progress from there and progress from there. And then the next thing, you know, I'm signing up for the princess half and I'm like, oh my gosh, what am I doing? And then basically just became addicted ever since that one race. It was like, okay, the hardest part now is signing up.
Speaker 6:Yeah, I think we can all feel that what's your, what's your races you have planned for this coming year?
Speaker 10:this is scary to say out loud, but I am hoping for a dual park, perfect season.
Speaker 6:Awesome.
Speaker 10:I did a Walt Disney World perfect this last season and I thought never again am I doing this, because you know my back. I did actually re-tear one of those discs in the fall. Well, not from training, but I was training for Dopey. I was. I was one day I was at home, I was leaning over petting my dog and I tore my disc by petting him. I was, I was one day I was at home, I was leaning over petting my dog and I tore my disc by petting him. I'm like this is how you know you're getting older, just by leaning over and getting injured. But, um, but anyway, I yeah.
Speaker 10:So I did my Walt Disney World Perfect and my friends were like, hey, we should sign up, for we should all sign up for Dopey again. And I'm like, oh man, y'all, why are we doing this and so? But so much fun at the same time and that joy you feel when you cross at the end of Dopey is just indescribable. And so I thought you know, I could maybe afford one more year on this, on this back, and try to push it. And then basically, one of my friends was like, well, you're doing that, you might as well go for all of them. Yeah, you know why not, and so, yep, so I'm, I'm hoping for all the races. I I, you know, of course have the disneyland one. We know what happened last week with that and, uh, hopefully I can sign up whenever it gets announced.
Speaker 3:Speaking of Disneyland, you were you. I know you were in the UK. You were at a. You were. What was the event that you were at? And you were trying to register.
Speaker 10:Oh my gosh y'all. This is so crazy. Okay, so I was at Royal Ascot.
Speaker 3:Yes, that's it, that's it.
Speaker 10:I actually went with run Disney friends oh yeah, our friend, you were with Amy, amy and my friend Allie.
Speaker 10:I actually went with Run Disney Friends. Oh yeah, our friend, you were with Amy, amy, yeah, and my friend Allie. And so I went previously last year solo and it was so much fun and I had kind of talked about it with them and we kind of just decided, yep, let's go, let's have fun. Unfortunately, the day that we had decided to go and that worked for everyone's schedules was the day of the Disneyland half marathon sign up. So Allie's got two phones and she's on both of the phones and I'm on my phone and Amy's checking. Even though Amy's not doing it, she's checking hers and like what is going on. So for a good amount of time that we were there, we were also on our phone hoping.
Speaker 3:At a certain point, though, I kind of just like kind of gave up so you, you talked about the, the euphoria of crossing a you know a finish line at dopey. But for all the years that you have been running, uh at disney, what are like some of your most memorable run disney memories?
Speaker 10:oh goodness. Usually all of them involve running with a friend.
Speaker 10:Yeah, that's so sweet, yeah, aw, thanks. Well, this is the first. So many like the first one I did was really hard, because it was physically hard and my back hurt and I was just bawling at the end Like thank God I finished this, because I just never in a million years thought I'd be running again. And so I think that first one it was the Princess Half in 2022. And just crossing and feeling so proud of myself, you know, I'm not I don't know about y'all, but like I'm not often feeling proud of myself. I'm like, oh, you know, and I'm like, wow, I'm not often feeling proud of myself. I'm like, oh, you know. And and I'm like, wow, I just did this incredible thing and I overcame, um, and so that moment was just incredible. And then I did quite a few races alone. Family would come watch or I would go out there solo, knowing people or not knowing people. And so I feel like the first year, or you know so, of me being in this I don't know group, I guess, of of people these run Disney people I didn't know a lot of people, so I was alone a lot, um, and so this last year I kind of feel like I really finally found my, my group and my groove, and so getting to run with friends has definitely meant a lot. I think the best races are when you're alone and then you get surprised by a friend and then they run with you. That is one of the most incredible things For Dopey.
