Ethan Cannon

6:45 pace. I went the other direction on Battlefield parkway. I had thought I might be able to do the full loop, but now I see that would've taken at least 12 miles. There was a dusting of snow which allowed me to see my own footprints for much of the way back. Felt tired. Saw a car three times driven by someone who must have been as drunk as a duck. 

6:37 pace, mostly in Celebration, Florida. Wow, that was fun! Virginia and Oregon are both warmer than Minnesota but Florida is on a whole different level and I loved running in the warm weather. It was awesome to run on wooden boardwalks through the jungle-ish vegetation, and pass by beautiful lakes with interesting birds. The greenery just smells different here, which is fun. It reminded me of NOLA but less shoddy.

6:09 pace. I did the same route, but found the correct way to extend the run and then continued on to Island Village. As I read about how many miles people walk at Epcot (7-10+ they said), it definitely worried me. Plus, I had to wake up at 5:20 for this. The entire first half of the run was basically in total darkness. Thankfully, the boardwalks were well lit. Apparently Disney designed the Celebration community- no wonder it is so charming and walkable. Blisters got bad. 

Ran in Florida, in part with my nephew. 

Ran in Florida, in part with my nephew.

6:54 pace, east on Como. It was a total mess outside, particularly close to my home. Coming from Florida, the excitement of this was a little muted, but I did run in shorts today - a rare occurrence during January in MN. 

7:16 pace, east river road. This morning was one of the worst thaw/freezes I've had the opportunity of running through. I'm not sure what factors made it so much of a mess, but it felt like there were very, very few spots that I ran on bare ground rather than crunchy/slick spots. 

The roads today were bad. Exceptionally bad. I didn't fall down, which is nice, but there were massive ice sheets due to the melted snow and the rain we got last night, rendering some areas virtually impassible. I tried to run Como classic but just came back on Como.

6:29 pace. Ironically, an additional dusting of snow actually gave me some more traction in places where I really needed it. I'm not sure what is going on. I don't think I've ever seen sidewalks this bad, with no end in sight. I ran east on Como, then across transitway, on Washington ave, and up west river north to the playground. The river road path was just a total mess of thick ice covered in snow. I'm really surprised that wasn't better taken care of. Still, it was early on a Saturday morning, and at times I was able to run in the road pretty easily, which allowed me to go faster. 

7:28 pace. This morning, about 7 fire trucks drove by my apartment. I found the fire on my run, near Hunting Valley road. It was a bad idea to run east of the fire with the wind blowing that direction, as I breathed some air that was probably pretty gross. Pace was slower than I had thought, but this sometimes happens post-fasting. The University area is well-treated, elsewhere is not.  

7:08 pace, west river road. I was a good deal faster on the way back, likely thanks to the light which helped me see the ice better and run more aggressively. It was a very warm morning to run in shorts. 

7:05 pace, east on Como. Ice situation (I mean, the stuff on the ground) was a lot better today. 

Just under 7 minute pace, Diag / St A parkway. Beautiful sunrise and didn't feel very cold for being 10 degrees. In parallel to how last week the snow gave me more traction, I had another interesting counterintuitive experience. I had my first fall of the season, but it wasn't related to ice. Early on in my run when it was still dark out, I tripped over a bump in the sidewalk. I then fell onto an area of ice, which actually helped me because I was able to slide on it which likely saved some pain and potentially a little damage to what I was wearing. Overall the ice is a lot less bad than last week which has been nice. 

6:57 pace, Boom island. It was my first time running on Dinkytown greenway in a while it feels like. Bridge 9 is supposed to open today but there were still vehicles on it when I ran by. This morning was a best-case scenario in that it was warm out, but the snow that had been supposed to come last night didn't amount to much of anything. 

6:20 pace. East on Como with detours around St Paul campus and Como lake, all the way to the top of the hill on Wheelock. This was designed to be another good run for the morning after a snowfall. It was cold and more windy on the way home so it took me longer to make it back, but still I have no regrets about running outside. I very nearly ran inside. 

Treadmill run. It was feels like -23 but running to the gym I almost felt like I could have handled it. The fans that are in there are overall a huge plus, but they are on constantly so they do heat up the room. 

7:07 pace, Roseville route. It was -5 degrees, which was the coldest actual temperature I've run in in at least a couple of years. It was of course not one of my more enjoyable runs, but nor was it ridiculously uncomfortable. I came home and was able to immediately get back to my life as the thawing process wasn't very painful. My hands started to feel cold early on during the run so I tried to like wiggle my fingers a lot but that only worked for a couple minutes before I started feeling weird sensations doing so. 

7:11 pace, west river road north. As in, the original WRR north. Today was my first time since last April crossing bridge 9. It was really nice to cross the river on a pedestrians-only bridge. They have really high fences now but you can still see out. There was some snow on the ground, but not too much slipping. Felt relatively nice and warm. 

As for the new shoes, they felt fine. My first impression was that my toes were being pressed down into the ground and were getting more of a workout. The last time I really fell in love with a shoe right off that bat was the spongy Saucony Triumph 20s. Thus far, these seem to be ok though. 

7:02 pace, St. A parkway. I considered running inside but the cold snap that starts today will force me indoors for at least tomorrow and Saturday. 

To develop my opinion better on these shoes, I will need to run on a harder surface than the layer of snow I was on most of today. 

Today was a "stay inside all day" type of day due to the cold, so I ran a bit further on the treadmill. I've become better at being able to listen to "productive" things on the treadmill recently which is nice. 

I ran on the treadmill for 98 minutes, plus getting there and back. 

6:52 pace, east river flats. This was my first time running that route in quite a while. What I found was that it definitely appeared untreated. However, it's been a while since it snowed and people walking on it must have really packed down the snow into something that is not very slippery, nor very soft. So it didn't really impact me much which was nice. 

7:06 pace, a mix of Como classic and Como ave. 0 degrees and feels like -15. Wasn't easy going into the wind but it could've been worse. 

6:59 pace, including 6:46 pace on the way back from west river north, when the wind was more at my back. -2 outside but it was whatever. I got out a few minutes later than normal today but I can definitely tell that the mornings are getting lighter. So far so good with the new shoes. 

6:55 pace, St A parkway. Got some gross air this morning. The cold felt fine, but I won't complain when my morning runs are above 0 degrees again. 6:46 pace on the way back. Going out I was extra slow because navigating Talmage is challenging in the dark with all the ice formations it has. 

6:51 pace, Como classic-ish via Hendon. This time around, the roads were much more passable. 

6:05 pace, west river road. -1 when I left but I never really felt cold, mostly due to my quick pace, but perhaps a little due to a bright rising sun. Talmage is still a mess but a lot of the surfaces I was running on weren't. This allowed me to kind of push it and get my heart rate up in a way I haven't been able to much this winter. One thing I noticed is that my UMN face covering seems to do a better job of allowing me to breathe in those situations, rather than getting sucked into my mouth like my other one does. It shows how much I'm favoring morning runs that I chose to do this instead of run on the gateway in 20 degrees later today!