Community Trail Running

“It is the real deal. It is hard, but it's gorgeous. The views are incredible. You get to see some of those beautiful coastal mountain views. We do it on the summer solstice every year. So there's snow, which is always a fun piece to add in there.”

The Kusam Klimb is under new race direction, as friend of the podcast and race director Myke Labelle and his crew at Coastline Endurance have taken over the event. The Kusam Klimb is famous for “Bill’s Trail” and was originated to help the struggling village of Sayward, BC, bring in some money. That original goal, to help the community during tough times, is still the focus for Coastline. They are simply doing their Coastline thing, making the event run like a well-oiled machine, and runners know they will have an enjoyable experience.

“Nothing they've done is wrong. It's just adding that kind of, I call it the Coastline Endurance touch, to it to make things better or cleaner, just around the edges. Because I told them this when I met with them. I said, you guys are sitting on a gold mine here. This is probably one of the best events around because of what it is and the culture that it's created.”

The Klimb is sold out for 2023, but the event still needs volunteers and it’s worth getting to know it now so you can be prepared for the 2024 edition!

The conversation with Myke was great. He shares some insight into the business approach that the race series has to consider as well as how to keep the event true to its original intention. It’s always a treat to have Myke on the cast and this episode is no different.

Please like, rate, subscribe, and share!

It all helps in the world of online algorithms. Thank you for your support.

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Music by REDproductions from Pixabay.

If you enjoy this podcast, I would really appreciate it if you could like, share, subscribe, or comment! I’m trying to make this the best trail running podcast it can be and I certainly appreciate your time. Thank you all and happy trails :)

Galiano Trails Society is hiring: Trail Building and Maintenance Coordinator

I’m honoured to have joined the Galiano Trails Society board of directors! It’s a brand new role for me, and I will have some more to tell you all about it soon. But in the meantime, we are hiring and I must share the job posting with you all! Please share with anyone that you think would appreciate it.

Start Date: February, 2023Term: One Year Contract with possible extensionTime Commitment: Two 8-hour days per month on average with some flexibilityApplication Due Date: January 31, 2023

THE GALIANO TRAILS SOCIETY is a registered charity dedicated to the development and enjoyment of hiking trails on Galiano Island.

The Society is currently seeking a capable, Trail Building and Maintenance Coordinator (the "Coordinator") who has the skills to both organize and lead volunteer and summer student work parties, and undertake heavy-lift trail construction work, including clearing fallen trees by chainsaw and moving and laying gravel.

The ideal candidate will have experience building trails, be knowledgeable about good forest management practices; be able to operate a chain saw; can coordinate, lead and train volunteers and summer students; and has all applicable licenses and permits, including a Workers Compensation Board account, and liability insurance.

The Coordinator will be expected to work with the Trails Society Board to create, manage and report on an annual schedule for trail building and maintenance indicating at what stage of the project each trail is at; and, manage the general trail sites and working conditions, such as erosion and siltation control, barricades, signs, and maintenance of foot traffic past the site.

Please apply by January 31, 2023 by sending your CV and cover letter to:[email protected]

“I'm the one who gets our staff to execute. I oversee our staff, our trail crew, our trail director, our marketing team, and everybody, and also help to ensure that our organization is moving forward, that we're not staying stagnant.”

Deanne Cote works with the North Shore Mountain Bike Association’s board of directors to execute their vision, “Trails for all and trails forever”. Trails forever is a decent description of North Vancouver in general, and the NSMBA has a lot to do with that! They don’t quite maintain the entire system on the north shore, but they are always looking to add to the existing network and ensure the current network is smooth like butter. They’ve been doing this for 25 years now! We are very fortunate to have an organization like this working so hard on our home trail network.

“Our main purpose is to advocate for the trails, hopefully, get more new trails as well as maintain the existing trails.

We tend to hire more trail crew every year because we do require lots of maintenance out on those trails. We're always recruiting new builders and volunteers. This past year, we put in over 15,000 hours of trail work on our network.”