Speaker 10:I was running for my papa who had just passed away from bladder cancer, and I was having like an emotional day. And of course, after the rain on the marathon day, we were all just kind of hating ourselves, Like, oh man, my shoes are wet, everything's wet, and I'm cold. And I got to power through this. And then, at mile like 17 or so, right before Blizzard Beach, I ran into my friend Kimberly, and so that moment was like, oh, thank God, I need you, we needed each other.
Speaker 10:And then the same thing at Princess, I ran into my friend Bethany and that day I was thinking in my mind, oh, I'm going to PR for this half marathon. And my back, of course, was saying, uh-uh, you're not going to do that today, uh-uh, you're just going to finish. And in this moment of doubt and uncertainty and feeling sad and angry at my body for you know, being in pain, my friend had ran up beside me and then we ended up running the next like 11 miles together. So I think the best moments are, of course, with friends, because they just make it so much more special moments are, of course, with friends, because they just make it so much more special.
Speaker 3:Well, lindsey, that's an extremely admirable thing to say. Um, you know about how friendship ties in so greatly to the run disney community, and I think it's why we all keep coming back to it, because, I mean, sure, we love the sport, but we love the friendship that's associated with it. So that's extremely lovely of you to say, but I think we're going to bring things to a close here, but before we do, uh, we're going to do the regular old podcast shtick. Uh, if there's anything you'd like to plug, you know the the blog, your Instagram tell us how folks in the rising run community can learn more about Lindsay Henry.
Speaker 10:Oh my gosh. Uh. Well, my Instagram is Lindsay Henry. Oh seven 11. Well, my Instagram is lindseyhenry0711. And people ask me about that all the time. It's for the years I graduated high school and college. But yep, so definitely go follow me there if you haven't, and please say hi to me. I just I'm. I love making new friends and I really mean it when I'm like, oh, let's hang out, let's hang out, like let's do it. So if you're ever kind of in a moment of like doubt during a race, or you're looking for somebody or you're in that place because I was there, you know, going to races alone and not knowing who to hang out with and and what to do, or I had questions but I didn't know who to ask, I'm always here, I'm always going to be here, and um and yeah. So, uh, good luck on the next race season. Y'all. I'm so excited. I can't wait for September. It's going to be super fun.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much for your time, your insight and we look forward to seeing you at a future Run Disney race.
Speaker 10:Oh, thanks for having me, guys. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Lindsay, thank you so much for joining us. I have to apologize to Lindsay and to our friends. I heard most of Lindsay's interview but I was sitting here with technical problems the likes of which I have not had in the other 140 some odd episodes so unfortunately I wasn't able to participate in that. But I appreciate the rest of the gang doing a wonderful job and Lindsay just sounded like a terrific interview. I'm looking forward to Thursday, friends, so I can hear the parts that I missed. But thanks for doing that. That was fantastic. Let's see here.
Speaker 1:We talked about the shop a little bit last week, the Rise and Run shop. On our website. We are still targeting 1 July to reopen. When we reopen we will have the existing stock of merchandise for sale. There's not a great deal of it. We talked about race hats not the tie-dye hat, the one that I wear all the time, but regular race hats and visors, and we do have some on order, so those should be arriving early in August. A lot of popularity. When I mentioned the visors to our friends last week, they were excited. There was four people sitting around the table and I think they wanted a total of seven visors, but I'm not sure. Coming next week.
Speaker 1:Episode 145, wendy Larson is back with us. Wendy is a hand cycling champion. She's either won Boston twice and New York once or New York twice and Boston once. But we haven't visited with her in over a year and she's been really busy. She has a lot of stories to tell us, a lot of interesting things. Wendy is a really remarkable person. We look forward to hearing from her.
Speaker 1:My friends, it's time for the Race Report. Race Report brought to you by Stoked Metabolic Training. Stokesfit slash Rise and Run Coaching is the link to follow that is pinned to the top of our Facebook group page, as is the link to join in the Summer Challenge. Tom was very gracious. He was going to cut off that special $47 rate. You have to whisper that that's for Rise and Run listeners only, so you whisper there, but the response was so overwhelming he decided that he would leave that price available to our listeners until the training formally begins on. I believe it is the 8th of July. Is that the Monday? Yep, ok. So if you can get in before then and, as you've heard, those of us who have gotten in, tom's already started us out. Friends, in the Race Report Spotlight something just a little bit different than we've ever done before. This is a race, but I don't think there was a lot of running involved. Let's welcome Lucy and Carly to the Spotlight. Hi ladies.
