Behind the Design: The Making of the 2019 Walt Disney World Finisher Medals

The most magical race weekend on Earth returns for its 26^th year during the 2019 Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend presented by Cigna January 9-13, 2019. A few months back, we gave you a first look at the medals runners will be racing for, and there was a lot of excitement about the designs. Today we are excited to share a few more details about the unique finisher medals with the person responsible for bringing the vision to life, Will Gay, Design Director of Disney’s Yellow Shoes Creative Group!

Can you tell us a little about your background and how you came to design medals?

I am Design Director here on the Yellow Shoes Design Team, a part of the Yellow Shoes Creative Group based in Orlando, Florida. Our team helps elevate the Disney brands through design. Designing finisher medals for runDisney has been a personal favorite of mine, having run three full marathons here at Walt Disney World as well as numerous half marathons over the years. I’m also responsible for designing the runDisney logo that is still being used today, so you could say it makes perfect sense and come full circle with my medal designs for this year’s Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend.

Mind giving a little insight into the story and inspiration behind your medal designs?

Not only am I personally a runner but I am also a big Disney animation fan. I wanted the Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend medals to be reminiscent of the timeless sports medal designs with a blend of the classic Disney animated characters that we all know and love. Because of this, each medal’s colors and unique features were tied into the character’s story, traits and attitude. Many of those classic sports medals are also based in a circular design, so I knew I wanted my medal designs to also reflect the sophistication of that particular style with the shape of the medals overall.

What are some of the unique features of this year’s medals?

What you don’t see in the photos is that the full Marathon medal has an awesome animated Mickey Mouse featured in the center. It is a “spinner” that animates Mickey running as you spin it with your finger. The Goofy Challenge medal also spins, but in a completely different way —his head spins upside down, because you know, Goofy! Also, I believe this is the first time we have had Oswald as a featured character on a runDisney medal, so that is super cool.

Want to join in this four park race celebration? Spaces remain in select race events so check out how you can earn this exciting “bling”!

Let us know which race you’ll be participating in using the hashtag #WDWMarathon on our social channels! Follow runDisney on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram.