Big Bike Week!

Last week was a big week in the saddle, but it was a little more special than that. Here's a quick look at the week, with bike workouts in green:

It was an unusual week because the Raspberry Run 1 Mile was on Sunday the 19th (the day before that week started), so I didn't start last week with a long run. I rested my legs. So I just biked to the gym, went for a swim, and biked home (that's the 2 bike workouts on Monday, totaling less than 5 miles).

What makes last week's bike numbers special is that I biked 121.7 miles, but that included 3 SOLID and ACTUAL bike workouts! In the past, many of my big bike weeks have been a lot of errands and/or commuting on my bike. But this was actual rides. Tuesday's was a moderate ride being it was just 2 days post-race, Thursday's ride was 4x5 mile intervals, and Saturday's ride was a 25 mile tempo with extra at the end to get over 40 miles on the day.

For example, let's look at 2 big weeks from exactly 1 year ago: I had back-to-back weeks of 103 and 112 miles. That was 13 bike "workouts" over those 2 weeks, but only 4 of those were on my tri bike. And of those 4, only 2 were hard, 1 was "moderate," and 1 was easy. I had 2 hard and 1 moderate ride in 1 week last week, not over 2 weeks with lots of other easier rides. It's easy to stack up 100+ mile weeks when you're running errands on your bike, but not actually "working out." (Yes, there's a lot to be said for just "being fit" and using your bike... I'm not against that. I'm just noting that it *is* different when looking at total miles. Were the bike rides just getting around town? Or were they hard training workouts? Those 2 different kinds of miles feel different.)

TUESDAY I just biked moderately for about 35 miles:

I searched out some hills, but didn't ride hard.

THURSDAY I hit the Greenway for 4x5 mile intervals (on the stretch between split #4 and split #6 on this map):

And then a longer cooldown to splits #9 and #10 to get over 40 miles on the day.


Intervals highlighted in red.

Those intervals felt the best they have all year, and my 5-mile averages were 21.3 mph, 22.3 mph, 21.5 mph, and 22.9 mph. Nothing amazing, but I haven't had speeds quite that high this year.

SATURDAY I hit the Mendota Bridge detour to get to Big Rivers, and I did 25 miles hard at the start of a 41+ mile ride:

Hard through split #5, also hitting hills like 4 days prior.

This week will be smaller again, but then I hope to have another soild "saddle week" next week!

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Three Hard Workouts: Tempo Ride, Track Intervals, Bike Intervals

My boys and I got back from a few days up north on Tuesday. Wednesday was a pretty normal day of workouts.

Thursday I got out for a 34 mile ride with the first 20 as a hard tempo effort. Nothing fancy, but a good hard workout after a week away from my bike. I rode hard until split #4, when I ended 20 miles at 21.2 mph:

Speed and heart rate dropping after 20 miles (the arrow).

Friday I hit the track for 4x800 then 4x400. The week before (RIGHT before leaving town on our trip up north), I did 4x(800 then 400), and I forgot how HARD that workout is compared to this 4x800 then 4x400. Now that days are super long, the last half of my workout was in the sun even though I was out early:

T-shirt and water bottle in the sun after my last interval.

2:00 rest between 800s, 90 sec rest between 400s

1:20 + 1:19 = 2:40.3
1:17 + 1:19 = 2:36.9
1:18 + 1:17 = 2:36.2
1:17 + 1:18 = 3:35.8

1:14.9
1:13.6
1:13.5
1:11.9

A PERFECT DESCEND!! The week before, my 800s were 2:43 down to just 1 that was 2:36. This workout was faster! But then my 400s on this workout were about the same speed as the week before.

Lots of laps, and then wandering around between trying not to die.

Finally, on Saturday I hit the Greenway Trail for some bike intervals: 5x4 mile efforts. I usually do 5 mile intervals (usually 3 or 4), but I didn't want to contend with "issues" on either end of the Greenway Trail, so skipped the "edges" and did 4 mile intervals in the middle instead. And I don't think I've ever done FIVE efforts on a bike ride like this.

