Minnesota's "Runner of the Year"

Run Minnesota has started a system of tracking who's the best runner in different age groups for each year. It's VERY technical, and I don't fully understand it all... but I can appreciate it. I noted in a post late in 2021 that I had acquired some points in the "USATF MN Runner of the Year" for that year, and I thought that was pretty great. I was going to be more aware of it while racing in 2022, but I forgot about it for maybe the first half of last year.

Well, I recently thought of it and looked up some info, and it turns out I have some points for 2022 as well. I did a little better in 2022 finishing 11th overall with 8 points based off of 4 races. (Whereas in 2021, I was 15th overall with 6 points off of 2 races that scored points.)

Overall points for the 40-44 age group. CLICK HERE for a larger view.

There were 82 runners that broke the "standard" time for any race that earned points in the 40-44 age group.

If you're faster than the predetermined "standard" time, you get 1 point for sure. But then you can earn more points if you have a faster time AND more people are under the "standard." For example: if 5 people run faster than the standard time in a 5K (about 18:20 for the 40-44 age group), the fastest time earns 5 points, the 2nd fastest earns 4 points, the 3rd fastest earns 3 points, etc. And the number of points a runner has earned can be seen by the small number in parentheses behind their name in these results below.

I've always said I'm not as good at longer races, and that really can be seen in this "runner of the year" scoring:

27th fastest half marathon time, getting the basic 1 point. (Needed to run
1:17:40 or faster to earn more than 1 point as opposed to my 1:22:46.)


Moving up to 16th in the 10 mile, but still only the basic 1 point.


More proof that I just did NOT have a good day at the Gear in Gear 10K:
I earned NO points (just 0:01 faster would have earned me a point!!).


BK 5K earned me 1 point in 11th. 0:06 faster would have earned me 2 points.


My big points scoring race (5 points) was the Raspberry Run 1 mile.
I put in a lot of "mile specific" track workouts to make this happen.
But only 0:00.2 faster would have earned me ANOTHER point!

So all of that adds up to 8 points and 11th overall as seen at the top of this post. I earned 2 more points than the year before and moved up 4 spots. If I can keep my running going strong, maybe I'll try to do well at a variety of races this year... and that's what it takes: posting FAST TIMES (not *placing* well) at DIFFERENT race distances.

And just for fun, here's some of the graphs that appear with some of the results for different races with regards to the "runner of the year" finishes. These show PACE up the left, AGE across the bottom, and then the BLUE LINE is the "standard" time that you have to beat (be under) to earn points. Here's the BK 5K that shows I had a lot of 20 and 30 year olds faster than me:

(I'm the pink dot in these.)


The Halloween Half shows that I placed pretty well overall - 14 dots below mine.


This 1 mile was my best race for the year, but it doesn't really scream that
looking at these results. I beat a lot of 10 year olds. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯


And look at the SHEER NUMBERS in the TC 10 Mile!

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Ranked in the "Runner of the Year"

Maybe a month ago, I had a race buddy / Twitter friend tell me I had earned some points for "USATF MN Runner of the Year" in my age group as tracked by Run Minnesota (formerly the "Minnesota Distance Running Association"). The moment he told me, I had 6 points.

But unlike the "Grand Prix" seires I've done of theirs in the past, this one is scored a lot differently (maybe more fairly), so I've lost 2 points as there have been some people that posted some faster times since then:

I posted this on Facebook last week, and it's a quick run-down of how it works:

[And this is all still provisional as there could be more times posted this year (doubtful because we are now covered in snow, and track races don't count), and some times waiting to be made official might not get approved at all if the race director didn't follow through.]

Someone told me (I had no idea) that I had earned some points in "Minnesota's Runner of the Year" contest. It turns out that my 3 road races I ran this year put me 13th out of all runners who ran 1+ race at on a certified course faster than the “standard” time (there’s 46 men in the 40-44 age group who ran sub-standard times, but I’m 4th-to-last among those who ran a qualifying 2 or more certified races with a sub-standard finish).

This is similar but also much different than the “Grand Prix” series I’ve done in past years. In the GP, you race people who sign up for the GP in specific races: it was always 1000 points for the winner, and then the points get split up (based on total number of GP finisher’s at that race) as times get slower. If race times are slow (like the year it was a HOT day for the Victory 10K), the winner still gets 1000 points and it goes down from there.

