2025 Activities year-in-review
This year I’m compressing my running and biking review posts down to just one post and talking broadly about the trackable activities I did over…
Read more
A little north shore bikepacking adventure
Earlier this year my wife suggested a trip up to the Superior National Forest to explore some of the gravel roads and campgrounds via bike.…
Read more
Navigating spring and fitness
Here in Minnesota we’re now solidly in early spring weather and that poses unique challenges for people who like to be active outside. In the…
Read more
Let’s do a fitness stat geek-out!
Even though I’m a Liberal Arts guy, I’m a collector at heart and stats fill that inner need to acquire new information all the time.…
Read more
Trying out Zwift
I’ve never been much of a fan of indoor workout machines, preferring to be outside if I’m going to run or bike. I can’t stand…
Read more
2023 Biking year in review
It’s time once again for my annual review of how I did in the biking and running endeavors that I do, and first up is…
Read more
Exploring bike paths in my home town
Over the past few years the suburb that I live in, Fridley, MN, has slowly been adding more and more infrastructure for biking. The past…
Read more
Some quick life updates
It’s been a couple months since I posted here, and so I thought it was about time for a general life update post. August through…
Read more
Photographing Crit Races
Last night I got the chance to photograph the beginner races of the Tuesday Night Crit series at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds. My wife was…
Read more
Exploring Limits: Mountain Biking in the Southwest
My experience with singletrack has come in three areas. My first exposure to singletrack has come through trail running. One of the main parks where…
Read more
Surly Ghost Grappler – the 400 mile review
When the Surly Ghost Grappler was announced in February of 2022 I was intrigued. It was a weird mix of mountain bike, gravel bike, and……
Read more
2022 Biking year in review
This year was another great year for me when it came to biking. Although I had to take a break in the middle, due to…
Read more
Quick and dirty bike stand
Over the years we’ve started to acquire a few too many bikes, and figuring out a good way to store them in the garage can…
Read more
Old Abe Trail biking, to avoid the rain
Sunday morning was meant to be a beautiful ride around the NW metro area with my wife, clocking in a 50 mile distance. However, as…
Read more
Layering in winter
Living in a cold weather area you need to be prepared for different weather conditions if you want to be outside and active. It’s not…
Read more
Garmin fēnix 6S – Long Term Review
In June of 2021 I bid farewell to my old Garmin 735XT that I loved and upgraded to a brand new Garmin Fēnix 6S. The…
Read more
2021 Biking Year in Review
Once again 2021 proved to a bigger than normal year for me when it came to biking. I didn’t top my 2020 stats, but it…
Read more
Well that was dumb…
Because of the adventures I like to take via bike, I put a rear rack on almost every bike when I get it. I procrastinated…
Read more
The end of the GravelKings….
In my first impressions post I talked about the weird issues of the Panaracer GravelKing SK+ tires and concrete with grooves in it. In the…
Read more
First Impression Review: Panaracer GravelKing SK+
Update: I’ve since removed these tires and gone back to my old ones. About two weeks ago I decided to move over to tubeless, and…
Read more
The Journey to Tubeless
Last winter I decided to try going tubeless on my fat bike, and had mixed results. I knew that the tires I was using were…
Read more
#30daysofbiking 2021 edition
Last year was the first time I was able to join in with the #30daysofbiking event that encourages folks to get out and ride at…
Read more
Review: 2021 Surly Ice Cream Truck
This review is a long time coming, but now that I have over 100 miles on the bike I feel like I can share my…
Read more
Making 2021 plans
For the first time in a while I’m feeling really hopeful that we’re on the back-side of this pandemic. Vaccines are rolling out, case numbers…
Read more
My tubeless adventure
In the biking world there are a few topics that will provoke a massive discussion. Frame material and “definition of a gravel bike” are two…
Read more
2020 Biking Year in Review
It’s time once again for my yearly review wrap-ups. Starting as always with my biking year in review! Despite everything bad that happened in 2020,…
Read more
Strava Privacy Zone… a lesson learned
Even though I use a Garmin device to track all my activities, I push all of them from Garmin Connect to Strava. For the most…
Read more
Staying active in the dark
It never fails. Every year around this time my activity levels drop like a rock and I find I need to re-motivate myself to keep…
Read more
A little documentary work
My wife decided to do a tour of regional park reserves, and set about planning a 3 day, two night, bikepacking trip to visit them…
Read more
The streak has ended, but…
Back at the end of March I decided to join up with #30daysofbiking. The goal is to bike, even just a little bit, every single…
Read more
Working with what Minnesota gives us
This past weekend we took an extended trip to Itasca State Park. It was a long time coming, and we were super happy to finally…
Read more
The story of a toe
A couple of weeks ago I had an unfortunate run-in with a dumbbell. Not the kind currently trying to take over social media, but the…
Read more
#30daysofbiking… complete!
For the first year since I had heard about this challenge, I managed to get it done. If you’re not familiar, #30daysofbiking is a challenge…
Read more
2019 Biking Year in Review
It’s time once again for my annual wrap-up of my running and biking adventures for the year. This year marked a huge change in my…
Read more
Fitness week recap – 12/2/2019
Week Starting 12/2/2019 Running: 14.3 miles Biking: 33.4 miles Steps: 68.787 (34.33 miles – 20.03 walking) Impression: Two weeks ago was vacation week for me and my running and…
Read more
Fitness week recap – 11/18/2019
Week Starting 11/18/2019 Running: 12.5 miles Biking: 14.8 miles Steps: 83,999 (41.5 miles – 29.00 walking) Impression: Pretty simple week this past week. Rode my bike to the train…
Read more
Fitness week recap – 11/11/2019
Week Starting 11/11/2019 Running: 9 miles Biking: 38.1 miles Steps: 71,932 (35.14 miles – 26.14 walking) Impression: Didn’t get out an run much this week. Still dealing with some…
Read more
Trying to be less car-dependent
When I was a kid we didn’t own a car until I was 15. We lived in a neighborhood in St. Paul and so bus…
Read moreFitness week recap – 11/4/2019
Week Starting 11/4/2019 Running: 13.7 miles Biking: 13.4 miles Steps: 87,609 (42.91 miles – 29.21 walking) Impression: Low mileage week. Was at a conference for a couple days which…
Read more
Fitness week recap – 10/28/2019
Week Starting 10/28/2019 Running: 25.2 miles Biking: 50.5 miles Steps: 98,266 (48.82 miles – 23.62 walking) Impression: Got back to normal this week with a decent amount of running…
Read more
Fitness week recap – 10/21/2019
Week Starting 10/21/2019 Running: 6.0 miles Biking: 36.8 miles Steps: 57,383 (28.81 miles – 22.81 walking) Impression: RECOVERY WEEK! Yep, not much to report on the running front. I…
Read more
Fitness week recap – 10/14/2019
Week Starting 10/14/2019 Running: 106.2 miles Biking: 0 miles Steps: 245,966 (125.26 miles – 19.06 walking) Impression: Really quick and easy post this week. I didn’t run much all…
Read more
Fitness week recap – 10/7/2019
Week Starting 10/7/2019 Running: 15.6 miles Biking: 43.1 miles Steps: 83,683 (41.07 miles – 25.47 walking) Impression: Little bit of a down week this week. We’ve had some crappy…
Read more
Trying out bike packing
Last week my friend Mike pinged me and asked what I was doing on Saturday night. He picked up a bike a few months ago…
Read moreSomething went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
Second Runnings 