I know that I’m late to writing about the recently announced changes to the Wine and Dine Half Marathon Weekend at Walt Disney World. It’s been a few weeks now since runDisney made these anouncements. However, the Wine and Dine Half Marathon had changed drastically.
Registration was on Tuesday for the new Wine and Dine Half Marathon Weekend. So, I’m sure that many of you are already registered. So, what are the changes? Well, for starters, for the fist time, the Wine and Dine Half Marathon will take place on a Sunday morning instead of Saturday night. This is a huge change.
Once Disney closed the Osborne Family Dancing Lights, I had a feeling that Wine and Dine might make some changes. After all, one of the big attractions for this half marathon was running through the lights at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. With that gone this year, it would have been a different race even if the race were to be held at night.
With the move of the half marathon from Saturday night to Sunday morning, it opened the way for more changes. For the first time, there will be a 10K race on Saturday morning. So, the Wine and Dine will join every other runDisney race weekend in offering a 10K race. With this addition, the predictable race challenge has also been added. It’s called Lumiere’s Two Course Challenge. So, a 10K, Half Marathon challenge is now offered at every runDisney weekend except the Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend.
By placing the 10K race on Saturday morning, it bumps Mickey’s Holiday 5K race up to Friday morning. I’ve listened to a few podcasts and read a few blogs that are not happy about this. Why? 5K races are typically seen as family races. If you’re a local in Orlando, having a 5K race on Saturday morning meant that you didn’t have to take your kids out of school to run in it. Now, you will.
Another change is that they had to move the after party at EPCOT to Sunday night. In all previous editions of this race, you could hang out at EPCOT after the race until the early hours of the morning. It was a true after party for the race. Now, you will run the half marathon on Sunday morning and have to wait until the evening to enjoy the party. That also means, if you want to go to the after party in EPCOT, you won’t be leaving Walt Disney World until Monday at the earliest.
As I’ve read the reactions of other runDisney fans about this race, I can totally feel their frustration. Wine and Dine had gone from a half marathon weekend at Walt Disney World I really wanted to run to a race that I don’t mind missing. Of course, once I learned that the Osborne Family lights were leaving Disney’s Hollywood Studios, I was already leaning that way. As I write this, I’ve noticed that all the races are sold out. So, I guess the changes haven’t hurt interest in this race weekend at all.
In addition to the changes to Wine and Dine, runDisney announced the line up for the Avengers Super Heroes Half Marathon Weekend. The 10K race will be the Dr. Strange 10K instead of the Captain America 10K (from last year). The 5K race will be the Captain America 5K instead of the Avengers Super Heroes 5K (from the last 2 years). When I first read about the change in names, it put me in an interesting situation. I loved running the Captain America 10K!
I mean, look at that Captain America 10K medal! How can you get as excited about the idea of a Captain America medallion. Plus, with the Avengers Super Heroes Half Marathon Weekend the weekend after the TCS NYC Marathon, I’m not sure that I would want to run a 5K, 10K, and Half Marathon.
Well, y’all, there’s a reason I haven’t posted about these changes sooner. There’s a reason, why these changes to the Avengers weekend won’t affect me this year. While I can’t get into specifics yet, my life is going through some pretty amazing changes. It is due to these changes that I will not be running any of the races at the 2016 Avengers Super Heroes Half Marathon Weekend. Additionally, these changes are why I did not get any training runs and workouts in last week and will likely miss this week as well. I am not discussing any specifics on social media at the moment. However, there will come a time where I will. If you want to know ahead of that, feel free to send me an email at whyirundisney@gmail.com. If you are reading this and are Facebook friends with me or follow me on Twitter and/or Instagram, please don’t ask through these avenues. Just send me an email. Rest assured, it is good news.
So, what do you think of the changes to Wine and Dine? Did you register for the Inaugural Lumiere’s Two Race Challenge? What about the Avengers weekend? Do you like the idea of a Dr. Strange 10K? Or would you rather have kept the Captain America 10K?
Why I runDisney 
I registered for the Inaugural Lumiere’s Two Course challenge, but I was sad to see some of the changes. Wine and Dine was my first half marathon and running through the lights was always magical. But with the final year of the lights behind us, the idea of the race without the lights was a little depressing. I’m not a fan that the race changes removed the last nighttime race on the runDisney schedule.
Glad you’ve got good news coming! These changes make me glad I did Wine and Dine this year, even if it was just half a half.
I am sending you an email now about the good news! 🙂
As you know, Wine and dine is my favorite race ever and I am sad to see it go through changes but I am looking on the bright side-a Beauty and the Beast themed race with the challenge and I will actually be able to run, go back and shower (this is so key as a babywipe shower in a hot changing tent does not cut it), relax and get to experience a FULL after party from 8-1, so we still get the benefit of the eating and drinking after.