Rise and Run
Rise and Run
181: Inside the 501st Legion: The Bad Guys Doing Good at runDisney
What happens when the Empire's finest decide to support runners instead of hunting Rebels? This week we're joined by members of the 501st Legion, a global organization of Star Wars cosplayers who bring movie-quality villain costumes to the sidelines of Disney races. Mai, Marianne, and Tony reveal the intense dedication behind their screen-accurate costumes and share heartwarming stories about using their passion to support charities and bring smiles to children in hospitals.
The 501st, known as "the bad guys doing good," demonstrates how fandom can transform into meaningful community service. From cheering strategically at the most challenging points of a race course to bringing joy to sick children, these volunteers exemplify the power of combining passion with purpose.
We also connect with four friends who recently conquered the Tokyo Marathon, one of the most challenging World Majors to access. They share insights about navigating Japan, battling record heat, handling the intense expo chaos, and adapting to a 14-hour time difference. Their post-race adventures in Kyoto, Hiroshima, and Tokyo Disneyland offer valuable tips for anyone planning their own Japanese running adventure.
Plus, we dive into Marathon Weekend 2026 registration details (which sold out in record time), discuss the promising Hollarhype app that delivers personalized audio messages during runs, and celebrate weekend race achievements from our community.
Whether you're a Star Wars enthusiast, a World Majors aspirant, or preparing for your next Disney race, this episode combines inspiration with practical advice to elevate your running journey. May the course be with you!
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3 am again.
Speaker 2: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 3:Hi, my name is Robert. I just ran the Disney World 5K and you're listening to the Rise and Run podcast.
Speaker 4:Robert, thanks for the intro. We appreciate it. Hey, friends, that's the last intro we've got in the queue, so how about sending us some? We look forward to getting them from you. Oh, hey, friends, welcome to episode 181 of the Rise and Run podcast. I'm Bob. I'm here this week with Jack.
Speaker 5:Hiya.
Speaker 4:With Alicia Hello. With John hey, how you doing. With Lexi, hello. And with Greg, hey, hey. Hey, hiya gang, good to see you. This week we talk with folks from the 501st. If you're not sure who the 501st is, okay, that's good. That's good. That was perfect. We'll leave it there. Hang on, you'll catch up with the rest of it after that. It was a fun interview. We're glad to talk with them. We also talked with four of our friends who went over to Japan and ran the Tokyo Marathon last week. We hope you'll enjoy that.
Speaker 5:If you enjoy the Rise and Run podcast, go ahead and share us with your friends and introduce them to the Rise and Run family. We want to share in the Run Disney journey, so please remember to follow us on Facebook at Rise and Run Podcast and Instagram at Rise and Run Pod. Check out our YouTube channel and visit our webpage riseandrunpodcastcom If you have any questions, comments, race reports or want to introduce an upcoming episode. Yeah, call us at 727-266-2344 and leave us a recorded message.
Speaker 4:Jack, give him that number again because we need recorded intros.
Speaker 5:I got you, Bob. It is 727-266-2344.
Speaker 4:Operators are not standing by. It's a recorded line. Nobody's going to answer. Answer, but you'll get a recording to leave a message.
Speaker 2:We'd also like to thank our patreons, whose support helps keep the rise and run podcast rising and running. If you'd like to join our patreon team, please check out patreoncom slash rise and run podcast. And we want to go ahead and thank our newest Rise and Run Patreon member, sarah, who joined the. Hey how you doing level. And speaking of our Patreon team, I want to make sure that everyone is aware. Be sure to check your inboxes so I don't bombard you with a collection of 32 emails.
Speaker 2:What I've done is know right now what we need our patrons for is to vote for next week's episode, our upcoming round one of rise and run march madness table service edition. Again, the patreon. Since there's only six of us, if we have a tie, we're going to need a tiebreaker, and that tiebreaker does go to the Patreon. So make sure you get your votes in before we're going to call it Tuesday morning of next week, so that's when we'll shut it all down. But yeah, so again, make sure you check your emails. I've been sending out one per day per specialty region, including the plastic cheese region, the sports speed region, the banana region and the last region in honor of our friend Tom Stover over at the We'll Run For Podcast the Cliffs Blocks region, so be sure to go check that out and get your vote in.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think it's a lot of fun Looking forward to that starting next week, huh.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 4:All right Friends. Rise and Ride podcast sponsored by Magic Bound Travel. Our friends Brad and Maggie were with us last week talking about the Rise and Run Cruise in April of 2026. Info on that's on the Magic Bound Travel website. Maggie wants us to know that MBT is ready to help the Rise and Run guests for 2026, just as soon as Disney releases room availability. Right now, unless your travels start in 2025 and extend to the first two weeks of 26, they can't book rooms for you yet. However, if you put a request in and get in the queue, then you will be amongst the first to get quotes as soon as the rooms are available. So now's the time. Magicboundtravelcom is the website. Check them out.
Speaker 4:I've got. I'm going to put it in the apologies and alibis section because in my notes this is where it comes. But, friends, I spend a lot of time and I'm glad to do it. I enjoy it working on the race report spotlight Every now and then, as exhaustive as my search is, I'll be on our Facebook group page on Wednesday and I'll see.
Speaker 4:Oh look, somebody ran a race last weekend and I never saw this post. Never saw it. Our buddy, shelby Allison, was that person last week and I've got to talk about this one because she ran the Little Rock Arkansas half marathon. Well, I think. Well, she ran the 10K and the half marathon and she PR'd in both of them, so I don't want to overlook that. Plus, she is working with her newly established and I think she had a hand in establishing this the Fun Arkansas Racing Team. That's right, sa runs for fart, but they did that on purpose. Oh, nice job, my friend. I'm sorry I missed it, but I'm glad we got to make it up for you. Let's take a look at the training calendar. Spring time surprise, three weeks away. Oh, I'm getting excited. This is training week 15. Your assignment for this weekend is four miles, including a magic mile. Anybody else have mixed emotions about springtime surprise being so close at hand? I'm excited.
Speaker 2:No, you're, you're. No, you're absolutely right. It's a fabulous weekend, but it also means we're not going to see friends for a really long time. That's it, yeah.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that's it. I'm also still waiting to hear about what Brooks has to New Balance. Brooks, it's Brooks it used to be New Balance. I do that all the time. It used to be New Balance. I do that all the time. It used to be New Balance. And now it's Brooks. Waiting to see what happens with Brooks, with the sportswear, and I would have thought we'd have heard something about the shoes by now, but we haven't. It's got to be the shoes Got to be the shoes. That's not the wrong franchise, though, john.
Speaker 9:Oh sorry.
Speaker 4:Mars Blackman Mars, John. Oh, sorry, that's yeah, that's not Mars Blackman Mars. Yeah, All right. So all that's on the training calendar right now. Kids Training updates Anybody?
Speaker 9:I can say that I ran my first run since the marathon weekend and it went pretty well. I was Good. I said, let me get out there and at least try to get three. I said, okay, I did 4.2. So I was happy with it.
Speaker 5:Oh wow, Look at you being overachiever. You're going out for three. It's at 4.2.
Speaker 9:Well, I got to the point where I felt okay, well, the first five minutes I'm like why am I doing this? You know how that goes.
Speaker 8:Oh yeah, that's always first yeah.
Speaker 9:Then I'm like, okay, actually I feel okay, I can do another, I can extend this loop out of half and get back to my house about about four. So I did it. I I probably could have went longer, but this was a good. I didn't want to push myself too far, but it was. It was well. I. I have been training other ways besides running, but I think the running is going to get my I guess my cardiovascular up a little better than what I. It should have been Okay, good.
Speaker 7:I have been dealing with not really injuries, but a lot of little things that keep happening. I had a problem with my ankle and now my shoulder has tension in it, but I've been going for walks, fast walks, with my dog, yogi. Today we did four miles and we actually got negative splits on each mile, which I was pretty proud of for us, and so I'm just doing what I can at the moment. Hopefully I'll get back into running again soon, but at least I'm able to move my body and, um, it's something. Hopefully I'll be ready for springtime.
Speaker 2:Yeah, is that a PR for Yogi?
Speaker 7:Uh, no, he actually has done a 10 K before.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay.
Speaker 7:He's a little dog, but I told him today cause we went for two miles yesterday. I said it's a long walk. Are you sure you want to go? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I want to go. And we got home and he has been sleeping ever since, but he had a great time. He loves it.
Speaker 9:Good, that's good. You know, Jeff keeps saying walk the miles. If you can walk the miles as you can, Yep, you know what it does help, but the motion is a little bit different. That's the only thing. But it does help.
Speaker 4:It is yep.
Speaker 7:Yeah, it is, but Sometime on my feet is better than nothing.
Speaker 4:Yes, we'll go into that in depth. Maybe when we get into the summertime, when we're not talking about races coming up and we're looking for something to talk about, that's always a good topic.
Speaker 2:Training for me this past week went really well. I had the uh pen ultimate simulation weekend so I did the the one, four and ten and everything went really really well. You know, again, it's it's those that time by yourself. Sometimes it really gets to you. But you know, you just got to work on those mental exercises to keep yourself entertained, or music or podcast, or you know, one of my favorite things I remember Brittany Charbonneau told us years ago is every mile pick a different color and try to find something out on your trail or whatnot. So lots of different exercises to do there.
Speaker 2:I will say I talked the other week about wearing a weighted vest and I don't know, either smartly or foolishly, decided to wear the weighted vest for the four mile uh walk and let me tell you that is quite humbling. So when it came time to do the 10 miles the next day, shoulders were a little sore, but I know in the end it will all uh benefit in helping prevent osteoporosis and everything like that. And I was very happy with my. I was very consistent in my 10 miles. All my splits were within 10 to 15 seconds of one another. So it really goes to show what Run Walk can do for you. So yeah, I'm real excited to get down to Orlando here in a couple of weeks.
Speaker 4:Hey gang who used the Holler Hype app this weekend? I did yeah, yeah, it was a very pleasant experience here in a couple of weeks.
Speaker 2:Hey gang who used the holler hype app this weekend? I did yeah. Yeah, it was. It was a very pleasant experience. I think over the course of my 10 miles I got 12 hypes oh nice which was, uh, which was really nice, and you know it worked exactly as advertised.
Speaker 2:Um, you know, as emily said in the interview, uh, last week, you know so, the whole, the whole time I was running I was listening to spotify and it, you know, whenever a hype came in, it would, you know, gradually dip the music down a little bit enough that you could still clearly hear what was being said. And you know, a lot of it was extremely motivating, and I absolutely loved hearing from a lot of my friends. I got a hey how you doing? From John, which is nice, and you know Alicia sent me one as well too, I will say, though, from the person who is doing the hyping.
Speaker 2:And this is just for me. I just want to say this as a blanket statement in general, because we're not pulling out our phones to look and see who's sending the hype. It might be a really good idea to mention your name when you're hyping someone, in the event that that person doesn't know who you are. Or maybe you know who they are but you don't recognize their voice, or something like that. Like you know, the first one I got was from our buddy, rob, and you know he was like hey, greg, you know, this is rob, I'm. You know, I'm down florida walking my dogs right now. I know you're doing great.
Speaker 2:So, even though I've met rob before, you know, once or once or twice, I was able to make that, you know, that vocal connection and everything like that, and that and that made the experience a lot better for me. So some people did that, others didn't. Regardless if you did or did not, I really appreciate all the hypes. I loved sending them out. I made sure Bobby will appreciate this one. Our buddy Kay was out on a 12-mile run this past weekend so I hyped her by singing the Eagles fight song and I think she really, really enjoyed that.
Speaker 4:I'll bet you did, I bet you did. You probably really enjoyed it.
Speaker 5:Does it scare you when it goes off? Because I know for vacation races. They had something very similar during my 50-miler and I felt like I was jumping out of my skin because I didn't. It just popped out of nowhere.
Speaker 9:It could have been that, because I know she said they do have some. Emily did say there's some affiliations at bigger races.
Speaker 2:So you know. But Jack, to answer your question, no, it didn't scare me at all. It was usually the way you could tell is there was maybe about like a second or two where you could hear that transitional period of your music dipping down and then hearing the message. So it didn't catch you off guard like that.
