Snowy Track Workout

I did my first track workout of the year a few weeks back. Then just over a week ago, the track was too icy for a workout. Two days later, we got EIGHT INCHES of snow. And then the sun came out and I was able to hit the track on Friday!

A track that was too icy on Friday, 8 inches of snow a few days later, and then ready for a track workout the following Friday - just a week later and in the SAME week as 8 inches of snow! Wild.

I did a lap before running hard to check on the condition of the track. The homestretch had some pooling in the first lane:

Wet, but not icy. (45 degrees.)


But the first turn was still kinda nasty...


... areas were thick and icy.


These areas were the worst!


Still lots of melting snow from the outer lane along the homestretch.

I did a version of the workout I did a few weeks back (which was alternating 800s and 400s). This time, I didn't alternate and did 4x800 with 2:00 rest, then 4x400 with 90 sec rest.

With the issue of running wide and avoiding the ice on the first curve, I knew times wouldn't be THAT fast. I did my first 800 in 2:45 and was a little bummed. So the goal was to descend times and try to suffer.

When I got to the 400s, my first one was decent at 1:15, and then I thought I'd try to knock them down to 1:11-1:12. But my 2nd one was 1:12, so now I was just trying to hold on. This is what I ran:

1:22 + 1:22 = 2:44.9
1:21 + 1:19 = 2:41.2
1:20 + 1:18 = 2:38.9
1:18 + 1:19 = 2:37.9

1:15.8
1:12.8
1:12.9
1:12.4

You can see where I was dodging icy spots on the first turn in my Garmin details:

Jagged on the south edge.

Not amazing times, but a solid workout on the track!

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A "Two Bike" Cycling Workout

On Tuesday, I had some time after my 2nd class of the day before needing to get the boys. So I took advantage of that and decided to turn my "long trainer workout" into a ride outside on my mountain bike ENDING with a trainer workout - that way I could bike LONGER but yet be LESS BORED. Win-win.

The only issue was that some freezing rain started near mid-day. So we had a fresh layer of ice. I got home to ride and it was JUST starting to disappear because it had climbed to 32 degrees:

Crunchy, frozen ice everywhere, with a bare spot melting up ahead.

My workout was "now or never," so I headed off on the slickness. It had just started melting, so going down Marshall Hill was WET. My pants and both pairs of bike shorts soaked through on my butt. It was soggy and gross. I knew that if I had waited (if I COULD have waited) another hour, it would have been much better... and sure enough, it got better over the course of my ride. The Greenway around 4 miles in just had damp spots:

A few minutes later, the sun came out and things really started to melt. Here was the view around mile 11 crossing the Ford Bridge:

Partially frozen Mississippi River.

And then the trail on the St. Paul side of the river was practically dry!

The handlebar shadow is the only proof I was on my bike.


I thought I was going to have more crap on my face.


A river loop with extra down the Greenway, to Minnehaha, and a bit north of home.

Then I took about 5 minutes to park my bike, get a drink, carefully take off wet clothes, and hop on my bike on the trainer in the basement. (It was less than 5 minutes from after resetting my Garmin post-ride until I started my trainer ride, but probably just over 5 minutes after stopping my ride because of the time it takes to save the workout and get back to my normal watch face to see the actual time of day.) I didn't spin too hard, but I added in 2 efforts of 15 minutes:

Nothing fancy.

That gave me 67 minutes outside at a moderate pace, and then 90 minutes inside at a slightly easier pace, for 2 hours and 37 minutes of decent saddle time for the afternoon! Not bad! And all that riding gave me a 2-day total of 764 "intensity minutes" to start the week! I *think* that's my 3rd biggest 2-day start to a week, behind a big week in March 2 years ago, and my PR of 899 intensity minutes after a Monday and Tuesday this past summer when my car was in the shop. (The funny thing about that last one is that you'd think I'd have a HUGE week of "intensity minutes" after a start like that, but I had a race later that week, so I didn't even double that 2-day total with the remaining 5 days that week.)

This weekend will be a bit smaller, so we'll see how big my "intensity minutes" are for the week once this strange week is over. But I was happy for a big Tuesday ride!

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Semi-Wordless Wednesday: Icy Sidewalks

This was walking back to my car from my son's school recently:

This is why I'm still mostly on the treadmill. Maybe I can get outside to run today, as we've had a few nice days of slight melting lately!