15 mph wind from the west - slow heading "out," fast coming "back."


Intervals between the 2 groups of laps.


Splits on the east side...


... and splits to the west. (Just before Hwy 100.)


The intervals are shown as the five "bumps" in heart rate.

So that 15 mph wind from the west showed in all of my splits: #1, 3, and 5 were slow, and #2 and 4 were fast:

5x4 mile efforts, 3 mins easy riding in between:

#1: 12:16, 19.6 mph
#2: 10:35, 22.7 mph
#3: 12:09, 19.7 mph
#4: 10:11, 23.6 mph
#5: 11:54, 20.2 mph

I thought my heart rate was going to show me pushing harder INTO the wind, but that HR graph above is pretty even (if anything, my biggest spikes are going fast WITH the wind near the end of #2 and #4).

That was a busy Saturday afternoon on the trail, so I was working my way carefully around lots of people which slowed me up a LITTLE. It was still a good effort after a few decent workouts!

The following day (Sunday, which was yesterday), I took it easy to let my legs rest after a few big days!

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Two Decent Rides!

I was able to get out for some intervals on the Greenway earlier last week. I had 90 minutes to bust out some speed:

Not an overall fast run, but fast in the middle.

I did 4 intervals of 5 miles each down the Greenway. There was a 14 mph wind from the NW, so #1 and #3 were slow because of that, and #2 and #4 were faster. I like to glace at my average speed 1/2 way through each interval and try to get it higher by the end, so you see that noted in my workout:

4x5 mile intervals with 3:00 easy spinning between:

#1: 16:29, 18.2 mph (17.8 halfway)

#2: 13:38, 22.0 mph (21.7 halfway)

#3: 16:19, 18.4 mph (18.1 halfway)

#4: 12:52, 23.3 mph (22.8 halfway)

I wasn't super happy with those splits, but I haven't been riding HARD lately - I've been going LONGER, but losing my speed.

Then on Saturday, I went out of another longer ride very much like I did on the previous Saturday. I rode a very similar route, but took on even a few more hills. On my ride the week before, it was calm and I had 1800 feet of elevation change. On this ride, there was a 12 mph wind, and I had nearly 2100 feet of elevation change. And even though I was hitting a lot of hills (on purpose), I still tried to do a 25 mile tempo ride at the start of this longer ride.

Adding on lots of little out-and-backs where I found more hills.
Did 25 mile tempo from split 1-6 (1:16:49, or 19.53 mph ave on those hills).


The red area is the "new hill" I found just south of split #5.

75 miles of outdoor riding for the last week of April isn't too shabby. I mean, it's not GREAT, but not horrible either. Need to keep working on that shorter-end speed...

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I Ran! (Then Biked Hard, Then Ran Again!)

I took a week off from running after feeling some pain on April 1st and 3rd, and I tested it on Monday the 13th after 9 days off (wearing the "night splint" to bed every night too). I just looped around home because I didn't expect it to feel OK for long. So I never got more than a mile from home:

Numbers are half-mile splits.

My calf didn't hurt, but it started feeling a little tight around 1.5 - 2 miles into the run. I thought I'd be calling it quits around mile 2.5. But it got better and never hurt at all. I stopped after 4.75 miles just because I didn't want to overdo it. It felt OK the rest of the day and things felt promising!

Also, I ran into a turkey in our neighborhood just before mile 4:

I feel the big test for my leg came over the next 2 days...

The day after my first run, I was on my feet a lot for my classes. And went for a few random walks. And then I headed out for a short bike ride down the Greenway being it was over 60 degrees (on my "actual" bike and not just on my old cruddy mountain bike). Shortly after I started, I thought I'd maybe go hard for the first 15 miles or so (I didn't start thinking I'd do much effort, but OH WELL). So that's what I did: a 15 mile tempo ride with a long cool down at the end to get in 24+ miles. I averaged 21.2 mph for those first hard 15 miles, and you can see my speed and heart rate drop just after 42 minutes:

My left knee was a little sore, and my left calf felt a little tight, but nothing bad.