Speaker 2:So no, I wouldn't say it scared me by any means that makes a difference, because I didn't have any music going on so all of a sudden it would be pure silence out in the woods, and then no, I will say the one thing that holler hype really reminded me of and grant, I have not used this for years, but when nike had their running app, you could send a cheer. So it wasn't like an audible message, but it was just like a clap or like a yeah, exactly so. So it reminded me a lot of that product from years ago, but it was just.
Speaker 4:It was great to have the personalized message attached to it I know what I'm doing now, and next time I get the word that jack's out, I'm gonna sit back here.
Speaker 5:Hey, jack, you know you would. Oh god, I should get the app.
Speaker 4:I'm curious I'll tell you what I. I wanted to use it. This weekend I had a race in uh st petersburg and I took off at I don't know 5, 45 in the morning, had all my stuff laid out, realized I didn't bring my headset with me, because I usually don't take it with me on a race, so I was out as far as getting hypes was concerned, but I did send one. I did, however, read in the chat groups and in our socials a lot of people using it and a lot of people just really liking it a lot, which does not surprise me at all so it was great to see the activity feed portion of the app.
Speaker 2:Just the the sheer number of people you know, within the rise and run group, just you know, supporting one another was really, really fantastic. Now, the last note that I'll mention about holler. Hype is, as emily mentioned and for those people that have used it so far, is you know it does track your mileage and, I think, like your, your local temperature or something like that yeah, right, I would I would make sure that you have either a run keeper going a strava or your watch, because the gps that is associated with the app is not very accurate.
Speaker 2:Because I did 10 miles on saturday and when I finished I got a like a text or a facebook message from someone and it was like, boy, you went longer than you, than you were supposed to and I was like no, I didn't. And then I looked at the holler hype and it said I, I went 17 and a half miles and I'm like, no, I only did 10.
Speaker 4:So it's very runner friendly.
Speaker 2:It is very runner friendly, absolutely.
Speaker 9:Hey, you know it's there, so you did it, that's true, you got proof, it's documented, so it is proof.
Speaker 2:There we go.
Speaker 4:Well, again, this is something we're bringing to your attention because we think you're going to enjoy it. This is not a sponsor or not an affiliate, so we're not out making money off of this and we just think it's a neat thing and we think our friends will enjoy it. Let us see, gang, what went on earlier today, which was actually two days ago. Oh yes, marathon weekend registration, or, in the case I'll tell you, in my case, it's probably my busiest week, my busiest hour, certainly of the month, if not of the year. We got a lot of things going on during registration, but man, oh man, did that go fast. How did we do? Who got in and what did you get in for? How did you do?
Speaker 9:I did. I got in. I got the two races I wanted I'm in for the marathon and I'm in for the 5k but it was a very stressful morning.
Speaker 5:This was the easiest I ever felt. Well, I mean.
Speaker 9:Well, the registration wasn't stressful, the pre-events before it were. So down the street from my house, a garbage truck hit a telephone pole. Oh my In the morning. So the electric company, the phone company, the internet companies, they were all there fixing the morning. So the electric company, the phone company, the internet companies, they were all there fixing the poles and I'm like, oh great, no, it's going to happen at 10 o'clock, that's when they're going to cut power and cut the internet.
Speaker 9:So I'm like please please, please, let me get in. Well, they didn't cut the power, they didn't cut the internet, so that was pleasant. So it was a little more stressful than it normally would be for me.
Speaker 5:You're usually like a person gets 10, five minutes or whatever, and you didn't today no.
Speaker 9:I got. Everything was an hour. I'm like an hour. Then all of a sudden, like you said, it was an hour. Then it dropped down to 30 minutes, Like in, and I was done. I was done by a 10, 20.
Speaker 5:So oh wow, what do you use Chrome Firefox? Which one worked for you? I'm curious.
Speaker 4:Uh it's random.
Speaker 6:Yeah, I think it's not for him. Yeah, I think it's different.
Speaker 9:No, no, no it's. I've got it on every different browser that I've tried, that's random yeah.
Speaker 6:Dang, it's his internet. I know we need to go to John's house for registration.
Speaker 9:Actually, I have fiber optic cable directly into run Disney servers. That's how I get in Jack.
Speaker 6:I knew it, I knew it All the way across Georgia, down through Florida, all across the states.
Speaker 4:He hops into his Mandalorian Directly to Disney IT. Yep, he registered yesterday. Yeah, that's how it works.
Speaker 7:I got in for just the marathon, which is what I wanted. Just the marathon.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that's good. So I'm excited to be back again.
Speaker 7:Yeah, of course it went pretty smoothly. I I wasn't really panicked. And then when I got off and things went so quickly, they did whoa, maybe I should have been more worried than I was wouldn't change anything, alicia no, I know and I I've been in that place before to our friends who weren't able to get in. I've been in your shoes. Keep checking those notifications because it can open again.
Speaker 4:Yeah, we'll talk about that in a second. I think that's a good topic to bring up. I got the marathon, I didn't get the 5K. Really.
Speaker 10:You didn't get the 5K.
Speaker 4:Nope, I didn't get the 5k. Really, you didn't get the 5k, uh-uh, nope, oh, geez, I am now. I now have a 5k bib. I searched on our friend Matt's Facebook page, team Run Diz, and found out that St Jude's Hospital for Children still had at the time I looked, which was like middle of the afternoon still had charity bibs for I don't. They had it for all the races. I don't know if they had them for the challenges or not. Anyway, they had it for the 5k.
Speaker 9:So I will be doing the 5k for St Jude's more to follow my friends because I'll be begging you for money. Yeah, you know it was interesting, bob. Everything went out really quick, but wine and dine didn't go out as quick as everything did last year, so I think we might have gotten a false sense of security that, okay, this didn't sell out that quick. Maybe it's getting back to where. Maybe you could sign up for the marathon in April May.
Speaker 5:That's how I felt with Alicia when she was saying like, oh yeah, I took my sweet time registering. I did the same because the marathon usually is open for a lot longer, at least. Like days right Usually.
Speaker 7:No, not so much anymore, but it's usually one of the last ones of the day to sell out. Recently, right.
Speaker 4:Well, let's take a look. I've got the numbers in front of me from our friend, ryan Teets. Let's just look at the marathon right now. Marathon sold out in 69 minutes this year, 111 minutes last year. I'm looking in 2023. In 2023, things went really fast, but I'm pretty sure they were still restricting the number of entries in 2023.
Speaker 2:Well, that was also the year of the massive IT issue. Yes, oh yeah, that's right.
Speaker 4:That's right, well, 23, it sold out in less time. But let's go back. And now we're getting into post-COVID and I'm not sure, but in 2020 2020 would have been actually pre-covid guys. 2020 was pre-covid.
Speaker 7:That was a probably 2019 registration date yeah yeah, the full did not sell out until october when I did it in 2018 for my first one. I signed up in october, yep um same.
Speaker 2:And yeah, things have changed drastically since 2019 you know, I I can't remember where I saw it, but someone had made the comment and I think this makes a ton of sense is obviously the popularity of run. Disney has always been there but it has exponentially grown in the last couple of years, but you almost kind of have to credit COVID to a running boom. Actually, this is slowly coming back to me now the fact that the acceptance rate for the lottery for the New York City marathon was only two to three percent and the fact that you know, with lockdowns and and being home and and working from home and all that jazz, I think that created a new renaissance and running for a lot of people who had never considered it before and now they're part of this activity and you know they're looking for races to do and obviously that includes the world majors and run Disney as well as local races as well too.
Speaker 2:So a lot of this does kind of track it, in my opinion, and I think also, you have to credit social media.
Speaker 6:Oh, a thousand percent, yep you know, in the past six, seven years you look at how many influencers there are and how many people vlog their runs and how many you know like it started with what res runs was one of the first yeah, the first and and now?
Speaker 6:um, you have so many like you can just google. I mean you can put in youtube, run disney, and you get 50, 60, 100 hits. And I think that is also accredited to the fomo, because when people you know hear things or watch things, they're like oh, I want to do that and it makes it more popular.
Speaker 5:I remember watching uh, it was during COVID and someone ran a marathon on their balcony. That's desperation, that's pretty impressive, Cause that's a lot of like turning backyard backyard marathons yeah.
Speaker 8:Let's take a quick look at these.
Speaker 4:take a quick look at these numbers from our friend Ryan. The first thing to sell out was the 5K. It sold out in 44 minutes. I'm not going to go through every one of them In order. Then the 10K and Goofy sold out almost the same time, dopey, then the Marathon and the last thing to sell out was the half hour and 20 minutes. So by an hour and 20 minutes everything was sold out. Comparing that to previous years, that's much faster than last year where it ranged from 70, no 53 minutes to two hours. 2024 was actually similar to this year I was going to say 24 looks very similar to 26.
Speaker 4:Similar to this year. Uh 23, as we already mentioned, was an anomaly and then, as you go back in time, it took them a little longer to sell out. Ryan, thanks for sending that info. I'm posting it on the Facebook page. It's interesting stuff I'm posting it on the Facebook page.
Speaker 9:It's interesting stuff, bob, when you couldn't get into the marathon, was that because you signed up for the 5k? You signed up for the marathon, then went back in for the 5k, or when you did both, it was gone already.
Speaker 4:No, 5k was gone before I got into the registration link. So by the time I got in there, the only thing I had available that I wanted was the marathon. I didn't even have an option for the 5k. So yeah, but that's going to work out, we'll be okay. Uh, charity bibs again.
Speaker 2:That's one way to go yep, that's the route I went. So in theory I was. I mean, I logged in to to help friends and, and thankfully I logged in to help friends and thankfully I was able to help a couple of friends, which always makes me feel good. But so I wasn't really necessarily stressed out today, which was nice. But I'm thrilled to be running once again on behalf of Give Kids the World for just the half marathon, give Kids the World for just the half marathon. So, bob, you and I, we should powwow a little later on, maybe some combined ideas that we can do to help both of our charity bibs. So I'm definitely excited to be helping out such a wonderful organization.
Speaker 2:And I will say this in chatting with Give Kids the World today. I can't speak for other charities, but obviously I think this is a really sought after race weekend because by the time I was chatting with them middle of Tuesday afternoon, they informed me that they were already sold out of the full goofy and dopey. So I mean, which is wonderful for all of these charities that you know, it's, you know, a positive double-edged sword in terms of you're able to get into the race and you're also able to help out fabulous organizations. So it's a wonderful route to go, but, you know, check the the spreadsheet that mark does for us. Check out matt's website. Yeah, um, you know, if this is a route that you feel like you need to go and really do some good in the world, yeah, the other thing is to get on Telegram and again Matt's the guy there and look for the announcements.
Speaker 4:Join the Disney notifications. I don't know exactly what it's called, but it's not hard to do. If I could figure it out, it can't be that hard.
Speaker 9:It's the Run Diz Alerts on Twitter or X, whatever you want to call it. But if you go to his webpage, team Run Diz, he has a page just for that with all the different ones. But he says Telegram is the best one, with most accurate one, I think he said yeah, that's why I used it.
Speaker 4:The other thing I will say is I actually had a good time today. I mean, yeah, it's stressful, alicia, maybe I should have been more stressed than I was, but we had a bunch of folks in the rise and run marathon weekend chat, the community chat on Facebook. But I also opened a zoom link and we had 30 or 40 people on Zoom just talking to one another and I know a lot of folks got helped and I know a lot of folks got in and I'm excited for that. I love seeing the excitement of folks. I say this every year there are three exciting days when it comes to dopey or the marathon the day you register, especially the first time that's really exciting. The day you start training.
Speaker 9:And then the day you finish the event, and in between it's hard it's hard, but I was telling somebody last night I think I get more nervous about registering than actually running the race.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I would say that now, after doing a few races.
Speaker 9:Race day, you know, yeah, I got to do dopey, I got to do a marathon, but that day you're trying, can I get in? Oh my God, is this going to happen? You know it's a little more nerve wracking, I think.