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Failed Speed Workout (Followed by Good Trainer Ride)

Last week, I was excited because they were predicting 48 hours of above freezing weather from Thursday through Saturday. That meant I could have ice-free paths along River Road to do some speed work on Friday! But when I woke up early that morning, it was foggy. The air was moist. It looked like it could be slick outside as it was 35 degrees.

Down our alley. Look at that ice shine! D'oh.

The sidewalks were OK, so I was hopeful that River Road would be good! But when I ran in the street on some quiet side roads about a mile from home, I noted that the streets were much more slick than the sidewalks - asphalt was "catching" the moisture more than concrete sidewalks.

Foggy down by the river.

The part of the trail where I like to start my 2x2 mile intervals was SLICK. I ran a bit farther, and where I like to do 800s or 400s was OK... for about 200 meters. I hoped it would get better, but it didn't. I turned around after 2 miles, and didn't know if I'd be finding a place to run fast... it was turning into an easy run.

I ran up Marshall Hill thinking maybe I could do hill repeats (of about 0.22 miles), but the top 1/3 of the hill looked like this:

Taken the following day after more melting had occurred... looking down the hill.

I just wasn't finding any LONG ENOUGH section to do any real speed work.

On a last-ditch effort, I ran straight to St. Thomas. Their sidewalks had been nicely cleared, and they were only slick in 2 spots. So I prepped to run a few 800s after warming up for a SUPER long 4.5 miles! Here's my map with 0.25 mile splits being taken... lap 5 is where I like to start 2x2 mile intervals, lap 7 is where I like to run 800s (through lap 9), lap 15 was coming up the hill and finding ice in the last half, and finally the SPEED happened in the orange:

Close-up of the repeats, with a 90 degree turn near the middle.


Resting for 2:00 on the east end. My water bottle and
hoodie were in a tree, hence the walking off the sidewalk.


A looooong "warm-up" on slick sidewalks before 4 quick efforts.
And no cool down because I had logged too many miles already.

My efforts looked like this:

1:22, 1:21 = 1:43.2
1:17, 1:25 = 1:43.5
1:19, 1:22 = 1:42.2
1:17, 1:23 = 1:41.2

Pretty consistant for not running on a track! Each straight-away had an icy spot, but the footing was otherwise decent.

I made up for the lack of speed workout on Friday with a decent trainer workout on Saturday. I started a workout mid-day, but my wife called me upstairs for some "mommy and daddy time" (NOT TURNING THAT DOWN), so it started as 15 mins on the bike followed by me forgetting to stop my Garmin...

... but then a few hours later I got in my REAL workout of 10 x 5 min efforts:

Back with a bit about some FAST long runs shortly!

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Frozen 15 Mile Ride

My car stopped working on 10 days ago (Friday, Dec 12th), and it was towed to the dealership. After a week of wondering why they weren't working on it (knowing so because of an app on my phone showing my car was locked the whole time) even though they said they'd get to it right away, they found an easy answer that they admitted should have been taken care of right away instead of sitting there for 5 extra days. (I was told it was ready 30 mins before they closed on Friday, Dec 19th.) My wife worked this past weekend, so I decided to bike out to the dealership on Saturday afternoon to get my car. It was 15 degrees with 20 mph winds. Yikes.

I grabbed my mountain bike (this is NOT road bike weather!) and figured out the best possible way to get there being I usually use 3 different freeways and highways when going by car. I planned a route and layered up:

The ski mask ended up over my nose after a few feet because it got cold!

The first 4-5 miles on Summit Ave looked this this, with clear traffic lanes but packed snow in the bike lane:

Not slushy, so no problem for an old mountain bike.

I knew the end of Summit Ave was closed (technically it's John Ireland Blvd at that point, and they have taken down a bridge to rebuild it), so I turned on Western to get across I94. But then behind the State Capitol, another bridge was closed that I didn't know about. However, I could sneak around the barrier and walk my bike across (as I couldn't keep it upright in this few inches of uneven snow):

Looking back the way I had come.

I went along the cemetary to Arlington, crossed I35E, and got on the Gateway Trail. It hadn't been plowed from the 1/2 inch of snow we got 2 days before, but it HAD been plowed from the heavier snow from 2 weeks ago, so that was great:

Again, easy riding on my mountain bike!