For this “Runner of the Year” system, you don’t sign up for anything - you just race. You have to be faster than a “standard” to get any points (notice the men’s and the women’s lines on the 4th image about the Moustache Run Half Marathon), and only the top 10 times all year get any points. So the first image shows I had the 9th fastest 5K time (for men 40-44) for 2021, so I got 2 points. And I had the 5th fastest 10 mile time, but being only 6 people were under the “standard,” I still only got 2 points. And the 3rd image shows that even though I ran a race winning 1:22:17 for my half marathon 9 days ago, there were already 10 times faster than me from earlier in the year, so I got 0 points for that win. But I could have gotten another 2 points for being 10 seconds faster! (Noting that 9th and 10th had half marathons that were just 9 seconds faster than me.)

So for ROY points, it’s not about doing well at a specific race, but instead posting a killer time at any (certified) distance. And the more you race different distances, the better chance you have at earning points.

I had 1 more point here until Doron ran a fast Thanksgiving race. (And yeah... in case
anyone ever questioned me when I said Brian Kraft brings out all the speedsters!...)


5th fastest! But only 6 men ran faster than the "standard," so I only got 2 points.
(Points are shown in parentheses after the names.)


Winning the race, but not fast enough to get any points!


My finish at the Moustasche Run with the lines noting the "standard" men's and women's times.

That 78.2% age graded 5K from May might be my highest age graded result ever!

Here are 2 more wild scatter plots from the year:

The TC 10 Mile: SOOO many runners!


EVERY Minnesotan Half Marathon finisher taking place in MN from 2021.

It was interesting to note there are so many more half marathon runners in the 13-20 age range than there were in the 10 Mile (notice how the scatter plot is more horizontal for the half marathon, and more clustered up for the 10 Mile). But I'm guessing that's because the 10 Mile is a lottery, and a kid doesn't want to "wait and see" if they get accepted.

So if I pay more attention to this in 2022, there’s NO way I could shoot for the win (notice the top 3 have 20+ points and I had a meager 4 points). But if I’m feeling good about my running next year, I could see myself trying different distances just to try to post some sub-standard times. And earn a point here or there. I also like a good random goal!!

Here's a LOT more info about Run Minnesota's "USATF MN Runner of the Year" if you are interested.

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Interview in "RunMinnesota"

We just got our March/April issue of "RunMinnesota" - the magazine published by the Minnesota Distance Running Association (MDRA). The cover shows some MDRA members taking a polar plunge:

And inside is a "Member Spotlight" interview about me!

Here are 2 closer up version that you can actually read. I SWEAR I'M NOT THIS SASSY IN REAL LIFE!! I must have been in "a mood" when I answered these questions...

This week is my spring break, but I'm home with a kindergartener with some bumps on his back (the Doc's not sure what it is, but he said to say home from school for a few days). But now that my Chipotle order has been published, I'm expecting one of you to deliver today...

p.s. I JUST signed up for O'Gara's 8K this weekend! My team scrounged up 4 other male runners, so with me as the 5th, we have a full team and can score points towards the year-long series. I'm NOT going to "race" it - I'll maybe go around 80-90%. I'm nervous running fast with my knee/quad issue. But I suppose I NEED to test it shortly, being it's nearly duathlon season. We'll see how I decide to run it. Back on Monday with a race report!

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Final Rankings in the 2016 'Grand Prix' Series

I had hoped to race more of the Minnesota Distance Running Association's (MDRA) "Grand Prix" series this year, but that injury in late March through July took me out of it. The last race in the series for the year was Rocky's Run which was 10 days ago. I had to glance at the overall standings before that final race:

Down in 28th having just raced the first 3 races in the 2016 series.

Well, I moved up 9 spots to 19th after racing Rocky's Run:

Officially, I was the 19th male out of 69 total. And 6 out of the 39 women beat me too, so overall I am 25th out of 108 total.

The fun news here is looking at my Rocky's Run score - I was the first "Grand Prix" racer and earned a perfect 1000 points to end the season. Looking for the sliver lining, folks. :)

Tom R was chatting with me about the series at Rocky's Run, saying "Oh, you should make sure to do it again next year, because this year the winner will only have like 9200 points." When I won the series back in 2012, I had 9623 points. But I'm not interested in racing it next year. I don't want to push myself to race that many running races, especially after spending so much of this year injured. (I'm 99.9% sure I'll do the series again, just not right away next year.) I think I'll still race some of the USATF circuit on my YWCA Endurance Sports team in 2017 because that has less pressure: I can help my team at whatever races I am able to race, but there are other teammates to earn points if I don't want to (or can't) race certain races.