Speaker 4:You know I'll hit race number 60 at springtime. Surprise, this is the first time. No, okay, I'm going to say this is the first time I failed to get something I wanted. That's not entirely true. There was a year where I wanted to get dopey that was three years ago and didn't get it and ended up with the marathon that ended up being a blessing in disguise. That was three years ago. Yep, yep, what? The heck it was yeah.
Speaker 5:Either time has flown or, like I keep thinking, we've been doing the podcast for a lot longer than we have.
Speaker 4:Well, we're coming up on four years. Four years in October, that's wild, I for a lot longer than we have. Well, we're coming up on four years. Four years in October. That's wild. I love you guys, I love you too. Oh, calm down Wait hold on.
Speaker 2:Jack said I love you. I thought she was against love based on the podcast the other week.
Speaker 4:It's not against love.
Speaker 5:No love for Jack. It reminds me of the virtual series that Half does.
Speaker 2:I know I'm just teasing you. It's fun.
Speaker 9:So, Bob, I have another question for you. So for the 5K, what are we doing, Aliens?
Speaker 4:Aliens. Good question, john.
Speaker 9:Which Sigourney Weaver aliens.
Speaker 4:The Toy Story aliens. Okay, good, Toy Story aliens. I don't again. I don't have a line on shirts, but there are plenty of shirts out there. In fact, Kauai and Pizza Apparel has one. It's a good looking shirt, yeah.
Speaker 9:I really want somebody to dress up as sigourney weaver now. That that would just be fantastic. You, you know, somebody will. Now you know that yes absolutely, and and I think, I think actually our buddy, alan is actually doing the 5k this year yes, he is, because he wants to be an alien yes, yes, he is so sweet alan's also doing the 5k and, of course, the full, because he's perfect, um, but yep, he's excited about it.
Speaker 4:So that's what we're doing, john, we're. We're doing the aliens instead of the dalmatians. This year we're the toy story aliens. So I think that's going to be a lot of fun. Again, I know people are excited about it. If you signed up for a charity bib, don't forget, john posts a fundraising thread on our Facebook page every month, so that's available for you to use. Of course, in any way we can help you out, just let us know. There are episodes of the podcast. I don't have them in front of me when we talked about fundraising efforts. I'll go ahead and look those up for next week and let you I think there's a I know there's one that we dedicated the episode to, if I'm not mistaken, I put the links to the fundraising podcasts in the post.
Speaker 2:Okay, the two that stick out to me is when this was very early on, when we had Peter Brookhart on.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And also our buddy KG from the Living, the KG Life podcast.
Speaker 10:Right.
Speaker 2:Those are our two main ones that are dedicated to fundraising.
Speaker 4:Okay, well, there we go. Hope you got what you wanted, friends. If not, don't give up, it's not over. You've got other avenues and it's exciting. We hope to see you there. All right, friends, let's visit with our guests for the week.
Speaker 9:Okay, so let's welcome some guests from a galaxy far away. Let's welcome Mai, Marianne and Tony, who you might have seen recently cheering at the Disneyland races in California. Welcome, guys.
Speaker 4:Hello, hey, thanks for joining us, thanks for having us.
Speaker 9:Let's get started. Let's tell us about yourself some background. Do you run Disney? Do you run besides cheering? What else do you guys do?
Speaker 12:I'm Mary Annie. I am currently working at Disneyland but I do run at the run Disney sometimes. Mostly it has been in Florida for that one, when they had it only in Florida and they took it away from Disneyland side, been in Florida for that one when they had it only in Florida and they took it away from Disneyland side. Uh, but I've done like the Marvel ones but any of the ones that are Disney light side ones over here I would have them doing the cheering while the dark side I'll be running.
Speaker 11:I'm. I'm the reason why they've done some run Disney's, because I happen to see it one day. I was like that looks kind of cool. And so I trained and I did the Dumbledare 2016. Yeah, go big. And then go home, saw a family model here and then yeah, and then yeah, and then I started doing all the Disneyland runs and then, um, I was like go bigger, and then I did. I was gonna go and start doing my uh coast to coast and I got the Kessel that time and then um and I was going to do the Kessel to Chateau but that was 2020.
Speaker 11:So that didn't happen and uh, yeah. And then, uh, we did for my 40th birthday. We did my princess half marathon, gathered some friends went to Florida did that. It was fun and I tried to do the. I was like I need to do the marathon, gotta get that off my bucket list. So, the full marathon I tried this morning and sadly, I failed and I did not get it was tough, you still got a chance.
Speaker 9:It did go quick.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it went real quick. We've got friends who may not know what the Kessel Run was. Would you explain that?
Speaker 11:It's the Star Wars light side and that's the Disneyland's run and then the Star Wars dark side of Disney World. So you have to do both in order to get the Kessel.
Speaker 4:Get that special medal.
Speaker 11:Most expensive medal so far?
Speaker 5:yes, I wish they still did that. I would do it in a heartbeat and I know john would too.
Speaker 9:Yeah, well, when I started they the kessel run was virtual. Well, the first half of it was virtual, so you did a virtual half and if you? But then if you did the fall, you got that, that, the fall to half. In Florida you got the Kessel Run Challenge medal, but not an official coast to coast Kessel Run medal.
Speaker 4:Yeah, so it's the Star Wars equivalent of the coast to coast medal.
Speaker 11:Yes, yeah.
Speaker 10:Very neat and I am Tony, so I don't do any running Other than the only sport that I do for running is basketball. But I don't do that anymore. I'm tired from that, plus my body's all surgery down and everything like that. So I'm just running. Just gets me tired just thinking about it. So I just like to go support, you know, friends, family that do the runs, cause I know how extremely brutal they are.
Speaker 10:Um, so when, when my came up and asked us to, hey, you want to cheer on the runners and you know, if that gives me a reason to put on my armor and go have fun, I'm all in. I don't care what it is, I'm all about it. Um, as they know. So when she asked me to come do it, I'm like, oh, absolutely, what time we have to do it. She said 5am. I said huh, and so you know I was like just poking fun at that. But we didn't mind that at all. It was, it was nice and easy. You know, we suit up and stand out there and take 1000 pictures with people and hugs, high fives and all that.
Speaker 7:So that's how it started pictures with people and hugs, high fives and all that. So that's how it started. So, tony, you're kind of alluding to it, but why don't you tell our friends what the name of your Legion is and what you all do.
Speaker 12:So we have a costuming group called the 501st and basically the group is trying to be as accurate as possible with either the movies or games or whichever, or and then, uh, to take a next step utilizes our costume for charity. So, uh, yeah, pretty much. That is the five.
Speaker 10:And there's about 15 to, I think, now, almost 16,000 members worldwide. Wow yeah. From all over every country, continent, every planet. I mean they from all over Every country, continent, every planet.
Speaker 4:I mean they're all over the place. I like that, that's good.
Speaker 10:Yeah, so it's well-known. It's interesting. You know, the charity aspect of it is why we do it. You know it's all volunteer work. We don't get paid, you know. So that's part of the 501st as well.
Speaker 12:Yeah, our motto is literally the bad guys doing good.
Speaker 4:Yeah, nice.
Speaker 12:We do also have other costuming groups as well. So for 501st it's mostly the bad guys, if anything. But there's also Rebel Legions, mandelmerks or even the R2 Builders right over there. There's definitely other groups out there.
Speaker 10:Yeah, they got the. Dynasty stuff like that too. I had no idea. Yeah, there's a bunch of groups kind of umbrellaed under us. The closest one is the Rebel Legion. They're basically like our sister, you know. Club yeah sister club to us. Cool, we do all events, they're always included. Yeah, it's just a big family.
Speaker 9:You can't have the good guys without the bad guys. Right, Right.
Speaker 5:I mean, yeah, that's true. In case you haven't figured it out, this is kind of uh, it's in the world of star wars, correct? Correct, because, I'll be honest, the first time I didn't know you guys's names were as a group called the 500.
Speaker 12:First, I just thought you guys were all employed by disney so actually with the 501st, when it first began it was just a group of people that you know made costumes and then afterwards started to do the charity events with it. But at a certain point it got so big that even George. Lucas noticed about that. Oh yeah.
Speaker 5:Please tell me you saw him.
Speaker 12:Well, I mean, we've done like conventions, you know. So with that, you may see him once in a while. I don't know if you've heard anything like that, but otherwise, yeah, so when George Lucas, he was fine with us as a costuming group, as long as it's, you know, for charity, not for money, etc. Right right.
Speaker 12:He actually introduced the 501st in canon in terms of Battlefront. That's where they became the clone troopers phase two. So if you see clone troopers with like a little blue on the top of their head over there, those are the actual 501st clone troopers there. So we actually got integrated into the storyline.
Speaker 4:Big deal.
Speaker 12:As far as I know, the founding members, when they first made him they decided it's cool to have a battalion, and usually with them they usually have some kind of odd number on there, so they just named it Five-Wolf First. So as far as I know, We've talked a little bit.
Speaker 4:Did it start out in California, because I'm surprised how big it is.
Speaker 12:I don't think so. I'm trying to remember where it started, but there's usually documentaries out there right now that you can actually check out. I know one of the founding members' name is Alvin Johnson. I'm not sure if he's in New Mexico or something.
Speaker 10:I don't know off the top of our heads. Well, I don't. I could Google it. Where it completely started, but he's basically the founding father of it.
Speaker 12:Correct.
Speaker 10:Yeah, he started it and then it just snowballed and became way bigger than what he ever thought it was going to be. And we've seen him at conventions or even at some social gatherings and some have met him, some have talked to him. I've never been able to see him or talk to him, but just through the avenues that we know of people and we've seen through social media he seems like a great, wonderful guy for what he did. Not just for this yeah, he is his first.
Speaker 4:For what he's turned it into, also the philanthropy it does also.
Speaker 12:I'm going to tear up every time I talk about it, but don't mind me. But yeah, his daughter was actually terminal cancer over there, so yeah, so he decided to. You know, found it for that kind of thing. And then there's also her name is Katie. And what happened? Was she watched? What was it? The Phantom Menace? No, when Pad may was being watched over by rtd2, katie wanted an r2 unit in order to watch over her when she was terminally ill. So so, her the droid, somebody made it, it was r2kt. Yeah so with that, one r2kt is still around.
Speaker 12:Love that, yeah. So with that one, r2kt is still around the world helping out kids, especially with terminal cancer. Watch over them. That's very cool. Also, it got integrated in canon as well, so if you ever see in, I think, Star Wars Rebels, you might find R2KT. It's a pink droid, pink R2.
Speaker 11:I think I've seen a pink R2 before.
Speaker 12:That's the one and then I think in a very, very super brief scene in episode number 7 as well, where they were like in the rebel base area. You could see R2 KT floating by somewhere.
Speaker 5:How do you like become part of the 501st, because it sounds pretty epic it is sometimes a hard, arduous journey, depending on what costume you're looking at.
Speaker 12:Oh so, with that one, the more like known characters, the more it's like really hard to see what kind of all the details. But in the 501st we have what we call the costume reference library, so they list out all the approvable costumes on there and what you need to get started in terms of level of requirement. Get started in terms of level of requirement, which they do have three levels, which is basic, level two and some of them are level three, depending on there. Um, so in my particular costume, which is a shadow stormtrooper, it's based on a new hope. So I have to get like every little thing on a new hope in terms of getting it correct. So even now we have stormtroopers that are based on rogue, one on andor, and it's just little tiny differences here and there. So they're very, very as accurate, as you can see, to like the number of frowns on a helmet. So, like this one in particular, this one has like one, two, three holes on there. There might be a stunt version that has four holes on there. Okay.
Speaker 12:It's very particular.
Speaker 10:I gotcha and my character is a shadow scout which is not really known unless you're deep in the lore of star wars. Um, he's, he's a comic book case, comic book based character. Um, he, they, they're a group of them. Um, they fought against, uh, luke skywalker in one of the comics, I don't remember which one it was. Obviously they ended up losing. Um, they became, uh, vader's kind of right hand men when it came to certain battles. Um, they basically take the front line of everything, um, and kind of, basically, the navy seals of scouts, okay, no kind of playing in the shadows, playing in the dark, you know that type of deal.