I turned onto the Bruce Vento trail to head north. The wind was out of the NW, so I was nicely "pushed" down Summit Ave, but the few miles heading north to Arlington was wind IN MY FACE as well as all of the Bruce Vento Trail. I was getting chilly. I took the hand warmers out of my gloves and added them to my shoes (where I already had toe warmers and 2 THICK pairs of socks).

A sweet abandoned go kart / buggy / thingy next to a PRETTY CLEAR Bruce Vento Trail.

I went on that trail until it ended. Near the end, I crossed a bridge over a more major road (before I694), and it was GLARE ICE. I took one pedal stroke and my back wheel spun out. I tried to coast the rest of the way, but the wind blew my back wheel out from under me, and I landed on my feet with my left pedal scraping the trail. That was my only time "crashing," and I landed on my feet without my hand even touching the ground. I "penguin walked" the rest of the way over the bridge, and continued biking.

I finished the last mile or so along the side of Hwy 61:

FAST cars, but very clear and wide shoulders. And there's my destination on the right!

The guys at the dealership were impressed. I just wanted my car so I could turn on the seat warmer and go home. (I often turn it on low for a little while, but this time I had it on high for the ENTIRE drive home.)

15 miles in 15 degree weather with a 20 mph wind.


Uphill for the last half. D'oh. And notice my speed dip at 30 mins
where I had to jog my bike across the snow-covered bridge.


"Strained" the day before the ride (a hard treadmill
workout - more on that shortly), but otherwise a lot of "maintaining."

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Turkey Trot Race Report: (ALMOST) a Family 5K!

Wednesday morning (the day before Thanksgiving), we woke up to the world covered in snow and ice for the first time this season:

Our road was ALL ice.


Side streets were just as bad.


Chipping ice off our sidewalk next to our house.

I was SO glad that happened TUESDAY night and not WEDNESDAY night just before the race! We were in for (and still are in) a cold spell, but an extra day to get sand and salt working was hopefully going to make the race course not so slick!! (Or my race plans would just go out the window and I'd just run to try not to get injured...)

Let's back up another few days. I've been mentioning how I want to be running more errands on my bike like I was 1-2 years ago, so after taking Henry to school for robotics earlier last week, I kept biking past his school to stop at packet pick-up on my bike:

My bike out front after picking up 3 race packets!

My wife worked on Thanksgiving (the life of someone in healthcare), so the boys and I got up after her and got ready to race.

Pre-race tradtional photo (at home because we were going to get to the race JUST before the start!).


Staying warm in the car before heading out to race.


After a jog to the start. A BIT worried about all the ice you see in the foreground!


Henry and I were ready to race!

Charlie was signed up to race too, but his cousin (who he was going to run with) backed out because it was cold (mid-20s), so he decided to just wait for us at the finishline. So Henry and I hung out for a few minutes, and then I worked my way a bit closer to the front.

Where I started. People packed in tighter in front of me
to put me about 10 rows back. Pretty ideal for me!


View behind me.

The race ending up starting 10 minutes late. We got to the race site hearing "We going to be starting a little late..." over the loudspeakers, and we were concerned we were going to freeze. But then we heard it was just going to be 10 minutes, and that was A-OK. After a little wait, we heard the gun and we were off!

Blurry cell phone shot about a 1/2 mile in!

I zipped past a woman running 15 minute miles who lined up DIRECTLY on the starting line of a race with 5000 people in it, and I collided a bit with another guy trying to get around her. But the roads were in decent shape as you can see from that photo above!! I wasn't worried about ice because it would make me "slow," but because it could make me "injured" - lots of slip tends to make my achilles flare up.

I took off pretty hot, and then knew I was easing up a bit. So when my first half mile was 2:53, I knew that if I held my current pace, that my next split would be a lot slower. So I sped up a BIT. I was mainly passing people, but I was also occasionally being passed - it was a very "random" start to a race. My opening 2:53 half mile was about perfect, and I was afraid that I'd end up having a few splits over 3:00 pre-race (based on slippage, cold weather that's harder to run in, and my general slow-down over the last 5 months). But I was happy to be running into the 9 mph wind with an opening mile like this:

• MILE 1: 5:44.2 (2:53 + 2:50)

We rounded 2 corners and started running along the river WITH the wind now. And I'd counted at one of the corners (just before the 1st mile marker) that I was in about 39th place at the time... I was going to try to work my way up.

Around the Hennepin Ave bridge, there was a big cheer zone with lots of turkeys:

My 2nd (and final) photo from during the race.

