The Luck is Changing!

So... after all the bad luck we've experienced here in hot and humid Florida, finally some good things happened today! We decided to go to the Wilderness Lodge for our pre-race meal this afternoon... but more bad luck... the sit down restaurants were closed for another two hours! Not wanting to wait and NOT wanting to eat the chow line food... AGAIN... we asked the concierge where a nice restaurant would be outside of Disney (all the food in Disney refuge is the same, you see!). She suggested a place called Bahama Breeze. So we hopped a cab and 30 dollars later we arrived!

We waited for our server for 20 minutes! It seemed like forever! Finally we asked another server if someone had been assigned to us, which no one had. He was very apologetic and got our drinks for us and took our order. Then... more bad luck... we waited 45 minutes for our food. BUT THEN the luck started to turn...

The manager came up and apologized for our wait and offered to give us our entire lunch for FREE! Yes.. for FREE! Wow! Nice Floridian! We ate eventually and then we walked up the street a couple of blocks to a Walgreens and purchased some Gatorade (for the aero drink) and stuff for the race tomorrow! Then we hopped another cab - this one driven by a really nice Indian man - and he jetted us back "home" to the Port Orleans Riverside... for $15 bucks! YAY! That's the cheapest cab ride we've had yet!

Earlier today we checked our bikes in to the transition area. We also listened to a panel discussion put on by a few pros that are racing here.

I won't be winning this race (haha!!!). Heather Gollnick and Nina Kraft are here! Wow! I'm thrilled to just see them and I'll look forward to seeing how fast they are out of the water.

My swim time is now 7:03am gun time. I'm hoping for a swim time around 35 minutes. The buoys are out there... it looks pretty far! Some people who did the race last year said their swim time was a good 4-5 minutes slower. They are convinced the course is longer than the 1.2 miles advertised. We'll see.

I'm hoping to sleep well tonight. I've hydrated up all day... and I'm eager to start the race. It was VERY hot and VERY HUMID today. It was tough to just walk around. I'm hoping for less humidity tomorrow... probably won't get it...

Send good vibes my way around 10:30-10:45am EST (that's 830 in Idaho!). That'll be when I should be coming in on my bike and starting off on the dreaded run!

My goals are still the same. To finish. To finish in under 7 hours (although it's realistic for me to get 630). To experience the race and the surroundings.

Thanks to everyone for the text messages of support! I look forward to tomorrow...