Speaker 2:Hi, hello. And Carly to the Spotlight. Hi ladies, hi Hello.
Speaker 1:It is great to see you. Thanks for joining us. I saw your post that says delete this if it's not allowed. Well, we do that anyway, whether you put that in there or not. But I started reading I went, oh, this is cool. And to put a little variety into the race report spotlight, why don't you tell us about your race?
Speaker 2:Okay. So Carly and I both had the amazing time of racing in the Air Race Classic 2024, which is an all-women's cross-country air race. Aha. And so we raced 2,600 miles over four days and we learned a lot and we had a great time, oh, it was awesome, let's see you started.
Speaker 1:Now you live. Do you both live in Florida?
Speaker 11:Yes, yes.
Speaker 1:In.
Speaker 11:Melbourne, florida, but we work in Vero Beach.
Speaker 1:Yes, Okay, so I assume you flew to Illinois for the start.
Speaker 2:Yes, myself and our third teammate, bailey. We flew up from Vero Beach to Carbondale, illinois, on the Thursday before the race, which I think was the 13th.
Speaker 1:And this was a Piper Archer. You're flying right.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Is this your aircraft, or a lease, or what?
Speaker 11:We wish Both Lucy and I work for Piper Aircraft. We're very fortunate to work there. So Piper was generous enough to lend us the Demonstrator Archer LX, which is the blue for the race. So we raced it across the country and brought it home today, actually this morning.
Speaker 1:Good looking bird. I'll tell you yes.
Speaker 11:Thank you.
Speaker 1:We love it.
Speaker 11:It was a great, great airplane. We had a ton of fun flying it. We're very, very thankful that Piper let us use it for the race.
Speaker 1:Sharp paint job. Bright red with black highlights. Look good, this is a fixed pitch prop. Fixed gear aircraft.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Okay, four seater Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, cool, cool. Well, tell us about the legs, tell us what you did and how you did.
Speaker 11:Oh my gosh, we had the best time ever. So the air race itself was nine legs this year, like Lucy said, 25, 2600 miles, and so we went from Illinois to Indiana and Michigan, ohio, oklahoma, kansas, and ended the race in Colorado, oh, and Minnesota. We stopped in Minnesota, yeah, okay, yeah, but it was awesome. And so the way the race works is it's like golf, it's a handicapped air race. So, before the race starts, we fly our aircraft and race configuration, which is maximum continuous power at, however, whatever our gross weight would be, and we are given a handicap speed and that is our speed to beat for the entirety of the race. So it's up to us to use the winds, use our environment, navigate terrain and obstacles and, most importantly, rely on each other to get the aircraft from point A to point B as safe and efficiently as possible.
Speaker 1:I looked at some of the numbers. You finished just about at max airspeed for that aircraft, didn't you?
Speaker 2:Pretty close yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, pretty darn close. Did you run into any challenges along the way?
Speaker 2:I would say our biggest challenge for this race was definitely weather. The rules of the air race is that you have to remain in visual flight rules the entire time. So no going clouds, no going super, super low. Um, and we can you go?
Speaker 1:can you go vfr on top?
Speaker 2:yes, we can go, okay or we can go vfr over the top.
Speaker 2:We can't just hop through the clouds, get up and come back down through the gotcha right so, specifically our legs, from moni, illinois, illinois, to Awatonna, minnesota, and then from Minnesota down to Moberly, missouri, all three of those legs, or all two of those legs we had to do VFR over the top, which ended up being a really good choice. The weather was really challenging but we found a really nice, smooth air up top which helped us out a lot with kind of resource management and helping us, you know, save our energy for the parts of the race that we're going to be a little bit more intensive.
Speaker 5:And can you tell us what VFR over the top means for us non-aviators here?
Speaker 2:So if there is a layer of clouds and you find a hole in them, you can go through it and end up over the top of the cloud layer and then come back down without actually going through the clouds themselves it's pretty, john, you get to see the top clouds yeah, it's nice.