Speaker 10:Um, and I got that character from her. Actually, um, she's the one that got me in the legion and so I owe her. I owe her everything and she hears it all the time. Um, but she, her outfit or her armor, I had to modify for my height. You know, I'm six to 200 pounds smaller than me, so there was other things that I had to get built and redone for my, for me till then, wear it. And she was like hey, I'm in this survival first. They do charity work for kids.
Speaker 10:She, smaller than me, so there was other things that I had to get built and redone for my for me to then wear it and she was like, hey, I'm in the survival first. They do charity work for kids. She knows I love kids and loves you know, trying to help out, and you know just how I am. So she's like you should just wear my armor one day to a convention and see how you like it. The moment I put that thing on and I just turned into a superstar. I'm like I'm done. I got to do this.
Speaker 4:You know what I mean and we do. Yeah, we do know what you mean. Yeah, we get it, we get it. I'll get back to that in a second, but we do, we understand. Do you make all of these yourself?
Speaker 12:So in terms of them, there's a hit or miss of what people would do. A lot of people would make their costumes like from scratch. For us we have what we call armor makers, so the folks that has their own build and then they make their own, uh, to share with the legion. So you have to like know who you're from, and they usually sell it like at cost of what they have built it from um. So in terms of that one, either people could do now 3D printing nowadays or, if they do, forming In terms of accuracy, it would have been vacuum forming for a lot of these, but the newer characters, they're going to have crazy details on them nowadays, so a lot of people do 3D printing.
Speaker 10:And all the ranges are very different, from you got your Vader and your Boba Fetts, which are probably the most expensive armors in the Legion, down to a reserve type, pilot or an officer, which is probably the lowest. So you have all the characters in between there and, depending on your budget and what you want to do, you can actually go out and buy it as is, or you can get them made. And then we have these things called armor parties where we all meet up, drill, cut them, paint them, trim them, size them. I mean it's a whole thing and you have 30 people that show up to these things and they're willing to help out, because not everybody like me. I'm not crafty at all, I'm terrible. So I have friends in the Legion that do that and they do that for either a side hustle or they do it as a job, so they'll help you out and paint stuff and cut stuff and sand it and everything Pretty neat.
Speaker 4:When I was talking earlier, you said we knew what you meant. All of us, at one time or other, have run in costume at a Disney event not to the level that you do, but we get it, we get. We understand the reaction that you get and the pleasure that you can see on the faces of others. It's a neat thing, absolutely.
Speaker 10:Yeah, like, my main thing is is just making sure people are happy and I mean we all are all three of us because otherwise we wouldn't be doing it but our, our reaction to their reaction when they see us is the most heartwarming thing in the world because I know from them to how much they run and I just know from running in general how taxing it is, especially when you're going through. You know however many miles you're doing. You get to the halfway point, you're almost done, but then you kind of get that little boost of motivation when you see us or you see other band members or other characters or whoever it may be. Yeah, I feel like when it comes to us, we get so interactive with everybody. Where just this time we had a free hugs I was doing a free hugs sign, giving a bunch of hugs to people and she's out there with her Star Wars sign. We're just trying to bring some fun to what you guys got to go through.
Speaker 4:It's good stuff.
Speaker 9:Yeah, going back to that through it's good stuff. Yeah, going back to that. So I know in the past, uh, disney used the 501st members to supplement, I would say, the race courses for the star wars races in both in disney land and disney world. Have you guys ever been official? I know the last couple of races you were unofficial Star Wars characters. Have you guys ever been official characters?
Speaker 12:In terms of the first I think two or three runs that Disney has done, they did put a cast out to anybody that had a costume, not specifically to the 501st, but however they did put an announcement to the 501st. Uh, but however they did put a announcement to the 501st like hey, anybody interested? Then they could just come over. Uh, I think they did the same thing with like the marvel run as well. They did get a lot of costume folks out there as well, so they're proud of like different clubs as well yeah, I think that first time we got invited to come do that, we had over just about 100 troopers.
Speaker 10:Wow, yeah, it was a huge, huge, huge turn. And then we had one more year after that and then they stopped. I don't know why 2020.
Speaker 11:Oh, it was 2020.
Speaker 10:Okay 2020, stopped it and then we've never heard anything after that, but she's always doing the running Maya is. So we're like, hey, let's keep the tradition going, let's try to bring as many characters back as we can, just to have some fun.
Speaker 11:Just to play off of that, when Disneyland run came back I jokingly said to my sister Marianne, over here I said you know we should just picket it, just strike, say we want Star Wars half back. She thought that was the most funniest concept ever. Just like out of the blue, just in the middle of the race, we're just picketing. It's like we're not going to run. Know, it's like we're not gonna run this until bring star wars half back. But it shockingly, a lot of people love it.
Speaker 11:So we're like let's just make this into a tradition. Just bring our friends. It's not sanctioned by the 501st um, it's just for fun. And you know I'm like tony says, we just enjoy making people you know happy and to cheer people on. Because I've been on the other end and every time I see a marching band or just you know, even though in Disneyland I remember the one sign that always cracks me up was this church that goes take a candy from a stranger and they had like Twizzlers and stuff. Just the signs itself always makes me laugh and that just makes the grind of that 13 miles go.
Speaker 5:I remember you guys from Disneyland, I did the. Disneyland race right when it came back. I do remember that and I was like you know, I really do wish Star Wars would come out. I feel like Disney's hinting towards us that it might just at least for one weekend, because they had a Star Wars-themed race this past January.
Speaker 11:So yeah, that was a 10K. And I almost sent Mary Annie out there when it's like, because her side says please bring Star Wars half back, and then I said the next side, next session's right?
Speaker 4:no, not like that oh right exactly yeah no, it, it needs to be the theme for the weekend.
Speaker 9:Yeah, because when we just ran the marathon last year in Disney World, uh, the backstretch between the, I would say, the transportation center, uh parking lot of, uh, magic kingdom to animal kingdom, it was basically star wars alley. They had, yeah, what about six, seven different character stops.
Speaker 5:I think of uh um, yeah, and they had it where it was like there was smoke coming from places and there were shooting, sounds like a two, two, toot, toot, toot and with lights and everything. Honestly, it was probably my favorite part of the course hey, jack, I almost started into the race report.
Speaker 9:That's an inside joke, folks oh and yeah, but unfortunately when I got there it was light out, so I didn't. I saw the lights going in the background, the sound smoke, but it wasn't dark. It must've been pretty cool If we ran it in the dark. You know what? Who do we have? We had? There was Vader, there was Kylo there was Chibaka.
Speaker 3:Phasma, there's a couple other ones.
Speaker 9:Yeah, there's a couple other ones. Yeah, there's a bunch of them, so maybe they're coming back. We're hoping. My big theory is it's coming back in 2027 for the 50th anniversary and I hope it's big and epic, but who knows?
Speaker 5:oh my god, if they like seriously though I feel like one they're testing it to see if people would actually go for it Again. Obviously you would.
Speaker 4:Oh, there's no question about that.
Speaker 5:And two. My worry is they're only giving us little snippets, but not a full weekend. They're like this will satisfy everybody here's a little segment in marathon and then here's one race. Give me a weekend.
Speaker 4:Okay, we'll have to wait and see.
Speaker 5:I think it'll come I always thought it was cool. I watched, um, there's this guy on youtube who used to do the star wars races called res runs, and um, he did one where it was like you know how you like, towards the end of, I believe, the half marathon. They ended it it, I think, at ESPN, and there was just a straight shot line of you guys I mean to run through that. I don't, I'm pretty sure that has to have been you guys. It was before COVID, it wasn't. Was it all Disney?
Speaker 4:Yeah, that must've been Disney. It was probably Disney Jack.
Speaker 12:Way, way far away from the parks.
Speaker 9:Oh way, way, far away from the parks. Oh okay, 20 2019. When I was there for star wars weekend, the 501st was there helping supplement uh that's cool. You know because they because I mean I don't think disney had jawas and sand and uh, you know sand people as characters. You know because in their, in their costume department, so they were there.
Speaker 11:Unfortunately got rained out most of it, but you know it was, they were all there if I recall correctly, because I did both, uh, the disneyland and disney world star wars one I think it was near um, it was definitely 501st that was there, uh, and they were near Terror, terror. Okay, I do remember that.
Speaker 4:Okay, very good. Hey guys, you talked a bit about charity that you do. Can you tell us more about it? Are there specific charities that you do things for? Is it organized at a big level or locally? Tell us about that.
Speaker 12:Sure, so in the 501st there is a request forum basically for anybody that wants to obtain 501st. However, it is voluntary, so they just put it out. For the areas that we have, which in California alone, we have segmented locations. So in terms of that, we have technically three garrisons we have the San Diego garrison, we have the Orange County garrison, as well as the Bay Area as well, and then we have subgroups in them which we are called squads. So we're the OC squads right over here and there's an LA squad. So we're kind of all like branched out everywhere. So they usually what. We have forums and it's like hey, we have somebody that's interested in doing this. Uh, are you guys interested in whoever has time to make it to each event? In terms of the requests themselves, um, it really depends on the request. Sometimes it could be like book fairs or classroom visits or, uh, you know, like super side things like weddings or the zoo or you know, star wars day zoo.
Speaker 10:The majority of the, the charities that we do that are kind of tied to us, um is make a wish, uh, red cross, blue cross, red Cross, blue Cross and Starlight Foundation. So we do a lot of hospital visits. There's yeah, I think there's two or three throughout the year and they're very small. Only a couple of members can go because they don't want it to be too crazy and it can be overwhelming for some kids and stuff like that. So they have a select few of us that you do it one time and you're good to go, because they want to get as much people as they can to do that.
Speaker 10:So the hospital visits are usually the, for me at least, are the number one troops for me, because you know you go into the rooms that are really really tough. You know kids suffering and dealing with a lot of stuff that we have no idea about, you know, and then the moment we get to walk in there as a costume character, it just you see, you see everything they're going through just completely disappears for a little bit of time. And thank God we have helmets on because there's been multiple times. You know you start to tear, to tear up, you know and it's, but it's. It's the most rewarding feeling in the world. So, with that charity aspect of being able to do those hospital visits or do the school visits or do the you know they even have um outside the hospitals, they'll have troops, they'll have like a little fair going on for, you know, kids and stuff like that. So we'll do those as well. But those are our biggest of charity events that we are associated with.
Speaker 4:That's outstanding guys Very good.
Speaker 9:Thank you.
Speaker 4:My, we've been talking a bunch. Was there some special costume you were going to tell us about, something that had to do with an SNL skit or something like that?
Speaker 11:going to tell us about something had to do with an snl skit or something like that. Yeah, I dressed up as matt the technician. Uh, for both the disneyland and disney world race. Um, it's the skit where. Um it? Who was it?
Speaker 11:basically, which is kylo ren, yeah, and he did a kind of like the hidden boss, undercover boss, that's the show okay, and he was going to be a technician and yeah, and it sounded like yeah, so he was wearing this like construction outfit, like an orange dress and this little name tag that says Matt on it. I had to wear wigs and I hate wearing wigs.
Speaker 4:It's hilarious.
Speaker 11:Just for this, you know, and during the Disney World, during the Disney World I took one of the pictures I had on the Disneyland run and wrote all the Matt, the Technician quotes, on it, and anytime anybody noticed me during the Disney World run I'll hand that card out.
Speaker 7:oh, my gosh, that's amazing it's good job on it.
Speaker 11:And then some matt the technician quote that's hilarious.
Speaker 4:You know. What's fun about this, jack, is that I know john knows everything that our friends are talking about. You and I are sitting here most of it's going over our head, but we're having. We're having a great time with it anyway, and I got a feeling our friends who listen a bunch of them are just going to eat this up and then the rest of them are going to be like me and you, jack, going. Oh, that's cool, that's a good story. So no, I know, star.
Speaker 5:Wars actually pretty well. I just didn't know the 500 at first because I I watched, so I've watched officially the mandalorian. Um, I watched that one and or I've. I've caught up for the most part. There's a lot of the animated stuff I haven't seen though did you know some of the 501st was in the mandalorian some of the parts that you see like a lot of stormtroopers in them, the 501st.