Time to start thinking more about 2017…

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Team Standings After 'Get in Gear'

In my "just let me bitch - I'm pretty pissed about being injured right now" post from 2 weeks ago, I noted that I was extra bummed because I was currently on top of the MDRA Grand Prix series (still early in the year though) and that my team was currently on top in the "blue division" in the USATF team series. I was extra bummed to have to stop running and not be a part of those things.

Well, the outright winner of the the most recent MDRA race (a 5K) ran it in 18:08, a time that I beat while racing with Henry in the stroller recently, so I COULD have had a perfect 1000 points added to my Grand Prix total. Dang.

But the good news here is that the YWCA Endurance Sports Team is still doing great without me! At the Get In Gear 10K a week ago, they came out on top of the "blue division" (I joke that it's like the JV division of track teams - it's something about being a "new" team I think). Here's our team's Get In Gear results:

Nice work guys!

So after the first 2 team races, we're on top in the "Open Men - Blue Division" category with 10 points, followed by the MDRA with 6, and the TC Running Company with 4. Keep it up, fellas! I HOPE to be joining you for a race or 2 by the end of the season!

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Grand Prix Standings After Three Races

I was just behind Nathan before this race. I got him by 2 places this past weekend, which gave me a slight lead in the series:

Still WAAAAAAY too far to go to make any predictions (10 out of 13 races count for the year, and we're only 3 races in).

If you missed it, HERE are some team photos I posted on Wednesday, and HERE'S my Irish Run 8K race report from Monday.

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Team Photos from the 8K

Here's what our men's team results look like from O'Gara's 8K Irish Run:

The men's team was 9th out of 11 teams, and our women's team was 11th out of 12. USATF team scoring needs at least 5 runners, and it adds up the finishing time of the first 5 finishers to get the team time. In our top 5, I hadn't met #2, 3, or 5 before. So I'll post some photos below showing pics of my team finishing the race.

If you've ever thought that I'm "kinda" fast, these team results will show you how wrong you were! Sure, I was the first runner for my team, but how would I do if I were on other teams? Not only would I NOT have been a "scoring" member of the first 2 teams (Run N Fun and Mill City), but I would have ended up 13th and 15th on those teams! The 5th place team is the first team I would have been able to score on, and my team has the slowest first place time (me) of ANY of the male teams. So I'm the "worst" best runner out there for USATF MN. Yay me.

Here's some of my team as seen in Tom R's album of racers:

The horribly awesome photos of me and Evan as seen in my race report.
WHERE THE HELL DID MY NECK GO?!?


John (AKA Alex) was 3rd for our team (616), and Eric was 2nd (590).


Heather was 3rd on our female team, and her hubby Steve was 4th on our male team.
(They have a daughter who Henry likes to play with at the Y.)


Jordan was 5th and Jacob was 6th for our team.


Scott and Mike.


Lara was our first place female!


Leslie (who's a HOOT) and Laurie behind #326 (who's my favorite trainer at the Y).

Those photos are missing 2 of our men and 2 of our woman. Here's a photo from Nicole C of one of the missing women: this is Rose, our team founder!

Oh, and speaking of Tom R and his photos, Tom also posted all the photos he could find of the MDRA "Grand Prix" racers and their rank in the race, with a comment along the lines of "It's good to know what your rivals look like!" I love it. Here's the first 2 sets of photos from the 8K:

Place 1-5
1 28 619 Alan Twomey M 30 27:29 27:28 5:31.5 Minneapolis
2 31 508 Brent Roeger M 44 27:44 27:41 5:34.1 Minneapolis
3 51 484 Mathieu Preuss M 31 28:49 28:45 5:47.0 Roseville
4 65 582 Steve Stenzel M 35 29:24 29:20 5:54.0 St. Paul
5 66 503 Evan Roberts M 41 29:28 29:24 5:54.9 Minneapolis


Place 6-10
6 73 90 Nathan Campeau M 36 30:03 30:00 6:02.1 Minneapolis
7 83 362 Rick Larsen M 54 30:32 30:27 6:07.5 Minnetonka (No picture)
8 87 89 Gerald Butler M 44 30:39 30:36 6:09.3 Lakeville
9 105 85 Paul Brown M 58 31:16 31:11 6:16.4 Waconia
10 106 490 Kari Putterman F 26 31:17 31:14 6:17.0 Minneapolis

Tom posted 9 sets of photos like this (along with the results of everyone in the photos) after going through all of his nearly 300 photos (that someone else shot for him as he was racing) and finding as many of the Grand Prix racers that he could. Awesome!