Speaker 1:Um, did you get into any elevation issues out in colorado, or was it still fairly?
Speaker 11:oh yeah yeah so our the race actually ended in Fort Collins, loveland or Northern Colorado airport. Um, no, co, if you will, um. And so our last leg, um of the entire race went from Dodge city, kansas, um, which also had some elevation. That was we knew Colorado would be um higher density altitude. So essentially the aircraft feels like it's flying, or it's performing, at a much higher altitude than it actually is, just due to the pressure of the air as you get higher with the terrain.
Speaker 11:So the last leg or two, we experienced that the cool thing is our aircraft did really well. It is, we're, again, fortunate enough to be racing something that does have a pretty new engine, so we were able to get the maximum amount of power out of it. Plus, we planned our weight very strategically in terms of how did we load the aircraft to make sure it was within center of gravity limitations. We waited for really good wins. We got lucky with some great wins for those last two legs and actually the leg number eight out of nine. We won that leg. We were the fastest.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was going to ask about that.
Speaker 11:So waiting for the wins paid off, we were pretty grateful for that, but definitely that's the beauty of the race is that it goes. It went through all types of airspace, all types of weather, all types of terrain, and so it really does test you as an aviator and also working in a team. We had a saying for the entire race we trust ourselves, we trust our airplane and we trust each other, and that's how we were able to navigate through all that unfamiliarity.
Speaker 1:This is awesome. This is great. I'm glad you took the time to talk to us, and I realize I'm geeking out here, but a lot of our friends listening, maybe not so much, so let's, let's bring it around a little bit, because you are Lucy, you are a Disney runner and Carly, you're about to become one, right? What races have you done, lucy?
Speaker 2:So my very first race was the 2010 Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend 5K.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:Um, it was. I remember distinctly that it was up themed. So that really came full circle this springtime. Surprise, I saw it was up themed again and I was like, oh, I have to do it.
Speaker 1:Were you about 10 years old back then, Lucy.
Speaker 2:Yes, Distantly um with 2020 to the 50th anniversary Dopey Challenge, and then I've been doing Dopey since then. I'm not doing it this January just because I wanted to save a little bit of money and travel to do some marathons in different states.
Speaker 1:Cool, very good, very good. Will you be there at all in January?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 6:Carly and I are doing the half together?
Speaker 1:Oh, excellent. And, carly, will that be your first Run Disney event.
Speaker 11:It will. It'll actually be my first half, so I am a brand new runner. Actually, lucy got me into running. She's my runner inspiration for sure.
Speaker 11:I started running because Lucy and I met at work three years ago and Lucy said hey, carly, we're going to run this really cool Halloween race that the town where we work at sponsors and I hated running my whole life. I just said you know what? I'm not a runner, I'll never be a runner, I'm not fast, but I wanted to hang out with my friends. So I said you know what, we'll try it. And it was a 4K. So I ran the 4k, I walked most of it, but I saw so many people running at my pace and I'm like you know what? People can run slow, just like me, and they seem to have fun.
Speaker 11:So I started running after that and I've been running since then and so I've done a 10k that I loved and as soon as I finished that, it was a 10K challenge. So it was eight, just over eight miles total, and I said, okay, it's time to find a half. So, lucy, I've watched her do all of these amazing run, disney runs and it just looks like so much fun. So I thought, why not? So January will be my first, and I cannot wait.
Speaker 1:I'm excited for both of you.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you.
Speaker 5:So when you guys did your legs, like you guys alternate each leg is there a pilot co-pilot scenario?
Speaker 2:So we did a pilot co-pilot scenario, like you said, where we had one pilot flying and one pilot monitoring doing basically everything else. So while Carly was flying, I was doing communications as well as configuring the aircraft, the GPS and everything and checking weather, Just making sure that we were flying in a nice direction, pretty safe, and also looking for traffic that we were going to pass by along the way.
Speaker 1:One more geek question what kind of nav systems did you have?
Speaker 11:Oh we're so. We feel very spoiled. We've got a G1000 NXI, we've got a G5 standby GFC 700 autopilot. It's dual GPS actually. So we were living life. It was again.