Speaker 10:No way. The main scene in one of the scenes in the Mandalorian, when they got off the little boats and you see them all coming off the boats. I think it was the last episode, the last, second to last episode, where you saw them coming off the boats ready to fight with Moff Gideon. All those characters coming off the boats were 501st members.
Speaker 5:Did you get to do it? No, not me.
Speaker 10:We're not canon, I'm not a canon character, but I'm also not a Stormtrooper. But we both have friends that were actually in that. That was in that movie.
Speaker 9:That's really cool, that's one of the things about the 501st their costumes are pretty much Perfect. Spot on yeah, what do you call it? Set or movie, accurate, so you would not know a difference. You're not going to go on Amazon and pick up a Stormtrooper costume and be in the Mandalorian. No definitely not yeah, these costumes, I've seen them in person and they are spot on.
Speaker 10:It has to be to join the Legion. It has to be movie screen accurate, because what you see in the movies is what we have, and that's the great part about it is. You've got to be so attention to detail with everything, otherwise you won't get approved, because it's that secretive.
Speaker 11:Otherwise you won't get approved because it's that secretive. If I recall, I think when you were trying to join, I think we had to take detailed pictures of the shoulder piece and the head piece, very detailed spots that they want to know that they are as accurate as possible. Yeah, so it is very, very detailed, their costumes for sure.
Speaker 9:Wow, it's impressive guys Go on their website and look at their costuming guide. You would be amazed of the detail that they go down to for being costume accurate. What's the website, John? Is it the 501storg? I think it is right, or is it com?
Speaker 12:com. I think com. Yeah, I heard that they could just Google 501st. That's probably true yeah.
Speaker 10:Either one works. And yeah, like you said, you won't see what we have at a Target or on Amazon or at Walmart for Halloween. You know nothing like that.
Speaker 9:It's it's stuff that we get from prop makers and even going to disneyland and buying one of those helmets there.
Speaker 10:That's not even close right no, no, not at all there. There was actually one of our members when his sons were smaller. They actually remember the they were probably about three feet tall the storm troopers, the little kid toys, but they were about three or four feet tall. One of the members actually hauled, hollowed out all of the pieces and made armor for his kids to join us at events. So that was like the closest thing to target band. You'll see as a as a Legion member, but that was pretty creative for him to do that so his sons can join us.
Speaker 4:That is neat.
Speaker 12:Also to mention with the 501st there is an age limit of 18 and over, but we do have a subgroup. It's called the Galactic Academy and that's for the younglings, if they want to join with costumes. So they still can join, if anything.
Speaker 4:How appropriate?
Speaker 9:That's too cute. Again we started. You guys cheer. I guess first of all you guys want the disney race, the star wars races, back. We all do so, hopefully.
Speaker 11:Run disney, you hear us out there, bring them back we will cheer so hard and we will have a big, big group it. It would be great. Invite the 501st back.
Speaker 9:We will come in masses and when you guys cheered the disneyland races. Is there a specific spot that you guys cheer or you guys pick and choose?
Speaker 11:as as a runner. As a runner, I was really strategic about this. I look at the map, I try to find which place it is, how to get there, because they do you know, block, they do oh, yeah, right yeah, and I know what part I was if I was running it.
Speaker 11:I know where I'm going to be exhausted. Usually is right in the middle. So I aim for six mile six or seven, just for just so you know you get that boost back on the before you go on back. Yeah, so, because I think mile nine they usually have something, so I try to get them around mile six or seven.
Speaker 4:What's up next, guys?
Speaker 11:Anything on the horizon yeah, we'll be there for harrowing.
Speaker 12:We'll be having our signs, pretty much the same as usual, yeah bringing free hugs to all yeah, we're also convinced with the dogs, if it.
Speaker 11:Yeah, you forgot the star wars part, because I noticed I had my dogs with me and and he had his dog and there was a point where everybody's ready to give him a hug and they saw the dogs and they run straight past them and went to pet the dogs oh yeah our dogs are dressed up in costumes and stuff that's my, my youngest, on the first year
Speaker 11:yeah just so you know, he was like the only under 18 year old that was allowed by Disney to run, so yeah, so he has experience in costuming and cheering. You know, the whole goal with that one was to for him to grow up and cheer, and I think he did it for three years before they stopped and people kept coming. I recognize you, you're taller than before they stopped and people kept coming and going. I recognize you, you're taller than before, you know, and whatnot. That was kind of fun.
Speaker 11:So that's why we try to keep this tradition going by cheering the Disneyland half with our signs and whatnot. So far I have seen, especially on a lot of the running the Facebook running forums, they would say like hey, I recognize you guys from last time and I made sure to get pictures with you guys every single time. So I was like now it's our responsibility to keep on keeping on at this point.
Speaker 4:Got it, got it Outstanding.
Speaker 9:I'm glad to see you here, glad to talk Star Wars. I'll talk Star Wars anytime. You guys know that I have weird trivia stuff that I probably pull off. These guys are like, yeah, we're proud of Johnny.
Speaker 4:He kept it under an hour. That's pretty good.
Speaker 9:I just got one question for you guys. It's a. What did Ali call them? Like rapid fire?
Speaker 4:Yeah, here's my.
Speaker 9:It might be even a hot take Rise of the Resistance or Smuggler's Run which one's better? Rise.
Speaker 4:That was easy, John. That was pretty easy.
Speaker 10:I don't know the reason why they're keeping that ride and letting go of Smuggler's Run.
Speaker 9:I was a Smuggler's Run guy.
Speaker 10:There's no wrong answer but yeah, we love the ride.
Speaker 4:Clearly there was.
Speaker 9:as far as you're concerned, Well, for me, putting the Falcon into hyperspace brought me back to a seven-year-old kid, so you know, that's true.
Speaker 1:I mean, we're on the dark side, you know we're on the other side, that's why trust me?
Speaker 9:I know I trust me.
Speaker 10:I like the dark side too the best thing about that ride is just being able to just let the joystick go straight into the ground and just keep bouncing all the way through the ride. You know, yeah. Yeah, you're right, oh yeah.
Speaker 11:That's that's right. Sorry, engineers.
Speaker 9:Yeah, yeah. So, guys, thanks again for joining us. Hopefully we'll see you in Florida when, when, the, when the or California, when the run Disney Star Wars races. Come back and be cheering you guys on, you guys cheering us on.
Speaker 10:Yeah, absolutely. It would be a pleasure, and thank you again for having us and being able to shed some light on what we do and what we're about, because that means a lot to us. So thank you, guys for wanting to do that, and we appreciate that.
Speaker 11:And do say hi to us when Halloween comes by. We do enjoy seeing everybody and giving them high fives and hugs.
Speaker 4:Look, friends, like I said, I believe, as we were talking with our friends from the 501st I know a lot of you out there, just ate that up, just we're all over it understood everything our 501st friends talked about, like john he did, and then I know there are a lot of you like me who a bunch of it went over my head, but I still enjoyed talking with them and I think it'll be fun to see them, uh, out at Disneyland or maybe even at Disney World one of these days. So thanks for joining us 501st. That was great. Oh, let's see Upcoming episodes next week, as we alluded to earlier, we begin. Ba da da da, bum ba da da.
Speaker 4:We begin the March Madness this year. Last year it was Walt Disney World Attractions, this year it is Walt Disney World Sit Down Restaurants.
Speaker 9:And Greg's going to be our own Dick Vitale next week.
Speaker 2:It's awesome, baby Johnny says. I like that guy.
Speaker 4:It's a tipsy dude. Don't go. I like that guy. I mean, he's bigger than life.
Speaker 2:Jersey boy, come on, you know it, listen. You survived cancer, was it four times now? Several times. Yeah, I mean Several times.
Speaker 4:yeah, he lives down in this area. He does yeah, I don't have him over to lunch or anything, but he lives.
Speaker 2:If you have him over to lunch, you better call me, because I'd be down there in the heartbeat, but I think he's a good guy.
Speaker 4:Anyway, that should be fun. That starts next week. Hope you enjoy it. Now it's time for the Race Report. The Race Report brought to you by Stoked Metabolic Training. Our friend Tom Stokes, stokesfit slash, rise and run coaching is the website Got several programs the Accelerate program, the Foundations program and his one-on-one coaching. You can find out more about all of those at that website or there's a link in the pinned section, the featured section of our Facebook group. Tom's eight-week New Year challenge is wrapping up so we'll have him back on the podcast here soon to tell us all about how that went and maybe let us know if he's got plans for something else in the future.
Speaker 4:Here, friends, let's go back a week and for our race report spotlight let's revisit the tokyo marathon. I know it was a week ago, but understand it's tough with the time zone changes and people with traveling plans and all that. It's tough to get everybody together the Tuesday after the race. So for this one we put it off a week and we're excited to have Danielle, hi, sarah, hello Carrie, hey there, and still in Japan where it's morning time. She just got up from breakfast. Lori, morning, yeah, see, she did that on purpose. Well, ladies, thank you, we're glad that you're here. This is exciting. The Tokyo Marathon, in terms of the big six, is the one that I think folks have the toughest time getting to or getting into, and I'm going to ask a question. I'll go around the room on this one. I make the assumption that if you're doing Tokyo, you have plans to do all six. Am I correct? Yeah, everybody's shaking their head. No negative responses there.
Speaker 4:Okay, was this number six for anyone? Nope, a lot of negative responses there. Okay, was this number six for anyone? No, a lot of negative responses on that one. Five for carrie. How about you, danny? This is five, for me five sarah number five five laurie uh number four oh, laurie, um well that begs me again in the fall bob okay. Well, that begs the question what's next, lori? What's left?
Speaker 8:I mean lori, I'll start with you uh, so I'm doing um new york in the fall, and then somehow I'm gonna have to find a way to get into boston yeah, that's, that's the other.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that's the other. Tough one, sarah. What's's left?
Speaker 14:So I'm doing Sydney in August, and then I've got Boston.
Speaker 4:Boston. Yeah, sydney outstanding. We got to hear about that.
Speaker 9:But Sydney is not. Is that still considered?
Speaker 3:It's a world major.
Speaker 9:Yeah, but there's no star for that yet, right yeah?
Speaker 13:You get the star for Sydney, but it's not part of the six star program.
Speaker 4:Okay, there's no recognition for it being part of a program yet until there's two other world majors which should be added in the future yeah, and I don't think they wanted to mess with anybody who was, you know, so close to finishing and had put all this time, money and effort into it. Danielle, what's?
Speaker 13:left. I am doing Boston in April for star number six and I am also going to Sydney this summer to get star number seven.
Speaker 4:Wow, wow, that's great, carrie. How about you? Boston? Yeah, well, I think Tokyo may be the toughest to get to, boston's probably the toughest to get in, and I know the fundraising requirements for charity are major, not insignificant for that one, but that's awesome. Well, let's talk about this one. Let's start with travel. When did you get there? How long did you stay? Lori? I already told everybody you were still there, so let me start back over with Carrie. When did you get there? How long did you stay, carrie?
Speaker 3:I got there Wednesday night pretty late and then came back Wednesday afternoon.
Speaker 4:Okay, so about a week Nice.
Speaker 13:Danielle Ikyo um on the 26th of february, which was a wednesday in the afternoon, and I flew home thursday march 6th okay, good, how about it, sarah?
Speaker 14:I was uh, came in monday night, uh before the race and then stayed till wednesday, so 10 days that's nice.
Speaker 4:Y'all made a good trip out and, laurie, we you've told us you're leaving tomorrow. How long have you been there?
Speaker 8:uh, we got in on monday before the race, so total uh, 17 nights here oh wow, that's fantastic.
Speaker 4:What a wonderful trip. I'm glad y'all were able to make more of it. I know my buddy, adam, went to South Africa. I think he was there overnight and did a marathon. I think he was two nights, to be honest, but that was a different story. No, he actually did an ultra, is what it was. Those ultra folks are crazy.
Speaker 9:We are like 14-hour difference, I think between 13, depending on time change, but during the marathon it was a 14-hour change. What did you guys do to get ready for that time change? Because, as we could say right now, lori just woke up in Japan, as if we were recording at seven o'clock PM on a Tuesday night.