Finally, 2 days after my first run and a day after that bike ride, I went for another easy run. My calf felt the same: normal at first, a bit tight around mile 1.5, but then fine for the rest of it. And it was fine the rest of the day! So I'm not out of the woods just yet, but it's clearly on the upswing. I keep massaging it to loosen it up, and I'm still wearing that nasty "night splint" to bed to help keep my foot in a position that doesn't allow my calf to fully relax.

Feeling good about back-to-back-to-back days with a run, bike, and a run!

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First "Real" Outdoor Ride of 2026

Everything aligned that I was able to get out for a long ride on Thursday. OUTSIDE! It was 50 degrees and the trails were drying well. I figured I'd get my tri-bike off the trainer for the first time in months, and I was HOPING I wouldn't get a flat on the dirty, gritty roads and trails.

I didn't have any speed goals... I just went to "ride." I tried to keep it sort of "moderate" most of the time, and then I found myself trying to keep my average above 20 mph (so much for "no speed goals"). I went down the Greenway and took the curve at Hwy 169 (where it becomes the Cedar Lake Trail I think), and then finally turned around at mile 16. That would have been a 32 mile out-and-back ride, but I re-rode some of the drier sections of the trail another time to make it more like 37+ miles. I kept my overall avearge at 20.0 mph or above until about mile 34.

Here are some pics from my last few miles when I busted out my phone:

The construction at the Keniworth trail is coming along! Fresh trail!


Nice stretches of the trail were clear and dry like this!...


... but other parts were QUITE wet.


Heading up to one of the many puddles that stretched all the way across the trail.

I hit one icy patch around mile 15, but otherwise things were good. I finished with 37+ miles with a 19.6 mph average before rolling around the neighborhood for another mile:

10 mph breeze FROM THE EAST was a nasty slap on the way home!


5-mile splits. I re-rode the section by the #2 split to add in miles...


Out-and-back riding "back" to the red line, then turning back
to the blue line, and then finally heading for home.


I think this is showing the BONK that I felt. Yikes.


Covered in puddle water and grit back at home.

My birthday is coming up, and I'm hoping I can get out for 45 miles for my 45th birthday. I hope we have some decent weather that day, because it's easy to do 10 miles in cruddy weather, but much harder to go longer (right now, the forecast high is 45 degrees, and that's right on my personal cusp of outside vs inside riding). I won't start that one with any speed goals... just with the goal to survive and hit 45 miles!

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Big Week, Especially in the Saddle!

Last week was a solid week:

That's 23.0 mile of running, 12 hrs and 19 mins of strength training, and 6 hrs and 30 mins in the saddle! With 35+ miles of that saddle time outside on 2 rides on my mountain bike. I posted about my 2 rides on Tuesday (outdoor mountain bike ride followed immediately by more on the trainer in the basement), and I did that AGAIN on Thursday!

• MON: treadmill long run, PT legs, and core. The treadmill long run (10.9 miles total) was solid: I did the normal 6 "harder pace miles" in the middle, and I started those at 9.3 mph and sped up 0.1 mph every half-mile. But I also sped up 3 extra times too (around mile 1.5, mile 4, and within the final mile) to finish those 6 harder miles in 36:08 (6:01.33/mile pace).

• TUES: 8x upper body, and 2 bike rides. Again, I posted about those bike workouts recently. It was just over an hour outside, and then 90 minutes on the trainer.

• WED: easy descending run, PT legs, and core. The run was funny. I realized early on that I was dropping time on every split. So just for funzies, I thought I'd try to keep dropping them. I perfectly dropped half-mile splits for the first 4.5 miles of the run because easing up a bit:

• THURS: 8x upper body, and 2 bike rides. Yes, like Tuesday... when I thought Tuesday was a GREAT day! This workout made this a great WEEK. It wasn't icy like it was on Tuesday, and it was a few degrees warmer. It was GREAT. So I tried to flip-flop the time I spent on each bike: I tend to ride harder outside, so I wanted to do more outside before just taking it easy on the trainer. (For example: my HR averaged 135 bpm on Tuesday on my outdoor ride, and then even after adding some longer efforts on the trainer, my trainer ride was only 127 bpm on average.) So I looped around the city for over 20 miles:

The numbers are 5 mile splits.