See all of Tom's photos here, and here's my Irish Run 8K race report.

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O'Gara's Irish Run 8K Race Report

Or, "My FIRST Race on an Running Team!"

Or, "Battling Past Some Usual Race Buddies."

Or, "Debuting Some NEW Shorts!"

After a beautiful and warm 30 days or so, we woke up to this on Saturday morning:

STOP.


I Instagrammed this: "Not the preferred view when heading to a road race... #OGarasIrishRun"

Many of us were talking pre-race about the icy footing and wondering if it would be an issue. Well, it really wasn't, so don't be nervous. I got inside O'Gara's Pub and found some of our YWCA running team:

In our jerseys for the first time!

And YES, that's a new pair of shorts! They are orange and green, and they KINDA look nude at first glance. Here's a pic my wife took of me post-race once I got back home:

Wearing my multi-colored arm warmers from my triathlon in Israel 2 years ago.
For the time being, I'm calling these my "nude shorts."

I grabbed one quick photo of the start of the race course before putting some clothes and my phone back in the car:

An icy situation up and over that hill 2 blocks in the distance.

I chatted with SOOO many "race buddies" briefly before the race. I got in line with everyone else, and found myself next to cyclist extraordinare Pam N. We commented about how NICE AND WARM it was crammed tight next to all of these bare-skinned athletes even though it was only 30 degrees. Soon, the pack lurched forward to the starting line, and we were off!

444 8K runners and 184 5K runners = 628 runners taking off! (This pic is from Tom Rs
camera - he had a friend on top of the bridge seen in the last photo. Thanks Tom!)


Same photo, only with an arrow. Hey, that's me!


The pack hitting the hill. I'm still visible to the right.


Now I'm REALLY visible as I dodged a puddle!


That's my foot in the lower right. Next to Jenna (63) and Nathan (90),
with Angie next to Nathan, and Evan just behind him in orange.

I worked up the hill and past a few friends. Nathan and I chatted on the downhill - he asked what I hoped to run, and I said 29:30. Shortly after, I realized that I had posted that I hoped to run 29 FLAT. That would be around 5:50 miles, or 2:55 half miles.

My first mile was solid: 2:49 and 2:53 for a 5:42 mile. Nice. A good opener.

The street was a bit icy/slushy in spots, but staying in the car tire tracks was good. Nathan and I were still together running in a pack of 6: the 2 of us and 4 women. Being this race is the MN USA Track and Field season opener, it draws out the speedsters. Mile 2 was slowing up a bit, but still OK: 2:54 and 2:59 for a 5:53 second mile.

Suddenly I realized that Evan was running past. (My race buddy who beat me in every race at the 2015 TC Loony Challenge, and who I was able to beat in my final kick 2 months ago at the Securian Run Half Marathon.) THIS WAS THE FIRST I REMEMBERED THAT THIS WAS A "GRAND PRIX" SERIES RACE AND THAT I NEEDED TO TRY TO BEAT MY FRIENDS WHO WERE DOING THE SERIES! Those friends include Nathan and Evan! I was so concerned with this being our first race as a team, that I forgot I needed to be racing hard for the series too! Well, time to try to stick with Evan!

Mile 3 included the turn around (in front of my old apartment): the first half was slower in 3:01, and the second half was where it needed to be in 2:54 for a mile 3 total of 5:55.

Here's a pic from Tom R again that shows the thin trail of runners heading back toward the finish (we had to dart off the frame to the right to go under a little overpass on Hamline so they didn't have to stop traffic on that busy road):

Cathedral and downtown in the distance.

My splits were slowing up. This is usually where I start kicking and passing people, but I think this is where my lack of speed work showed up. I had no "long kick" like I've had in the past. My next half mile splits were 2:56 and 2:59 for a 4th mile of 5:55. Sub-29:00 wasn't possible. But MAYBE sub-29:15 was possible (my 8K PR). I was going to try to stick with Evan and earn some Grand Prix points.