Speaker 3:For me. I literally just hit the ground running and stayed up. My body wanted to stay up and then the next night I tried to go to bed, like at their nighttime, at a reasonable time, but then I was up like at 1 am every day. Yeah, yeah. I never. I didn't really feel fatigued, but I just wasn't sleeping on a regular schedule. And I am still not sleeping on a regular schedule.
Speaker 13:Same Carrie. I've been home for five days and I am still waking up at odd hours. I didn't sleep a night straight through in Japan, the flight from Tokyo to Toronto, because I laid over in Toronto. I slept about six hours on the flight and that was the longest stretch I had slept in like 10 days. And even since coming home, that was the longest stretch I had slept in like 10 days. And even since coming home, that was the longest stretch I had slept was that flight. So it's going to take a while to get back on Eastern Standard Time or Eastern Daylight.
Speaker 4:Time. Yeah, it's Daylight Time too. Threw that in. Yeah, I got home.
Speaker 13:Two days later the clocks changed.
Speaker 4:So I have no idea what time it is you exchange so I made it in an hour.
Speaker 14:You still, you still messed up. Sarah, are you doing okay? I'm doing okay. I used this um, really lovely uh app for jet lag that I found uh in one of the tokyo groups that I was part of and I think that helped a lot, particularly going there. It was like you know instructions to wear like sunglasses at weird times of the day. I think you know that that helped, Like I found going there easier than coming back. Oh really. Yeah, just you know, that was just my experience, but yeah.
Speaker 4:It's been many years for me, but I used to find it just the opposite. But and there is light therapy you can do. I think that's what you're talking about, Sarah. Yeah, All right. Well, let's talk about. Let's talk about the race. Let's start with the expo. I imagine pretty neat expo Laurie. Anything special about the expo?
Speaker 8:The expo was really good for me. After experiencing Berlin and the chaos, I found the Expo was relatively smooth. I was in and out around a half an hour Now, the thing that I did do because the ASICS part of the Expo, where you got your merchandise, was insane. People were lined up and but ahead of time I ordered my merchandise directly from the ASIC store and I just went into the store and picked it up. So that was really helpful. But other than that, you know, pretty typical Expo.
Speaker 4:Anything noteworthy Carrie, Danny, Sarah, anything noteworthy about the Expo.
Speaker 13:The Expo was okay. I got there first thing, thursday morning. I waited in the line. We went to the ASICS March 1st because we knew that was going to get crazy and I was one of the lucky ones to be able to snag a jacket at the Expo. I didn't order in time on the ASIC site to either have it stored in Japan or sent to my hotel and that was honestly the craziest part was that section Like there was just a mad dash for the jackets and I somehow got right in front and people were like shoving from every angle and at one point I ducked down to see the second shelf and no one was letting me up.
Speaker 13:I'm like y'all are gonna have to let me up. You cannot keep me pinned to the ground. And I finally was able to get the jacket in my size because they were flying off the shelves and they were in real time behind the curtains like opening boxes and putting them on hangers and putting them out like five or six at a time and just you see hands coming from every direction just snatching, and I managed to get the one or two I needed and I'm yelling at the guy like part the Red Sea, let's go, let's go and I, like, pushed my way out, but that was. That was the most hectic part, but otherwise, lori's right, it was a pretty normal expo. Dead pickup took a while, it was fairly. It was actually very organized. Um, I thought it was organized at least. And then that down in the one of the lower levels of the building, just good amount of vendors, typical expo and I'll just piggyback on danielle.
Speaker 3:I was pinned in the jacket chaos wow after waiting an hour to get into the asIC store and it was maddening how uncontrollable it was, Like it was a-. Were you there Thursday?
Speaker 13:morning too, carrie. Huh, were you there Thursday morning too, carrie.
Speaker 11:Yeah, yeah, we were probably pinned in the same group because I was there.
Speaker 13:I got in line at like 9 am, got in right at 10 and walked right in and got in right forward and I was just pinned.
Speaker 3:It was horrific, like I was panicking, it was like so bad and I, the workers, are trying to tell people to move back and half the crowd doesn't speak english and no one's listening to them, and just the way they had it set up, like the system was just terrible. Like instead of having the jackets all hung up ready to go, they like danielle was saying they were just passing them under a curtain and it was like what are you doing?
Speaker 13:I think that by the time we got in there, there were I think there were jackets on the shelf and they just flew right off. They were restocked. Thank gosh, they were restocking in real time, but they were only putting out like five or six at a time, but it'd be like it'd be like all two xls or all extra smalls or like three large. So it was just you never knew what color, what size was coming out at once, but being pinned up against. Yeah, carrie, I'm agreeing, it was one of the.
Speaker 4:That was terrifying you know what they need. They need a good virtual queue. That's what they need yeah, it made.
Speaker 13:It made run disney expo like that merch. It made that merch area look like a cakewalk. Wow, like nothing. A Run Disney Expo could ever be as chaotic or bad as being pinned in Tokyo.
Speaker 4:Wow, that's really saying something.
Speaker 13:Oh yeah.
Speaker 14:Same experience, Sarah. No, I avoided day one of the Expo. I pre-ordered my merch, having heard about some of the chaos, and it was actually rather pleasant.
Speaker 4:So I feel bad. There's the key.
Speaker 13:I like having the story, but the rest of the expo was great after that.
Speaker 4:Well, let's talk about the race. Tell us about where you stayed, how you got to the start and how that all worked, and then we'll talk about the event itself. Kick us off, sarah. Yeah, so I stayed at the start and how that all worked, and then we'll talk about the event itself. Kick us off, sarah.
Speaker 14:Yeah, so I stayed at the start area, which is Shinjuku area, which was, you know, fairly it made it fairly easy that morning to get to the race. Lots and lots and lots of runners in Shinjuku actually like probably every 10th person it seemed like on the streets were runners, which was kind of cool because I had heard that was one of the things about Tokyo is that it didn't have sort of that same vibe of runners, sort of like infiltrating a city for a world major. But I found, like Shinjuku, there were runners everywhere. So it was kind of cool that way.
Speaker 14:But yeah, and, and you know, getting to the, the start area, I mean I think that's a whole other conversation that everybody probably had some different experiences, but there's a lot of different layers in Tokyo and I actually had to go underground to get to my gate for the start area, which was kind of interesting, and fortunately they had volunteers out in the start area a couple days before the race that were able to sort of like show people around and all the different crowds and stuff. So that I found been really helpful. But yeah, uh, yeah, no, shinjuku was, uh was certainly a, a, a, a cool spot, to stay for sure, for the Carrie, how'd you do?
Speaker 3:Um. I was closer to the finish area and thankfully met a friend in the hotel um leading up to the race and she walked over over. We walked to another hotel and met somebody else that she knew and then we walked together. Otherwise I think I would have been on a blind mission going to the train so you could.
Speaker 4:Oh, to the train. Okay, I was going to ask if you could still walk to the start, but you had to take a train to the start, okay yeah, but it was pretty.
Speaker 3:It wasn't very crowded, which was good, because I was expecting it to be like chaos and it wasn't that bad.
Speaker 4:So Lori, are you still in the same hotel or did you move?
Speaker 8:Oh no, no, we've moved quite a bit. Yeah, we moved around to Hiroshima and Osaka and Kyoto, so we've moved a bit. It sounds like I stayed very close to Sarah and we probably went into the same gate because I also had the underground gate three. But there was volunteers and Rick and I did a walk through them the day before, so I knew where I was going and it was quite easy to find your way.
Speaker 4:Danielle, once you got to the start, I assume they had different start times for different groups.
Speaker 13:They did, and they had different entry points based on your corral and your wave. So I also was part of the underground crew because I was in Corral K Corral K, gate 3, because each corral had a couple, like one or two entry points and like two or three different gates. So I was also part of the very fun underground crew. But I had heard, leading up to it like I was confused, leading up, like what am I going to do? What am I going to do? And the advice I heard was it sounds confusing until you get there and signage is so clear that you're not going to mess up. And that was 100 true.
Speaker 13:I got there the morning of and there was just volunteer after volunteer with signs and arrows and crowds of people and it was fairly easy to get to the start. I didn't. I think I was near the finish line. I was near Tokyo proper, I think. So I know I had to take a train quite a ways to get to the start. I think I was the finish. My friend and I stayed at the Conrad near the Shia Dome area. It was a good location from the finish. We weren't too far on the subway after that, very easy to get around. Once we were there with just the amount of signage and volunteers helping.
Speaker 4:Nice. Once you got used to it, it's good. Any big language barriers.
Speaker 3:I mean it's hit or miss Playing a lot of charades.
Speaker 4:Okay.
Speaker 3:In Google Translate. But there I would say race day, it wasn't as bad. There seems to be more English speaking versus other times of being out and about.
Speaker 4:Well, let's talk about the race itself, the Tokyo Marathon. Y'all got to the start. That's great. I'm glad I know you did, because I know y'all finished. How did it go? How was the course, how was the weather and what were the crowds like? Just what were your memories of running this marathon, lori? Kick us off.
Speaker 8:So weather-wise it was probably low 70s, but it felt much, much warmer and I'm thinking maybe it was because there were so many buildings and concrete and it was creating an effect, but wow, it felt awful warm. I had some issues with leg pain that morning so I was taking it pretty easy because I was not going to risk not finishing this race after going all this way. The course was fine. You know, it was through the cities and there were cultural type events happening on the side, which was nice Drummers and there were some cheerleaders and, um, the biggest memory for me were the crowd. The people were fantastic, way more low-key than any of the other majors, but man, they really feel like they were rooting for you in a more, a more silent way, I guess, and the volunteers, like they were smiling ear to ear the whole time. It was just a really lovely race.
Speaker 4:Sarah, how about you? What were some of the highlights?
Speaker 14:I would agree that the crowds I was surprised. I wasn't expecting as much in terms of crowds and it was lots, lots of people. People like there weren't really any. I think that's the thing. There's a lot of out and backs on that course, so it's easy to have people on those out and backs. It's like, you know, two for one almost, but yeah, and it was great.
Speaker 14:I think one of the unique things too for Tokyo was, like there's a on the course itself. I found there was a certain amount of camaraderie with the international runners. That wasn't something that I noted in other majors, like sort of everybody sort of knew a lot of us had traveled, you know, 13 hours potentially and get like and stuff. So, and you know, this race meant a lot because we all worked hard to get there. So that was neat as well. And certainly the weather was, I would say, probably the biggest thing for me as far as just you know not, and I think probably lots of people can have lots of things to say about this, but just as far as the heat, that was a bit unusual for that race was a bit unexpected. So but yeah, no, it was lovely to be out running the streets of Tokyo, that's for sure.
Speaker 4:That's great, all right. Now it gets tough. Now, danielle and Carrie. It gets tough because you know're trying to think well, what can I say that laurie and sarah didn't? And it's gonna be really tough for you, carrie, because I'm gonna ask danielle next so, um, I heard after that it was a record high for the tokyo marathon oh wow it did.
Speaker 13:Laurie was right. It got to about 70 something degrees. It felt a lot warmer with, um, no shade cover, um the heat definitely impacted the race, um the course itself. I really enjoy. I enjoy the actually running on the physical road itself, because it was I found it to be. Even I've run through new york, I've run through other cities and there's potholes, there's grooves in the ground. The, the worst, worst part of the tokyo courts was like the last half mile and it was cobblestone like running down the final the last half mile, last half mile, it was cobblestone, and then you made a sharp left to the end.
Speaker 13:Um, you know, the crowds were great. Um, I was expecting it to be completely silent from everything I had heard, and while it was quieter than other world majors, it was also louder than I expected it would be. There was great entertainment. There was great course support. The out and backs were a little bit of a mind mess, though, with like. You could be at the 15k mark and starting course support. The out and backs were a little bit of a mind mess, though, with like. You could be at the 15k mark and starting to feel the race. And you see everyone, 30 and 31 yeah back.