Trail was dry and clear! And met a train!

• FRI: tempo run, PT legs, and core. I did NOT know if it was smart to run hard after those 2 big bike days. My legs were HEAVY. Even as I was coming up to the point in my run where I was planning to start running hard, I wasn't sure if I was going to speed up. I decided to "give it a go," but I knew my time could suck. And it kinda did. I went 3 hard miles along the river:

My half-mile splits of the 3 tempo miles were:

3:04, 3:08, 3:09, 3:13, 3:03, 2:55

= 18:33.8 (6:11.27 pace)

I thought 3:04 was a decent opening split, but then they just kept climbing. I could NOT find another gear... when I did try to sped up, that would last for a few strides before I felt weak and had to back off a bit. Ideally, I would have been a minute faster over those 3 miles. D'oh. I realized when I started cooling down and didn't feel the need to start walking that my legs were shot from a harder week - I didn't have it in me to run harder, but now I felt fine once I got through a slower-than-it-should-have-been tempo run.

• SAT: 7x upper body circuts, easy trainer ride. Didn't go nuts today! Just an 72 minutes on the trainer watching TV. Coming down after a big week, and making sure I didn't injure myself.

• SUN: rest and core. Henry had state fencing all weekend, so I was on my feet and moving a lot, and it was a good "active recovery" sort of day.

So big days on Tuesday and Thursday (440 and 417 intensity minutes) propelled me to a big week of "intensity minutes:"

1867 on the week...


... only the 3rd time over 1800 mins since July!

Huh... that graph might hold a bit of a key for me... After a fun June with less training, my speed fell off a cliff for the rest of the year, and my intensity minutes did as well. I need to keep MOVING and DOING MORE if I want to get some speed back. I had 9 weeks over 1800 minutes for the first 5 months of that graph, and only 3 weeks over 1800 in the last 7 months. There's a lesson in there! (Also, I was teaching less last spring, so that's why I was able to make that so big!)

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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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Decent Long Run (For It Being Feb... and Me Being Injured...)

I felt decent about this one. After I went for a wet bike ride on Sunday and found spots of the trail that were still icy, I altered my long run on Monday to head down the Greenway a bit so I could turn around before it got REAL icy 0.75 miles past Lake Street.

Faster "pace miles" as half-mile splits #5-17.

It was 50+ degrees on Saturday and Sunday, and it was still 38 degrees when I went for my run on Monday morning. But being the ground is still frozen, as soon as the sun went down, all the "dampness" that I rode through on Sunday turned to ice before my run on Monday. It slowed me up a LITTLE, but wasn't too much of an issue.

I climbed the big hill just past split #13 before turning around at the top where it got extra icy. I had slower opening "pace miles" of 6:27 and 6:23, but I'd been speeding up since: I then ran a 6:08 and 6:07, and then the split that included going up that big hill was 5:58! I almost PERFECTLY descended my splits, but split 11 of 12 took a lot out of me as I climbed that little hill up under the Lake Bridge, so my final mile was just back over 6:00. Here were my half-mile splits:

6 miles at pace: 3:17, 3:09, 3:13, 3:10, 3:06, 3:02, 3:04, 3:03, 3:00*, 2:58, 3:05**, 2:57

= 37:09 (6:11.50 pace)

* up the big hill
** up the smaller hill under the Lake Bridge

There was no stopping to shit on this run! I was hurting, but it felt good to keep dropping time on those splits. It felt like the 2024 TC 10 Mile where I was hurting, but on the PERFECT VERGE of hurting TOO much - I was working hard but happy with my splits as they dropped.

My butt is still a bit tight/sore after these runs, but it's not bad, and nothing like it was last month. So I'm on the upswing! I'm making sure to ice it well after good workouts and also stretch it out nicely. (Not at the same time.)

