Restarting marathon distance running after a 7 year hiatus
Dopey Challenge – a 4-day 48.6 mile running event hosted by runDisney takes place at Walt Disney World every year during the marathon weekend. I’ve always wanted to do this, but I’ve always doubted my ability to finish such a demanding event. When one of my friends asked me if we wanted to do this together before we head into our 40s. I was first a little bit reluctant, but at the end, I went all in on it.
What exactly is the Dopey Challenge?
Ok, you might have read that 4-day part and think to yourself. Wait, 4 days?! Well, yes and no. You don’t run for 4 days continuously, but you do run for 4 days in a row.
Here’s how it works. The Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend is a 4 day event. Each day, 1 race takes place. First day is 5k. Then 10k. Half marathon the day after. All leading up to the marathon on the last day. For the Dopey Challenge, all you have to do is finish all 4 events on those 4 days. That’s it! Simpler said than done. Over these 4 days, you will have ran a total of 48.6 miles.
Why is it called the Dopey Challenge? Well, you need to get up and get to the start line everyday for a 4:30am start time. Meaning you should be there by 4am.. You’ll surely be Dopey at the end of the running event getting up so early everyday.
But before getting to my training progress, first a little bit about my running background.
Quick background on my running journey
I was never a good runner. Back in high school, 9 minute miles was the best I’ve ever done. And that was when I was a teenager! Then in my adulthood, I saw running as a way to lose weight after I gained quite a bit during college. So in 2012, as the running boom started, I signed up for The Color Run 5k in San Francisco with a group of friends.
We started training at an elementary school over the weekend. At first I could not even finish a mile. It took 5 weeks for me to work up my endurance for a 1 mile run. At the end, we finished our 5k in about 40 minutes. But I told myself, I could do better. So I continued running. Signing up for more 5k’s and 10k’s as training motivation. Eventually, half marathons.
I don’t know when, but I got addicted to running. Maybe it is the me time – a time to clear my head. Maybe it’s because I’m losing weight. Or maybe it’s something else. I started to sign up for more and more half-marathon distances. Rock ‘n’ Roll Half Marathon, Disneyland Half Marathon (oof, it was a scorcher!), Berkeley Half Marathon, and a bunch more. Eventually we did both the San Francisco Half Marathon 1st half in one year then the other half in the year after.
So we decided, that it was time to run a full marathon. So we signed up for the San Francisco Marathon for the year after. A brand new challenge. Looking back, we were not mentally prepared for the training and the running at a marathon distance. But eventually, we were able to conquer the marathon. But we were somewhat underprepared, our longest training distance was only 18 miles. Even though at the end, we finished the 2017 San Francisco Marathon; we had finished in over 6 hours time.
After that, I took on a new job in 2017, which took a lot of my time, energy, and focus away from me. So begin my running hiatus..until now!
Coming up, in this series of posts. I’ll be posting updates to my training progress up until race day 2026!