Speaker 13:I think the course had three or four different, I think it was at least three different distinct out and backs, so you were just seeing people across the way and then of course I would believe, around, I would see I would had a people across the way and then of course I would. I would, I would had a good enough distance in front of me. But I would see the back of the course, like I saw the sweepers, I saw like people like dropping, and so that was, that was crazy. But it's a race that I am personally glad is over. Um, great experience. Um, I'm sure we can talk about low lights and we can talk about this later, but I don't know if any of y'all were part of the four hour back crew where they ran out of water. On course they ran out of cups, they ran out of water, it was. It was a struggle if you were slower than four hours that's not good more on that.
Speaker 13:I want carrie to have a chance to talk highly good for you, I do like we all have great memories of the race and, yeah, not even the worst part, but tokyo was one for the books it was. It was really really cool getting to run through a lot of culture like a lot of like really cool buildings and the crowds and the cultural events all right, car.
Speaker 4:No pressure, come up with something unique.
Speaker 3:No, go ahead, whatever you want to say it started out in the corrals. You know, to Lori's point, like tons of support, met a lot of international individuals. I met a couple of older women that were in their late 70s, one that had been running for like 30 something years and never heard of the majors before my people.
Speaker 4:Very good she was from Ireland.
Speaker 3:she was very cute, and lots of Sydney people as well, Very scenic, you know, to everybody's point and the cheering it was quiet compared to other majors so that was interesting and them cheering is like this.
Speaker 3:I know you can't see me golf clap golf clap yeah, and it's just like they're very excited and it's very interesting to observe. Um, one of the other highlights was the I don't know if you guys paid attention to the Mario, all the Mario and one Luigi that were towards the cheer sections. That was a really motivating section right there, and some of the dancers and the cheerleaders as well.
Speaker 4:Of course, being flat was flat for the most part, with the exception of a few inclines, but nothing more than that of a few, you know, inclines, but nothing more than that, aside from the water, and that's a big deal, the water, at any event, especially a world major to run out any other low lights. You can go first, carrie. You don't have to have one, though just the heat yeah, I take it, it was sunny uncontrollable, but yeah yeah, was it.
Speaker 4:Was it a sunny day? Yeah, it makes a big difference if that sun's beaming down on you it started in the 30s, like mid-30s so, and it got hot fast really wow. Humidity must have been down for the temps to go up that fast usually mid 30s, meaning celsius no, no no, no, mid-30s celsius.
Speaker 13:They probably would have canceled the race yeah, no, I'm thinking that's 30 to 70 is a big swing, yeah it is yeah I was cold in the corral and then at some point, probably after I crossed the halfway mark, I definitely noticed within like a 20 to 30 minute period, the temperature just spiked like 10, like 10 degree spike in like a 20 to 30 minute period. The temperature just spiked like 10, like 10 degree spike in like a 20 minute period, and it was. It was rough.
Speaker 3:And, with the lack of water, you felt dehydrated, even though you were trying to stay on top of it.
Speaker 13:And that's probably my low light was I. I've gotten a good routine down when it comes to hydration and fueling and because of the hydration issues it totally messed up my fueling. I ended up. It was the most dehydrated and nauseous I had ever felt.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that's rough. It will make you nauseated. It will yeah.
Speaker 13:And it was, you know, selfishly, super frustrating for me because I held on to a PR pace for 17 miles. I held on to a sub five hour for the first 13. And then I held on to a PR for the next five and then lost it at a water stop that ran out of water and then the sun blasted. I couldn't time my salt pads. I couldn't time my fueling right salt tabs I couldn't time. I hate my fueling right because of. And so tokyo did this thing where they had a ton of sport, um, water like sport, drink tables and water tables, but they tried to organize it by the last number of your current, last number of your bib. I think a lot of people missed that because everyone would was crowding all these tables. So the first like tables for bib number, like last like bib, with the last digits of like zero to four, okay, yeah so you had to go to like seven I got you.
Speaker 13:Then we're like, yeah, that was fun. So that way the low light was the lack of hydration and it messing up the fueling. But you know what you win some, you lose some. It's the learning experience. But at the end of the day I'm it's a race that I'm so glad that I went and did I'm sure you did I think, in fairness to tokyo too, this was a record high it was, and they should have.
Speaker 8:They should have gotten it right because, uh, this was the only race that I'd seen about five people being carried off in stretchers. Personally, that's just what I saw, um, but again it's another star yeah, I'm sure you're all very proud.
Speaker 4:We're proud of you because you spent time and because it's a major cultural difference from what we're used to here in the US and Canada. What were a couple of the highlights of your trip outside of the race, Sarah? Why don't you start?
Speaker 14:Oh, I tacked on Kyoto after the race was over and that was by far the highlight was over and uh, that was by far the highlight. Like Kyoto, if, if you're running this race, you have the opportunity to make your way to Kyoto, it really is like another world. I um, it was, I mean just completely, um, you know, it was magical, almost like as far as the culture and the history and all of that. So I would um say that know, if I was going back, I would spend more time in Kyoto and less time in Tokyo. Okay. Yeah that was part of the highlight.
Speaker 4:Carrie, I'm not going to you last this time. How about you? What were some of your highlights of your trip overall?
Speaker 3:The museums. Beforehand, one of the Team lab immersion uh, borderless museums, that was really cool. Um, some shopping and then after, lexi actually helped me plan my trip and I went to disney. So ah, disneyland the weather was horrible, but I persevered and made the best of it.
Speaker 4:I would too. I think we all would. Yeah, good Danielle.
Speaker 13:We were busy going to go to Osaka and Kyoto and stuff like that, but we realized we were trying to tack on too much and I actually got sick upon arriving in. Tokyo. I had a really wicked head and chest cold the entire time we were in Japan so, and my birthday was two days before the Tokyo marathon. So, we actually did Disney before, so I can do Disney for my birthday. But I was sick, so we decided, after our time in Tokyo proper, we went back and did Disneyland for two more days. Okay.
Speaker 13:So we can get a better feel for it. But yeah, the weather was terrible. So from the record high of the marathon, where it was 70 degrees, it was like 40 degrees the rest of the week and on Monday and Tuesday I saw snow.
Speaker 4:Oh, wow.
Speaker 13:It was quite an extreme, my goodness, yeah, that's wild yeah. I know Shanghai is in the running to become a world major in the next couple of years. So if that happens I'll end up going back to Asia.
Speaker 13:So we said at that time we'll go back to Japan and do Kyoto, osaka, maybe go up to Sapporo and see some more of those sites. But Disneyland was really fun, um, and then we got to do I went to um, I forgot what temple I went to, but it was really cool. But we also went to the sky bridge and tokyo tower and the view from the city up high was really, really, really nice, nice, lori.
Speaker 4:I left you for last because you're still there. You can tell us about what you did yesterday, if you want. No, no, no. Tell us some of the highlights, lori.
Speaker 8:One of the highlights that was a surprise to me is we went to Hiroshima to the Peace Park. So that was very sobering, looking at the history and thinking about what's going on in the world. So I really enjoyed that. And then the next day we went to an island just off of Hiroshima and did some hiking, which was fun. This week we went to Nara and there they have these wild deer that they like, these special crackers, and they'll bow to you if you bow to them.
Speaker 4:Well, that was really fun.
Speaker 8:Wow you, if you bow to them. That was really fun. We're getting a little templed and shrined out right now, but I mean there's so many things to do and see here, and we also did Disney at the beginning of our trip.
Speaker 4:Wouldn't want to leave that out, and I wouldn't either. That's good, ladies. Thank you. It sounds like a wonderful trip and a great race. I'm I'm glad you all did it. I'm glad you all finished. Good luck on knocking out the rest of thing. Uh, you'll keep us informed. I know you will, but I'm gonna. I think we're gonna let you go for now.
Speaker 4:Thanks again for joining us thank you, thank you okay, let's get back to this week now and we'll start on Saturday. Let's start over in London at Battersea Park, the Battersea Half Marathon, the site of the Swifty Run. Just a few weeks ago Our friends Amy and Rob did this one. Rob actually paced Amy Multiple laps of the park, for this meant it was pretty flat throughout. That was nice. This is Amy's fastest half in about five years. Good job with the pacing, rob, and good job with the run, amy. Warmest day of the year so far over in the London area. At 11 miles Amy said to herself never again. But she knows that's not true. Good job, folks. Up in Binghamton, new York, steve ran the St Patrick's Day four-Miler and left us this report. Hey, gang.
Speaker 1:This is Steve from Binghamton, New York. Problem with the race report for the St Patrick's Day 4-Miler here in brisk, cold, Binghamton, New York. It's the annual tradition 4-Miler around town, Beautiful day other than about 23 degrees, Very brisk, very windy, but a great turnout. The race had the Guinness stop about halfway through and at the end. You know, as Lizzie would say regarding the bird in hand race, do it for the chicken, we do this one for the corned beef sandwiches and the Guinness at the end, and there were plenty of it, but good time. Had a chance to try out the Holl, and there were plenty of it, but good time. Had a chance to try out the Holler Hype app. Throughout the race A couple hollers came through at just key moments. Really appreciated the hype. So keep that up and happy running.
Speaker 4:Everybody. Sounds like it was pretty cold there, steve, but Guinness and Rubens at the end, so what the heck Sounds good At the Lovers Key State Park in Fort Myers Beach, florida. Rob did the Turtle Trot 5K trail race. Ran with Ash the Bear and Beckham Thor, dog of Thunder, who dragged him to a sub-29-minute finish. Not bad Beautiful course along sandy trails, gravel paths and a stretch on the beach with the Gulf waters all around. We talked about holler hype earlier. Rob said he sent a bunch of holler hypes out. That's cool. Bunch of holler hypes out, that's cool. Tara and Carlos ran a half marathon in Milwaukee, wisconsin indoor.
Speaker 2:This takes the cake for the most interesting race of the weekend, I feel like the Pettit Indoor Half Marathon, the hottest race in the coolest place.
Speaker 4:They call it 48 laps around the indoor track of the Pettit National Ice Center. Now that's a big track. That's more than your standard around the football field quarter mile track, because that would have been 52 plus laps for a half marathon. This one was 48. Temperature stays a constant 55. The course elevation never changes and you get to see your lap time each time around, so it's pretty convenient to adjust your pace. It worked for Tara and Carlos because they both PR'd Congratulations. They actually, at the same location, ran a marathon the next day. None of our friends did it, but there was one there. That's crazy.
Speaker 2:I mean that takes a lot of mental fortitude. I remember during the height of COVID, when my local Y reopened, I remember I had to do like 15 miles and it was like super, super cold outside so I knew there was no way I could pull it off. And I remember doing doing those 15 on the indoor track and ours was 16 laps per mile. And like I, just like you know you're losing count and it's you know, the same thing over and, over and over again.
Speaker 4:It just it really wears on you and you're always turning yeah, yeah. And a lot of those indoor tracks are like that 12, 15, 16 laps to a mile. But this one was like three point something laps to a mile. Oh, not to a mile. Yeah, yeah, three point something laps to a mile, not to a mile. Yeah, three point something laps to a mile. It was less than four, so I don't know Sounds okay, this sounds like a race that Joe would do.
Speaker 9:What does the indoor half? Yeah, running around in circles.
Speaker 4:Yeah, like the numerous times around Hourglass Lake, hourglass Lake. There's an icon there. Yeah, there should numerous times around Hourglass Lake, hourglass Lake. There's an icon there. Yeah, there should be a statue.
Speaker 2:You should get one of those. You know how they have those signs of like the monumental things that happened in that year In the decades? Yeah, I think there should be a decade sign there. 2001 Joe Graham ran dopey. There should be.
Speaker 4:There should be. I agree with you, that'd be neat. Let's go to arizona, to lake havasu, the havasu half marathon. Sarah, with this race, became a five-year legacy runner. At this event had some snafus, logistics wise the bibs got delayed, the bibs got delayed. The bibs got delayed because of a snowstorm in New Mexico, but once everything got worked out and the bibs got delivered, slash picked up, the race was kind of fun. It ended by the beach, so Sarah got to do her annual wade into the water. It was too cold and windy to really go all the way in, but she did get her legs and hips chilled, which felt a lot better after a run. For her legacy status, sarah earned a commemorative sweatshirt, which probably felt good after that dip in the cold water.