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Alex Pretti Memorial Bike Ride

I had been saying that I was going to get out for a bike ride on January 31st so I could keep my streak of having outdoor bike miles logged every month since March 2023 (when I started commuting more by bike). It turns out that a memorial ride for Alex Pretti was scheduled that day, so I biked out to find it. Here's what I posted later that day on social media:

I had to taxi my boys around midday, so I couldn’t start the Alex Pretti memorial ride with everyone else. I took off about 40 minutes late down the Greenway Trail as fast as I could go on my old mountain bike. I was hoping to find the group ride, but they didn’t share their route ahead of time for safety reasons.
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Right as I was giving up hope, I saw a bridge in front of me full of cyclists. I found them just before I-35W. I worked my way up on top of the bridge and joined the ride.
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It started and ended with tears in my eyes.
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As I joined the ride (maybe one block in), there were four kids holding a Guatemalan flag while waving at all of us going by (2nd pic). A cyclist just in front of me shouted “WE LOVE YOU, NEIGHBORS!” Tears.
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We rolled past where Renee Good was shot in the head (3rd pic).
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After going down Minnehaha and Nokomis Parkway for a few miles, I peeled off to head for home as the ride turned toward the VA where Alex worked. As I finished taking the last video of this post, I heard a tiny voice behind me. It was an old woman wearing a long old winter jacket with a small “old lady” dog on a leash standing next to her. She quietly said “all of this moves me... it makes me want to cry...” Her words made me tear up again. We chatted for a moment, and I wished her well and headed for home.
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There were thousands of people out there. No idea how many, as it was impossible to see them all at the same time. Very moving. I would like to go make “art” of these issues, but these are just snapshots of the day - too heavy for me to make art right now.

And here were the pics and video:

Shortly after meeting up with the ride.


Four kids holding the Guatemalan flag.


People stopping around Renee Good's memorial.


Just a sea of riders.




Carrie and Charlie. Charlie and I chatted for a while.


On Minnehaha near Cedar. The organizer made 1000 of
those vests, and suspects 5000+ people were there.


Riding on Minnehaha.


Headed over Hiawatha near Minnehaha Falls.


Direct link: youtu.be/lcg6wGuvTpk?si=Dy-N27ua9DhxEl4K

It's still not good here in the metro. One of my oldest son's classmates (and soccer teammates) had their Dad and older brother taken from work - I don't know his immigration details (I guess I've never thought to think "Oh, they're latino... I wonder if they're legal?"), but he's been here for at least 9 years as a member of our parish earning money to send his kids to private school. Our class instantly raised $1,100 for the family for at least immediate bills, food, etc. A friend's Spanish tutor was taken, hauled to Texas, and then released IN TEXAS because they are a US citizen. They have to find their way the 1,000 miles back (luckily, they have a good church where people are pooling together). A former directly-next-door neighbor had her nanny taken and hauled away for days. Another professor friend is helping to raise money for a family friend of 25+ years who's employer was taken in December who hasn't been paid since October.

We went out to eat last weekend down Lake Street in a very Hispanic neighborhood, and 2 of the 3 places we tried to stop weren't open. People are scared. US CITIZENS are scared. We ended up eating at a taco place where someone was manning the door to only unlock the door to let families in to eat - not ICE. My wife has multiple co-workers who have been stopped and told that their IDs weren't enough but would be let off "this time, but not next time." What paperwork are they supposed to carry? (They've asked, and never gotten an answer.) A family on my boys' fencing team makes sure to carry their passports on them at all times. (Oh, and their fencing gym is now locked 24/7 and you need to be let in by someone who knows you.) Sacred Heart Church in the Dayton's Bluff neighborhood here in St. Paul has had ICE agents sitting in the parking lot ready to grab parishioners after a number of their Spanish-speaking masses. Sure, come after the criminals, whether they are immigrants or not. But this "we're coming for the worst of the worst" is a line of crap. We are being terrorized, and if you're living around the area and don't feel that way, then you have a small, privileged, (white) circle. This is not OK.

I wanted to "make art" at the bike ride, but found myself unable to. But I've been out a few times since then to add to my "4 a.m. series," and here are a few fresh images from my Photo Blog.

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