Up and over the final bridge: Dan Greeno (228) out kicked Jeremy (330) by
3 seconds to take the win. IN 24:42! THAT'S 4:59 PACE!


The leaders (and lead biker) heading down the hill
to the finish (with some 5K runners in front of them).

I was slowly sneaking up on Evan coming up to those quick sharp turns to head under Hamline with a half mile left. At the base of the bridge, I ran up along side him and said hi. He pulled away up the hill (showing my lack of hill work with my tight heels). As we came to the top, I started catching up again. Here's Tom's photo from the top of the bridge:

Evan and me to the right.


Close up.


Passing a 5K runner with an unfortunate "tuck."


Close up. Evan has some of THEE BEST "final kick" faces.

I got past Evan just a few seconds later, and I pulled away a bit towards the finish. (BTW, I pulled past Grand Prix buddy Nathan before the turn around, and finished 40 seconds in front of him.) Here's a screenshot from the finishing video showing the gap between me and Evan just before the finish line:

Garmin pace: slow up the bridge, fast down, and then slow at the turns under
Hamline at 0.5 miles. A dip at the turn-around, then slowing to 7:01 pace
up the hill at the end, and ending at 4:54 pace down the hill to the finish.

My final mile was faster, but not SUPER fast: my last 2 half mile splits were 2:58 and 2:51 for a mile 5 total of 5:49. (An 8K is JUST shy of 5 miles, but my Garmin read exactly 5.0 miles.)

OFFICIAL RESULTS:

Steve Stenzel, #582, 35, M, St. Paul

29:20
5:54.06/mile pace (5:52.00 Garmin pace for 5.00 miles)
14:41 first half, 14:39 second half

65 out of 444 overall
62 out of 231 males
7 out of 26 in the 35-39 age group (first race in the new age group!)

Start to turnaround: passed 69 runners and was passed by 1.
Turnaround to finish: passed 5 runners, and was passed by 0.

7 POST-RACE NOTES:

• I thought I had a PR (and I tweeted that I did post-race), but then I remembered my 2012 8K finish of 29:15. So I was 5 seconds from a PR. Dang.

• Speaking of twitter, Evan tweeted me post race. He's ready to race again:

Oh, and Josh tweeted me too. He was cheering at Lexington (mile 1 and mile 4).

• I was happy to just have 1 half-mile split over 3:00. Running up to the turn around from mile 2.0 - 2.5 was 3:01, and the rest were sub-3:00. I thought about how it'd be nice to try to keep them all under 3:00, but didn't make that any sort of race goal. And I was decently consistent: all half-mile splits with within 12 seconds (2:49 through 3:01). And my mile splits were within 13 seconds (5:42 through 5:55). I had a negative split by just 2 seconds. Pretty consistent.

• My team did well! We had enough runners to score a full men's, women's, and masters' team. I'll be back with a post showing more photos of them, as well as our team results.

• My legs held up well for the race. Sure, it was a short race, but it contained some speed, and I haven't been doing much speed work lately. If anything, my lack of speed work made me legs feel BETTER post-race. (By not doing speed work, my final kick isn't nearly as fast, which in turn makes me hurt less once the race is done.)

• My left calf was a LITTLE tight/sore the day after the race, but nothing unusual. I was hoping it wasn't even going to hurt, but I DID just race. I need to give it a few days of rest, some rolling and massaging, and then start some easy runs. I should be OK.

• Finally, my cat gave me a nice post-race lick-down. This was the scene for 20 minutes as I was starting to type this up on Saturday afternoon:

There's a joke in here along the lines of
"being so hot that pussy licks ME," but I'm not going there...

Leaving the race, I jogged a bit of a cooldown, and then I got home. During the race, my sister came up with her family, and so did my parents. We were heading out for a birthday lunch for me (my birthday was the week before). We went to Davanni's for pizza, and then stopped by "Taste of Love" bakery between Izzy's Ice Cream and Choo Choo Bob's right in our 'hood. I had this blueberry vanilla donut in the lower right:

Henry's cream filled roll had SOOOO MUCH CREAM!


From Instagram: "Cake pops make him happy."

It was a decent day at the race, and a great day with my family!

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