Deanne has some great tips for all trail users as well. The conversation was enjoyable as it was nice to learn about the organization a bit more, including how they and the entire mountain biking industry are working towards more inclusivity, and what the NSMBA has planned for 2023.

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Music by REDproductions from Pixabay.

If you enjoy this podcast, I would really appreciate it if you could like, share, subscribe, or comment! I’m trying to make this the best trail running podcast it can be and I certainly appreciate your time. Thank you all and happy trails :)

Galiano Trails Society is hiring: Trail Building and Maintenance Coordinator

I’m honoured to have joined the Galiano Trails Society board of directors! It’s a brand new role for me, and I will have some more to tell you all about it soon. But in the meantime, we are hiring and I must share the job posting with you all! Please share with anyone that you think would appreciate it.

Start Date: February, 2023Term: One Year Contract with possible extensionTime Commitment: Two 8-hour days per month on average with some flexibilityApplication Due Date: January 31, 2023

THE GALIANO TRAILS SOCIETY is a registered charity dedicated to the development and enjoyment of hiking trails on Galiano Island.

The Society is currently seeking a capable, Trail Building and Maintenance Coordinator (the "Coordinator") who has the skills to both organize and lead volunteer and summer student work parties, and undertake heavy-lift trail construction work, including clearing fallen trees by chainsaw and moving and laying gravel.

The ideal candidate will have experience building trails, be knowledgeable about good forest management practices; be able to operate a chain saw; can coordinate, lead and train volunteers and summer students; and has all applicable licenses and permits, including a Workers Compensation Board account, and liability insurance.

The Coordinator will be expected to work with the Trails Society Board to create, manage and report on an annual schedule for trail building and maintenance indicating at what stage of the project each trail is at; and, manage the general trail sites and working conditions, such as erosion and siltation control, barricades, signs, and maintenance of foot traffic past the site.

Please apply by January 31, 2023 by sending your CV and cover letter to:[email protected]

CTR has our first paid subscription

“We ended up getting horribly lost and all four of us came close to dying of exposure that night. My buddies and I made a pledge there and then after we kind of were saved, that we come back the next year and knock off the whole 180 km in one push.” - Ean Jackson

Ean Jackson has been wrapped up in the Sunshine Coast Trail for quite some time now. What started as a group challenge has turned into a lifelong relationship for the Powell River, BC, based trail runner. Jackson was the very first to finish the run in one attempt (though it wasn’t the first attempt, because that one didn’t go so great) and these days he updates the website for the Sunshine Coast Trail and offers up help and advice to any trail runners who reach out.

His passion and love for the trail is clear as is the work the Powell River Parks and Wilderness Society (PRPAWS) puts into making the trail so great. Because the trail offers so much variety, it’s hard for Ean to choose any favourite area.

“Some sections are on the ocean, some are on mountaintops, some sections are on mossy green tunnels where old logging roads passed over 100 years ago. Some sections follow rushing rivers. It's it's really hard to pick one section as my favorite…”

Ean was a great guest who just loves this trail. I loved the chance to learn more about it from him. It was wild to learn about this hut-to-hut possibility so close to Vancouver, and to find out that staying in the huts is free was very surprising. I’m going to have to check it out, I know this much, and the shuffle event sounds like a great reason to get over there and see some of the trail!

Watch XSNRG here

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Music by REDproductions from Pixabay.

If you enjoy this podcast, I would really appreciate it if you could like, share, subscribe, or comment! I’m trying to make this the best trail running podcast it can be and I certainly appreciate your time. Thank you all and happy trails :)

“I'm fortunate to have great staff and we all use the stuff. If we use it and we like it and it works, we can sell it. It's not rocket science, right?” - Dave Cressman

Distance Runwear has been operating for over 11 years now. Located in Vancouver, and North Vancouver, BC, as well as online, Dave and Meghan Cressman, started the shop when they recognized an opportunity to differentiate their running shop from the others. They didn’t need to be bigger to be better, in fact, just the opposite. The reason they’ve found success is they sell what they know.