Speaker 11:We really feel like this race taught us how to really use our equipment properly. There's a lot of little hidden features in there that we don't ever use. You know, the beauty of the race is it is a total departure no pun intended from how we usually fly. Typically we're used to, you know, quick maneuvers, flights at our jobs, at the factory where we work, or longer cross -countries at a reasonable power setting, maybe 75% power. This race is designed to be flown as fast as possible and low to the ground at times, so definitely different for us, but flying this way really taught us how to use our equipment, I think, in a very different way as fast as possible and low to the ground at times, so definitely different for us, but flying this way really taught us how to use our equipment, I think in a very different way, which I don't know about you, lucy, but I don't think we'll ever fly the same after this race. It's taught us a lot of different things.
Speaker 2:No, I agree, we absolutely will not fly the same, and there's a whole lot of features. Carly's been flying these new fancy airplanes for about three years. I've been flying them for one, and so there's so many features about them that we started to really pick through as we had time in the air, and I just feel so lucky to be able to experience that.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, John did you have any more.
Speaker 5:No, that's pretty interesting. I mean it wasn't like second start to the right and straight on till morning.
Speaker 1:Oh, this is yeah, this, yeah, this is very interesting, very interesting. Thanks so much. I wanted to ask how you got started flying, but I'll have to save that for another time, okay.
Speaker 2:Anyway, for sure.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, that'd be great, that'd be great.
Speaker 5:And Bob wants to join you guys next year. It sounds Okay, yeah, that'd be great, that'd be great, and Bob wants to join you guys next year.
Speaker 1:It sounds like yeah, but I'd slow you down, I'd increase your max gross weight a bit too much.
Speaker 11:Oh no, it's all good.
Speaker 1:I'm a pretty big person. Lucy Carly, thank you so much. We really enjoyed that. I know I really enjoyed it. And thanks for taking the time to visit with us.
Speaker 2:I know I really enjoyed it, and thanks for taking the time to visit with us. Thank you for inviting us. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1:Well, I enjoyed the heck out of that. I hope some of you did too. I took an opportunity to do something a little different for the race report. Hey, it was a race, lucy and Carly. By the way, greg, they PR'd something in there. So for all their outstanding aerobatic work, let's give them the PR bell.
Speaker 1:Back to the terrestrial racing on Friday up in Dartmouth, nova Scotia, the seaside scramble 10k trail run. Laurie was there. This was, while advertised as a 10K, actually an 11K Kind of a tough, technical trail race. A lot of different kinds of terrain Lori had to navigate. Even though it was tough, she enjoyed the challenge. Scenery was spectacular. It was her first ever timed 11K trail run. We know what that means. And catch this. Laurie finished first in her age group. Way to go, laurie. Let's move on to Saturday, one of the bigger marathons in the US, outside the world majors up in Duluth, minnesota, grandma's Marathon. Cassandra was there. Cassandra ran the half, tara and Carlos ran the full. A lot of rain Rained almost the entire 26.2 miles. It kept the heat away, but it didn't keep the fun away. They still enjoy it. Volunteers, crowd support. We're still enthusiastic and excited. It's kind of remarkable that a relatively small city like Duluth can put together a world-class event like this, year after year. Congratulations Tara, carlos and Cassandra. I've heard so many good things about that one.
Speaker 3:I have to ask a question when does the name originate from? Because that's just a very unique name for a race.
Speaker 1:I don't know it is, but I don't know who Grandma is. That will be, let's see. Let's make that Alicia's homework assignment.
Speaker 3:I was going to say does the local Minnesotan know the backstory?
Speaker 1:So, greg, according to the Google, oh, alicia, you just pretend, you know.
Speaker 7:Okay, so it was because of the newly opened Grandma's Restaurant. That was the only local business that was up in Duluth and they sponsored the race, so that is why it is called Grandma's Marathon.
Speaker 1:Grandma's Restaurant. Grandma. Duluth is, in terms of major population centers in the US, but Duluth isn't itty bitty, is it? No, I mean it's a fairly large city, I, but Duluth isn't itty-bitty, is it?
Speaker 7:No, I mean it's a fairly large city.
Speaker 1:I mean, I've heard of it.
Speaker 7:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I just got to figure there's more than one restaurant there. But hey, maybe Grandma's is so daggum good, that's it. Well, there you go, Greg.
