Steve in a Speedo?! Gross!

Father's Day Weekend "Half Marathon"

>> Thursday, June 25, 2026

I was camping with family in 2023 when I headed out for a long run and thought "huh.... I could turn this into a 'Father's Day half marathon' if I wanted to..." So I did. That was the first of 3 years of "Father's Day Half Marathons" (here's 2023, 2024, and 2025).

We weren't camping this Father's Day, but we were "up north" on a lake with family. I didn't get out on Father's Day PROPER, but I took off the next morning for a long run that I was hoping I could turn into another 13.1+ miles for the 4th year straight.

Minimal shoulder for the first 3 miles!

Oh, a deer!

Fog in some low-lying areas.

I just did 2.5 miles easier as warm-up as normal: I wasn't sure I'd be able to go longer than a "normal" 11.5 - 12 mile run, so I didn't lengthen my warm-up. But the "pace miles" at the middle went well! After 3 miles (of a planned 6 hard miles), I told myself I could go longer! My goal right now SHOULD be speed over distance as my endurance is fine but my speed has slipped, but I didn't care... I just wanted to go FARTHER for my Father's Day run.

I did 7 miles harder instead of 6, and it's been a while since I've done that! My calf got a little achy on my cool down, but not bad. I got in 13.42 miles to out-do last year's 13.40 mile run:

The "personal record" is the longest run since having a "better" Garmin (since 2022-ish).
(And yes, it was a COMFY 41 degrees on this run!)

Four previous long runs all on Father's Day weekend.

Showing the half-mile splits. I ran hard from split 5 through 19.

That's a high "exercise load!"

(I think my highest "exercise load" is tied from the run at the 2024 Square Lake Triathlon and the 2025 TC 10 Mile which both have 458. Anything over 400 is HARD!)

My 7 harder "pace miles" in the middle felt pretty good! Here were my half-mile splits:

7 miles at pace:

3:06, 3:05, 3:11, 3:09, 3:08, 3:04, 3:09, 3:06, 3:08, 3:03, 3:00, 3:03, 3:05, 3:02

= 43:24 (6:12.00 pace)

And then I took it easy on Tuesday as to not kill my legs after my longest run since maybe Henry was a baby (we went on some 14 mile runs with the stroller, and I also did a 25K in that same time period about 14 years ago).

Semi-Wordless Wednesday: Turkey Babies!

>> Wednesday, June 24, 2026

I spot turkeys on about half of my runs along the river, and I always consider them to be good luck. Today was the first morning all year that I saw poults (what Google told me was the name of a baby turkey):

Two big ones and 5 babies.

Two Weeks of Training Around a Camping Trip

>> Saturday, June 20, 2026

Here's the 2 weeks of training that contains the long weekend of staying up north with 4 kids:

We left mid-morning on Friday the 5th, and came back the evening of Tuesday the 9th.

The nice thing about those 2 weeks is I started swimming again, and even with some pool time (meaning something that takes away from my saddle time), I still got in 137+ miles of biking over those 2 weeks while being gone for a 5-day stretch. I can't complain about that!

What I could complain about is little strength time and leg exercise time. But I have no problem "throwing that away" for fun family trips!

My running was decent too: I had decent long runs on Mondays (posted about the first one here and then a long run on the trip here), normal easy runs on both Wednesdays, and track workouts both Fridays consisting of 800s and 400s.

I was (happily) shocked that the 2 full weeks around that trip still had 1500+ minutes of "intensity minutes!" That's sort of my number that says "this was a normal-ish week" but neither of those weeks were ACTUALLY normal. (1800 is a NICE week, and I've only been above 2000 a few times.)

The last 4 weeks (nevermind the small current week as I took this screenshot on Tuesday).

Here's the same chart with the 5 days of the trip circled. SMALL DAYS!

Those 2 very similar weeks just at 1500 minutes were the 2 weeks I'm talking about.

That means I still have a 9-week streak of 1500+ intensity minutes (or 17 out of the last 18 weeks, only dropping below 1500 when I had some calf pain and didn't run for a week in early April). But to be fair, some of these recent weeks have been "artificially" higher because I've been counting strenuous yard work as "cardio" on my Garmin and getting credit for those extra workouts.

Looking at those last 2 weeks, I have less than 600 "intensity minutes" over the 5 days of camping, which is very low - I skipped bike workouts and all weight lifting on that trip. And of those 599 intensity minutes, 155 of that was intervals on Friday morning before going on the trip, and nearly 200 minutes was a long run and cool-down walk on Monday. The rest was just hiking / walking at the 2 state parks with the 4 kids.

Oh, and funny side-note... which day in the past 30 days had the "hillier than normal" long run out in Lake Vermilion State Park? It's hard to tell...