“That's partly why we've stayed small, is it enables us, or forces us really to be very focused on the things we do bring into the store because we just don't have a lot of space to just display things for the sake of displaying things. And that's probably been the lesson. We need to keep moving forward and we need to cut the cord if something's not working and then go and find that next thing or focus more on the things that we know work for us. That's enabled us to kind of stay relevant as well because we're always hunting, we're always searching for the new things.”

Dave was great and he gave a fantastic glimpse into what they’ve done to stick around for over a decade. Distance Runwear is open all week for your last-minute shopping needs! ;)

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Music by REDproductions from Pixabay.

If you enjoy this podcast, I would really appreciate it if you could like, share, subscribe, or comment! I’m trying to make this the best trail running podcast it can be and I certainly appreciate your time. Thank you all and happy trails :)

Kara Delwo of the Fraser Valley, BC, is passionate about putting on a great event. So when the race director spoke about hosting trail running races it was clear she wants to leave every single runner with fond memories. Her company “Heads or Trails” just opened registration for the Bear Mountain Trail Race (8km, 12km, 21km on May 13, 2023) and the Bear Mountain mountain bike race (11km or 23km on May 14, 2023). Delwo is pumped to welcome trail runners to Bear Mountain once again, and participants can expect a great atmosphere at any of her events.

“I've always really focused on pushing other people to achieve great things and to celebrate their actual achievements. I care a lot about the integrity of the event. Making sure that it's something that people get there and there's the wow factor and they want to come back. It's not just something that they show up to, race and leave. It's a full spectacular event.”

Heads or Trails hosts 3 trail running races (1 of which is still a mystery, but coming in August of 2023) and 3 mountain bike races. It’s the first year that Delwo is running the events on her own under the Heads or Trails brand, and she is excited to expand her footprint in the trail running community. The races are always accepting volunteers so send them a message if you want to get involved!

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Music by REDproductions from Pixabay.

If you enjoy this podcast, I would really appreciate it if you could like, share, subscribe, or comment! I’m trying to make this the best trail running podcast it can be and I certainly appreciate your time. Thank you all and happy trails :)

Blumaka Konnect get their independent lab results

Stuart Jenkins was a guest back in episode 18 and we chatted all about the Blumaka Konnect insoles. The idea with the insoles is your feet don’t slip inside the shoes. They were awaiting independent testing results and those results have arrived. They were good. Really good! My anecdotal discoveries with the insoles so far have me believing these things can make a difference. I’m really hopeful an elite will get their hands on these and think so too.

The Trail Running Film Festival is accepting entries

The Trail Running Film Festival is open for submissions until January 7! I’m super excited to be bringing this event to Vancouver and helping executive producer Mathias Eichler with anything else I can along the way. You may remember Mathias from episode 10 of the podcast. He’s an RD down in Olympia, Washington, and he is super passionate about this community.

So I’m calling out to any and all of you who are creators, please submit your work to the festival! It’s a great opportunity to showcase everything that is great about this community. If you’re interested in bringing the festival to your city, get on that now too! If you’re a run club, or a run shop, or just a straight-up trail running fan, this is a great opportunity to bring the community together and have a great time. Thank you all so much for helping me with this!

The opportunity to listen to a coach and one of their runners talk about a common subject is something I’m enjoying immensely so far. It’s fun to hear from both sides and this week’s podcast features this dynamic as Couch to Summit coach James Stewart joins us along with one of his runners, Brian Clements. James and Brian are chatting all about their Bremners Winter Vancouver Vertical Kilometre Series taking place on the North Shore of Vancouver, BC. The winter series is virtual (though the pair chat about some exciting news for the next summer series) and they have 5 courses (with 15 segments) ready to go. Runners competing on those 5 courses aren’t just competing for the fastest climb either as they made sure the series was more interesting than that. As a coach, James wanted to make sure all of his runners felt as though they were a part of the series:

“Brian's an incredible athlete, but he's not ever going to be setting the fastest times. But he's more than capable of doing like 50 or more VK's over a four month stretch, no problem. So I guess I was thinking about how do I reward someone like Brian and keep them interested in the series. So with the power ranking format we have, it's just the way that we reward people who put the most effort into the series and we give them rewards and challenges to aim for and that has actually spurned forward some really epic feats of endurance…”

Learn more about the series and register

Check out James and his coaching

Follow Brian on Strava

It was awesome to get to hear a bit about both of these passionate trail runners and how excited they are for this winter challenge. Are you going to sign up? Are there VK challenges where you run? Let us know!