Speaker 7:Yeah, it was the only restaurant that would sponsor the race.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, maybe that would sponsor the race.
Speaker 7:Oh yeah, maybe I said that wrong.
Speaker 1:The only sponsor Okay.
Speaker 7:Yes.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, that makes sense.
Speaker 7:They said thank you for doing that. We're going to call it Grandma's Marathon.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you got. Yeah, I put Grandma's right up there with like Flying Pig. I'm kind of at a loss for some others right now. I don't not quite into the Marine Corps category, but it's right there, it's. It's certainly one of the biggies throughout the country.
Speaker 7:Yeah, it's definitely a bucket list one for me.
Speaker 1:I tried one time to get in 10 months out no forget it.
Speaker 7:Even the hotels book like that. Was it in advance?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I couldn't get a hotel within a hundred miles. Yeah, book like that, was it in advance. Yeah, I couldn't get a hotel within 100 miles, yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 1:Maybe not all right, let's move on. Let's move to murphy, texas, the murphy's 5k and 10k. I know why that was named greg, it's in murphy's anyway. Hailey and cody were there. Uh, beacon falls, connecticut, connecticut. 5k at Beacon Falls, sue. The countdown continues. This is 157 out of 169 for Sue. Got to do something special for Sue when she hits 169. That's really cool. Sue ran this one with Rachel. Rachel completed number 100. Rachel, that's pretty daggum cool too. I didn't notice this. But I'm back to Murphy, texas, because in addition to the 5k and 10k, there was a half marathon. Sam, candice, miranda and Brenna ran the half Over to London, the Lee Valley VeloPark 10k.
Speaker 1:Katie ran this one. This is at the site of the 2012 Olympic Velodrome, which is the big cycling facility, and apparently outside they have a track that's a one mile loop. They ran the 10K on a one mile loop and Katie and others who were there say that this thing's hilly, which surprises me for a cycling track, but apparently it is hilly for a short course. She says the hills were maybe a little tough. Needs a little bit more training before she takes on Dopey. Katie, we all need a little more training before we take on Dopey, don't worry about that, you'll be okay as long as you do that training. The photos she used she posted made it look like she had a good time In Grand Ledge, michigan, the Comet Chase 5K.
Speaker 1:Sean says this wasn't his best race, but what made it better was watching his son run the kids dash and then helping his daughter along on the 5k, getting the run through the finish line with her for the first time. Now, sean, I should have asked, but I'm assuming that means this was your daughter's first 5k. So great memories trump, not so great race conditions. Anytime, sean, I agree with you. In not bentonville, but fort smith, arkansas, the true grit 5k, joe was there. Joe said the three amigos were there, but they didn't place in their age group. Very unusual Reason being the oldest age group started at 61 and went to 99. That kind of stinks, especially in an event that attracts 70-year-old runners, and Joe and his buddies are at those local races all the time. So may not seem like much. But 61 to 71, yeah, it's a big difference when it comes to paces and running. But, joe, we're proud of you anyway.
Speaker 1:Back to England. Anna Anna ran and she does this to me on purpose. I think I've got this one. How about it, anna? Sibley Back, the Sibley Back Gecko Gathering 5K in Cornwall. I hope that's right, and if it's not, it'll give Anna something to write about. That's cool too. This is also a one loop, a one, yeah, one loop race around the beautiful Sibleyback Lake, nice, and flat right around the lake. That's cool. Age group fourth place finish for Anna. Very good Congratulations. She's happy with that. We're happy for you. And there was a cow on the course that created some chaos Not as much chaos as the bears that were.
Speaker 3:I was going to say. What is it with wild animals causing such havoc on courses recently?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know Cows. I think that could be fun.
Speaker 3:I'm terrified, now for bird in hand, that the camel is going to come out and attack us, the camel yeah, It'll just spit on you, Greg. Not that PTSD again.
Speaker 1:Oh, oh my, oh my, yeah, uh, let's go back across the pond, this time to wales, cardiff, capital city. It's a park run. Don't always talk about park runs, but if you guys tell me about them, we'll talk about them. Andrew's 123rd park run, second fastest of 2024, by about 26. Oh, ran about ran this one. They're 5Ks typically. Ran this one at about 26 minutes. That's a good pace. Bigger crowds and he doesn't mean out to watch at park runs, he means bigger participant crowds with some nicer weather. Our friend Rob also talked about a park run, this one at Sutcliffe Park in London. Rob PR'd by one second with a time of 18.04 for his 5K. Rob is so close to breaking 18. I know he's going to do it.
Speaker 1:Park run is so big, especially in the UK and Australia. I'm not sure about other parts of the world. It just doesn't catch on in the US and I've got to tell you. I've gone to a couple in the St Petersburg area and they're fine. Kudos to the folks who organize them. It's a nice trail through a wooded area. It is a 5k. You do get a timed finish, although it's not competitive, but you do get an official time I it's a 30 minute drive to do a three mile race and I just don't do it. But they're a big deal in the UK. So, andrew, rob, great job. Finishing up Saturday in Boise, idaho, the Boise Half Marathon. Rosie and Anita. Rosie ran, said she kind of bonked at mile 10, but Anita was amazing, kept her moving, motivated her, and Rosie ends up with a PR, motivated her and Rosie ends up with a PR. Great story of great teamwork.
Speaker 7:Yeah, great job ladies.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just a couple. On Sunday, the brewery run, ravina Brewing 5K in Chicago. Laura did this one. This one wasn't a closed course so while she's running she had to wait at every intersection, worry about other pedestrians, local traffic. So that was interesting. Still had some good breakfast tacos, enjoyed a drink afterward at a brewery. I would hope so it was all worthwhile. Glad you enjoyed it, laura.
Speaker 1:In Central Park, the New York Roadrunners, achilles Hope and Possibility, four-miler Megan signed up, overslept, didn't make this one, but our friend Heather gosh. It's good to see Heather back out there. This is Heather's first race. I don't know if it's her first race of 24 or not. I don't know if she did one early in January, I cannot remember but I know she had significant surgical procedure done. She's been on the road to recovery and now she's back out doing some racing. I think that's awesome. This is a this particular race, a huge celebration of inclusivity supporting Achilles International. We, way back in the beginning of this podcast, we had some friends on who were affiliated with Achilles International. Heather was lucky enough to represent the Freedom Team in the push rim division. She also got to practice her balancing skills because she was using a borrowed race chair and always fun to master new skills on the course. Heather, really happy to see that you're back out there Finishing up.
Speaker 1:On Monday there's that New York State Park Summer Run Series in Belmont Lake Park, long Island. This one of 5K. Megan, I don't think overslept for this one. It's an evening race but I didn't see a report. Megan Didn't get it in before. You probably will send one, but didn't get it in before we had to go to recording.
Speaker 1:Don't always do virtuals, but Melissa made a nice post about finishing the virtual 5k from the Disney Summer Series in Lower Matacombie Key, one of the Florida Keys. Kind of warm, but I bet it was really pretty. Looked like she enjoyed it and that's it, friends. Congratulations to all of our friends who finished their races this week. It's getting warm, so if you're knocking them out, we're proud of you.
Speaker 1:All right, no Zoom this week or next. Next this Thursday no Zoom. The day of this release. The Thursday after is July 4th, a big celebration day, a big holiday here in the US, so most people have plans for that holiday. We'll skip the 4th. Our next Zoom call will be on the 11th, although I may. I just may take a look at the schedule and try and do one on a Saturday that perhaps some of our friends from Europe could join. If I do it, let's say on a Saturday morning here in the States, we'll see how that goes. All right, my friends, and if you run, you know you are our friend. If you're out there doing the stoked challenge and your muscles are a little stiff, that's not a bad thing. That's a sign that you're getting stronger. Keep it up. Keep up with the training. We start the biggies next week we start marathon, and wine and dine Be exciting. But it's a long, tough road to get through all that. But we'll do it together and until we see you again, happy running.
Speaker 3:The Rise and Run podcast discusses general information about Run Disney and is in no way affiliated with run disney or the walt disney company. Any information or advice discussed on this podcast should not be considered medical advice and should always consult with your health care provider or event organizer. Thank you.