Notice I had runners close to me - I like a race like that! I had guys to work to "pick off."

The 2nd mile ended right before the climb up by the Guthrie, and I was THRILLED with my splits. Again, I was hoping to keep them all under 3:00 and I wasn't sure if that was realistic. But these were great:

• MILE 2: 5:41.5 (2:52 + 2:49)

I was still catching people. I was around 30th at this point, and there was a bit of a gap in front of me. I worked up those small hills by the Guthrie, and then pushed as we were now running back into the wind. I found another gear as I passed someone who looked about my age with about a half mile to go, and I kept pushing to the finish. I started this race at a nice pace, and I felt great building speed toward the finish! I moved up to 24th with a half-block to go, but then the last 2 people I had passed (both younger guys) passed me back before the line. It turns out one of them was the kid of a friend, and that friend got a photo of his son passing me seconds before the finish:

Me in pink, and friend's son in the gray shirt.

The friend's son ended up starting 0:02 in front of me but only finished 0:01 in front of me, so I technically beat him in the final results. I ended up 25th overall, and the 1st master!

• MILE 3: 5:38.2 (2:52 + 2:46)

• TO THE FINISH (0.13 miles): 0:37 (4:57 pace!)

I posted my splits online, and a running friend/coach said "Nice kick!" to which I replied with "I *may* have been sandbagging a little... 🤷🏼‍♂️😂" I definitely just raced this casually, turned in some decent splits, and then pushed hard to the line!!

OFFICIAL RESULTS:

Steve Stenzel
44, M, St. Paul

17:42
5:42 pace

25th out of 5330 overall
1st out of 222 in age group
1st master

[Garmin: 17:41.5 for 3.13 miles (5:40 pace)]

It wasn't one of my fastest 5Ks, but for hoping to break 18:00 and being concerned I'd have a few splits over 3:00, I was THRILLED with this! I had a 17:51 5K about 2.5 years ago, and that was my most recent "slower" 5K. Just before that, I ran a 17:39 indoors and was happy about that.

I raced through the finisher's chute, jumped the barricade at the side, found Charlie who was cheering for me, and we ran back to look for Henry. We found him coming through a few minutes later:

Go Henry!!


Just out of the chute, ready to head home for Thanksgiving dinner!

Henry hadn't ran much since the end of CC season a few weeks ago, so he knew he wasn't going to post an amazing time - nothing near his 19:09 or 19:10 like he got in his last 2 races of the season. So he finished in 21:13, which was good for 161th overall, and 12th out of 314 in the "male 10-14" age group!

Full course.


Close-up of the finish. Nice build over the last half mile
after getting up a few small hills to the right.


First skinny dip in speed is an icy turn, and then the
2nd dip is lost signal going under the big Hennepin Ave Bridge.

Again, notice that nice boost in speed in the final 3 minutes! And I was right about my start: I started fast, eased up, and then sped up a bit to keep my splits more even. But my heart rate in that graph is NOT right - I was NOT at 153 bpm max! I was well over that! My Garmin beeped during the race telling me I had a "+14 performance condition" which is INSANE. It's usually good when I have a "+4." On days after hard workouts, I might see "-1." But "+14" means it wasn't reading correctly - it saw I was moving very fast with a (falsely) super low heart rate.

I mentioned how I passed someone who could have been in my age group with about a half mile left... well it turns out that someone my exact age finished 0:07 behind me (5 spots), so that burst in speed gave me the age group win! And then the person who was 0:04 behind him was in the next age group up, so the top 3 masters were all within 11 seconds! In front of me, I had a 33 and 38-year-old, but everyone else was younger - the vast majority were in their 20s. I like feeling like a "faster" old guy at a race. ;)

And I passed both of those guys in the final mile or so, so that strong final kick moved me from 3rd master and 2nd in age group to 1st master and 1st in age group. Nice! Feeling good about that!

We all jogged back to the car, which was parked just 3 spots behind Mama's car who was downtown an hour before us for work:

Sarah's car on the right, and mine with the lights on 3 behind her!
(My barely-visible finger is pointing to my car.)






Henry had a huge age group! And notice the 2nd "peak" in
finish times: those were 55-59:59 finishers trying to break an hour.

We were actually in the driveway at home 40 minutes after the race started! We quickly stretched, showered, and got to Thanksgiving dinner with family:

Some "Tom & Jerry" on Charlie's upper lip.

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