Join the Discord

With Twitter doing it’s thing I’ve started a Discord channel. I’m hoping to maybe get some live chats and such going when a few more people sign up. You know, actually use it the way people do! So if that’s something you’re interested in, head on over and check it out. It’s also got a chat feature so that we can type to each other just like any other old school chat :)

Other places to listen

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Music by REDproductions from Pixabay.

If you enjoy this podcast, I would really appreciate it if you could like, share, subscribe, or comment! I’m trying to make this the best trail running podcast it can be and I certainly appreciate your time. Thank you all and happy trails :)

“Personally speaking, it's been a creative outlet that I didn't know I needed. But beyond that, the best thing about doing the show has been getting to know all these people and hearing their stories.”

Chasing Cutoffs is a fun and creative trail-running podcast that Ben Mead hosts. The Olympia, Washington trail runner has been hosting the show since April of 2022 and features back-of-the-pack inspiration. The inspiration to start the show came from a disappointing DNF of his own, and during reflection of said DNF, he wondered why there wasn’t a show that featured stories from runners like himself. Chasing Cutoffs was born, and we are all better off for it!

“I attempted a 50 miler earlier this year, my very 1st 50-mile attempt out in Arizona, and it was a complete and utter disaster. DNF and on the day after I'm walking around in a daze, pretty darn disappointed and thinking “there's got to be a podcast about this, about being super slow, about being either DNF or DFL, or why is there not a show about this experience?”

Ben was a great guest and we got into all kinds of things, like some of the challenges he faced that he didn’t expect, what some of his favourite things about hosting are, and he even takes time to talk about producer “Daisy” and what it’s like having a co-worker that doesn’t contribute much. This interview is informative and entertaining and I’m so grateful that Ben took the time!

Join our Discord channel

Come join us on Discord! I don’t know what I’m doing on there yet, but it’s another way we can interact, and that seems good to me.

Dear Adam

I received one question from the recent callout from Andrew Giles of Edmonton, Alberta. Andrew, thank you so much for taking the time to submit a question! There were two race directors that were more than happy to respond to your question, which was very kind of them, and we definitely appreciate it here at the newsletter. Here is Andrew’s question:

Dear Adam,

I’m a solid mid to back of the pack runner. Most prizing is geared to the front of the pack which I never am - what should races do to encourage folks like me? Or should we just run simply for the joy of it? - Andrew Giles, Edmonton

Matthias Eichler of Rock Candy Running in Olympia, WA was a previous guest on the show and was more than happy to offer up what he does as an RD and podcast host:

Dear Andrew,

Short answer:"... or should we run simply for the joy of it?"Is there another way to run?Longer answer:Here are my suggestions and what I am personally working on as RD and podcaster:- On race day have raffles for all bib holders. That way prizes, especially valuable things like sponsored gear, can be more easily distributed among all the runners participating.

- Create races where coming in first isn't the only focus. For example, we had two endurance events where people can run short loops for 6, or 12 hours. Yes, there will be someone who has run the most loops, but everyone who races their own race and has a different goal. As a race director, this format really allows us to celebrate every achievement by every runner and not just the folks who make it on the podium.

- Highlight stories of the everyday runner, don't just talk about the pro athletes. That way more folks feel empowered to participate in our sport.

- Tell stories of adventure runs and FKT (Fastest Known Time) route. There is so much more to running than just putting on a bib.

Mathias Eichler

Rock Candy has “SATURNALIA” coming December 17, 2022. Register now and see what Rock Candy races and Mathias are all about!

Andrew, I’ve got one more for you. Look for another response from another race director next episode! Myke Labelle of Coastline Endurance and race director for Island Trail Series has also been on the show previously and was kind enough to offer up a response as well.

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Music by REDproductions from Pixabay.