Speaker 4:In St Petersburg, florida, at Fort DeSoto, a park that had just recently reopened following the damage from Hurricane Milton, the Florida Shamrock Distance Classic. There was a 5, a 10, 5k, 10k and half marathon. My friends Richard and Krista did the 5K. Richard finished age group third place. Krista finished costume first place. Good for her for her St Patrick's Day costume win 10K. I did the 10K. Great day for a run, almost perfect as far as I'm concerned. Temps high 50s. Winds were calm, flat course. A lot of out and backs. Got to see people over and over. I'm going to call this one an age group PR and an age group third place finish for me, one of the things I like to do as I get older. I challenged myself to run my age in the 10K. Prior to the surgeries I had it was not hard at all. When I was 64, 65, 66, I was still running 10Ks under an hour. Now at 71, that 71 minutes is tough. I missed it by 18 seconds.
Speaker 2:That's okay, though Next time.
Speaker 4:That's okay. It was a good run. I was able to actually run negative splits the entire race. I think miles four and five or three and four were exactly the same time, but everything else the miles were subsequently faster, finished strong, had a good time. Let's see, jeff and Trina were there and they ran the half. Now, this was kind of.
Speaker 4:Trina knows one of the things about these races. They're put on by a group in St Petersburg. I think they're terrific, we have a lot of fun with them, but they almost never start on time. Well, this one started exactly on time and as I'm running out for my 10K, I see Trina walking back towards the start line, because the 10K and a half started at the same time. She got tied up in parking and she got there late. I said to her hey, come join me, we're only. I was only like 200 yards into it, but she knew she couldn't do that because if you don't cross the first timing mat you're not going to get a time. So she went back and did it right, as did Jeff. Trina started out a little fast. I understand why. She wanted to catch up with the back of the pack, which she did. Jeff kind of struggled with it. Trina had a good race, good, solid race. I think she ended up finishing under three hours, does?
Speaker 7:that sound right, alicia? Yeah, yeah, she's been working really hard to get under three hours, so she got that and she also got a six-minute PR.
Speaker 4:Jeff, it wasn't his day, His words, not my day. Dead last start, dead last finish. The finish part's the important part of that, jeff. Good job, the way the course ran. I saw Trina probably I don't know, four or five times on the course and now not to be obnoxious because she was running twice, as far as I was Okay. As I drove out I saw her again. I didn't beep the horn or wave or anything. She had probably about a mile and a half to go when I saw her the last time. But that's a good event, a lot of fun, enjoyed it. Congratulations for the PRs and nice job. Let's go to Nashville.
Speaker 4:The 5K for Alyssa. This is a commemorative run for a young lady who was killed last October. I think it was. Amy was there. Special race day so many reasons Beautiful weather, sun was shining. She had co-workers turned friends at the race, an afternoon of laughter. But first and most important, a run for Alyssa. Amazing race, proud of what she did on such a gorgeous day. Kylie was also there. Kylie ran a PR, commented about the metal which was actually a functional whistle and also the cause for which they ran Out in Los Angeles. Kristen did the Griffith Park Trail Marathon In Montgomery, alabama, the Montgomery Half Marathon.
Speaker 4:Abby was there, lots of fun, lots of great energy. Good day in Montgomery also for running. Lots of fun, lots of great energy. Good day in Montgomery also for running Abby's second half in a week and lasts for a little while as she and her husband will be trying IVF next month. So no running for a little bit, but good luck Abby. Jody was there. Commented also on the nice running temperatures, made good times as they crossed the finish line, had a great time and can't wait to bring others with her when this one comes around again.
Speaker 4:Another event in Nashville the Nashville St Paddy's Half Marathon. Avery was there Starting temps in Nashville, avery says, feels like a 14 with 25 mile an hour. Wind gusts Yikes, but they pushed through. Despite some hills and the weather. Avery got a 21 minute PR in this half. That's awesome.
Speaker 4:In Indianapolis, indiana, they have a six mile run. It's in the 500 Festival Miler Series and the way that works is. The famous event in Indy is the Indy Mini Marathon that coincides with or comes close to the Indy 500. But before they have that, they have a series. They have a three-mile run, a six-mile run and a a 10 mile run, great for training up to the half marathon distance. Tiffany ran the six miler, this time Brisk at the start, but the sun came out and made for perfect weather at the finish. Tiffany doesn't mention a PR. Maybe she's done a six mile run before. I don't think I have, but that's an unusual distance.
Speaker 4:Claremont, florida, over by Disney World, the Spring to Life 10K. Kayla was there A little chilly at the start but it did warm up soon enough. Kayla dressed in layers appropriately, of course kept her in tune with her thoughts and she took a nice quiet run through the state park and knocked out a five minute PR on this 10k. Up in Gainesville, florida, the Florida Track Club, archer Braid Trail. 5k and 10k. Debbie did the 10k. A little bit hilly it gets a little hilly in that part of Florida, not mountains, just a little hilly Out and back on a rails to trails path. Those are nice to run on Trees and wildflowers along the trail, good weather. Running a race while listening to Rise and Run, debbie says, apparently does make you at least 5% faster, because she ran a PR today.
Speaker 2:We just had one of those the other week. Right, Someone got a PR. Was it listening to the podcast or wearing? No, it was wearing the visor, I think, right.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think it was the headband actually.
Speaker 2:I could be wrong. If you start combining a bunch of things, you've got to be careful. Start combining them. I could be wrong, all right. So if you start combining a, bunch of things.
Speaker 4:You got to be careful. You got to be careful.
Speaker 2:Greg Start combining them.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think you've got to be careful combining them. Oh, okay, all right.
Speaker 2:I figured a shirt, a junk band, a visor, while listening to the podcast, I mean at least several minutes.
Speaker 9:You're going to fly.
Speaker 4:You might actually hit the speed of light. They go back in time. I don't uh. Well, in fact, debbie mentions uh that the next time she's going to wear her rise and run shirt for the extra speed bonus, I did warn her to be careful. I don't want her getting hurt from going too fast. In addition to her pr, she's using this as a run Disney proof of time. Good run, debbie. Glad I am If it works, it works. I'm glad you. Glad you got that extra speed and knocked out that PR. Let's go to Blakely, georgia.
Speaker 4:The Tortoise Trot 5K at Kolamaki Mounds State Park. Kimberly was there. Small race, small race with a big name, lots of fun. Mentally curs. Small race with a big name, lots of fun. Mentally cursing the race director a bit. I'm out around mile 2.5. Apparently a long hill climb there, but first time to place in a race, third overall female for Kimberly, second in the 30 to 39 age group. So if my math is right, that means the first place winner must have been also in the 30 to 39 age group. No, it could have been second and third. Anyway, it was a tough age group, is what I'm saying. Good job, kimberly.
Speaker 4:Robbie's down in Miami running on runways. Be careful, watch out for the airplanes buddy. This is the MIA Runway 5K Miami Executive Airport in Miami, florida. First of three at various airports. They finish at Miami International in October. I remember Robbie's done this before I remember some of the reports. I remember Robbie's done this before I remember some of the reports. Run takes place on a runway while the air field is active, so there are planes taking off and landing on runways around them.
Speaker 2:That's kind of exciting. I'd have to imagine, though, that there might not be many Southwest planes, because I have a feeling based on today's news about no more free bags. Maybe not as many Southwest planes will be in the sky.
Speaker 4:Well, I don't know, maybe not, maybe not. Yeah, I smell what you're cooking there, greg. Actually, thinking about it, practically executive airports typically, typically a lot of corporate jets, that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:Yes, correct.
Speaker 4:And Robbie when he wrote down that the runway, the race, took place on an active runway. No, it took place on a runway. That's real. No, it didn't take place on the active. You were near the active runway. That's the one the airplanes were landing on.
Speaker 9:You get that little blowback if the plane goes over you.
Speaker 2:Maybe they had a challenge, wasn't it in one of the Mission Impossible movies, like Tom Cruise jumped onto a plane as it was about to take off. Maybe there's a Mission Impossible challenge with this race, who knows?
Speaker 4:Maybe there is. It says there are a lot of airport races and they are done on runways. There's one at Tampa. I think it coincides with a Disney weekend. I'm not sure I know. There's some reason I'm not doing it. But, Robbie, good job, man, we're teasing you a little bit, but good job, Keep it up. In Ovita, Florida, I think I'm pronouncing that right, there's a Shamrock and Run 5K. Emma was there. I know I'm pronouncing Emma right. She's been on a long running break since Wine and Dine. She did the Castaway 5K in January on her honeymoon. Maybe that explains the long running break. Recent wedding, recent wedding she always runs this one with her father to kick off their St Patrick's Day celebrations. We're not running much more than three times since a half marathon in November Finished this one, this 5K, with one of her fastest times in a while. Good for you, Emma.
Speaker 4:Sandy Spring, Georgia hosted the Chattahoochee Road Race 10K. Dorothy was there. Great weather, rolling hills, not really too bad for the Atlanta area had a group of friends cheering her on at the finish line. They captured in photo her pure shock and elation. At her finish time she knocked off over six minutes from her previous 10K age group PR and had her fastest 10K race since Thanksgiving 2019, just three minutes away from her all-time PR, Sherry was there. Sherry made a comment that she was there and running the 5K.
Speaker 4:Staying in Georgia, this time in Rome. The Barry 10K. Brooke ran it, took it easy for the first three miles and told herself that if she felt good at the halfway point which that was it that she'd pick up the pace. She did. Finished strong, Real happy with the effort. Good job Out in California. San Diego Mermaid Series 10K. Jennifer Sunny day in San Diego. I think they're all sunny days in San Diego, I think. Now to get ready for the hot chocolate 15K on Sunday. So we'll hear from Jennifer again in just a moment. Wrapping up Saturday in San Antonio the time to patty 10K. Abigail set a new PR, Knocking 15 minutes off of her previous PR time and earning a run Disney proof of time. Also an age group second place for Abigail.
Speaker 4:Moving to Sunday Not a whole lot of races on Sunday. I'm surprised there weren't any at all because the daylight saving time change meant that whatever race time you had was an hour earlier. But there were a couple. There was a decent one in New Orleans, decent-sized one in New Orleans, the Shamrock and Run. New Orleans. We had four friends there.
Speaker 4:Mandy did the 10K. Mandy says they ran along Lake Pontchartrain. It was cloudy and windy. It was an out and back with beer and bling. She got a nice photo of the whole crew that was there. We had four Rise and Run friends there Mandy, Emily, Ashley and Mira.
Speaker 4:Emily did the half. She only signed up for it two weeks prior to the race. Nevertheless, she knocked three minutes off of her old half marathon PR with a 151.30 finish. Emily that's awesome, girl, Way to go. Went at a steady pace for the first 10 and then kicked it into high gear. Last mile was the fastest in a half marathon. That's impressive. Would absolutely sign up for it again. And, as I mentioned, Ashley and Mira were also there. Think Ashley and Mira did the 10K Not positive.
Speaker 4:Oh, the Patty 10K at the beautiful Tennessee River Park in Chattanooga. Amanda was there, Was windy but good running temps. Oh and, by the way, Amanda now has a two new 10K PR, An improvement of more than a minute from last week's 10K. Houston, Texas the women's quarter marathon. Amanda ran this one, a flat race. Wasn't too crowded, super windy. She was smiling throughout the race, enjoying the sunrise, had a good race, didn't hit her A goal, but did hit her B goal. Finished in less than one hour eight minutes for this quarter marathon, which is just a bit over a 10K. So that's a good pace, Amanda, nicely done.
Speaker 4:And finishing up in San Diego it's Jennifer. Again, Jennifer said she was looking forward to the Hot Chocolate 15K. Well, here it is. Ran it very hilly course, did way better than she ever could have hoped and finished strong. Good job, jennifer. Good job to all of our friends in the race report this week. That wraps it up for episode 181. All right, my and if you run, you know you are our friends. It is a Zoom weekend. The information is on the Facebook page. We really, really hope to see you there. We can talk springtime surprise. We can talk marathon weekend registration. We can talk about whatever you'd like to. We just want you to join us and have fun. Keep up the training. Springtime surprise will be here before you know it. Until we meet again, happy running.
Speaker 2: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 healthcare provider or event organizer.