If you enjoy this podcast, I would really appreciate it if you could like, share, subscribe, or comment! I’m trying to make this the best trail running podcast it can be and I certainly appreciate your time. Thank you all and happy trails :)

Happy Anniversary

It’s hard to believe it’s been 12 months of newsletters and podcasting, yet here we are! Thank you all so much for coming along for the ride so far, the growth has been far larger than I would have ever hoped for and all of your support has been incredible. Your support has helped me achieve the goal of putting out material every two to three weeks.

When I started last November, my pie-in-the-sky goal was one subscriber a day and we have blown past that. We just cracked the 600-subscriber mark! A huge part of the subscription surge came when Substack featured the newsletter as part of their ”On Substack”, which was cool to be a part of. Substack recommendations also brought in a lot of subscriptions, which is when other writers on Substack recommend the newsletter. Huge thank you to Cole Noble, Sarah Lavendar Smith, Ron White, and James Maynard for currently recommending the newsletter, and anyone else who has at various times over the past year. Various other places that subscribers have come from include Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook (other people’s accounts, the newsletter does not have FB). Twitter proved to be very fruitful when I sent direct messages asking followers if they subscribed and provided a link if they didn’t already. This is something I do now every couple of weeks, but I didn’t do it for the first several months, so it led to a huge surge of subscribers. LinkedIn and Reddit have provided some clicks (a whole bunch from Reddit), but no subscriptions.

The podcast

Being featured on Substack also gave the podcast a big boost to download numbers. The boost in downloads after being featured was small in the beginning but snowballed after 2 episodes. Since being featured the downloads on each episode have tallied up faster for the most part. Substack shows that 28 episodes were published over the past 12 months. Two of those were trailers and two of those were descriptions of what the show is all about (one for Ultrapostie and one for Community Trail Running). These episodes have been collectively downloaded nearly 4700 times.

One of the first episodes that received a lot of traction from Reddit was Episode 12 with Scott Snell:

Scott is a super humble guy and one hell of a runner, and his story seemed to resonate with Reddit folks as it was downloaded over 150 times in the first 24 hours. Reddit can be a bit hit-and-miss for posts (I’m learning which posts do better than others on the platform), but the American trail runner was definitely a hit over there, as were the most two recent episodes, that featured Search and Rescue information.

Podcast analytics

Americans are downloading the podcast more than anyone else. 48% of listeners call the USA home and 30% of listeners are fellow Canucks. Our friends in the UK account for a nickel’s worth of that percentage pie and finally, Germany and France are worth 2% and 1% respectively. All of you are downloading episodes about 90 times in the first 7 days. Episodes have been allegedly downloaded in 49 other countries. That’s pretty cool!

Having downloads come from so many different countries is fun to see and the way people have been listening is interesting to delve into as well. I was surprised by how few people listen to podcasts on Spotify (2%), and how many listen in the browser (59%). Apple podcasts had a smaller share than I expected (20%) and Overcast (3%) actually beat out Spotify. Don’t forget to rate and subscribe to the podcast on your preferred listening app, it really helps!

The fact that you are all listening and supporting from all over the world means a lot. It’s very fun to be a part of this community and find ways to bring value and increase our love of the sport. The love for this sport, and the passion to share knowledge that all of the guests brought this year can’t go understated. The reason the show gets downloaded is because of these awesome people and I will forever be grateful!

Anatomy of a podcast

Before the show ever gets downloaded, there is a whole lot of production that goes on. Each 15-minute episode is the culmination of hours of work.

Preproduction involves reaching out to potential guests and finding a match. Sometimes it can come together really fast and others it takes a little longer. Once a guest is solidified, the focus turns to research on the person and the subject. Most of the questions and the introduction are sent to the guest the day before the recording. This helps ensure our 15 minutes of interviewing is as informative as it can be and it helps me ensure all the research was correct before recording.

The recording is definitely the most fun and shortest part of the process. I use zoom for ease of use. Generally, we chat a bit before recording to go over anything that needs addressing (I don’t think a single guest has changed anything to this point), and then I start my timer and the recording. I try and start wrapping up sometime after the 10-12 minute mark to make sure we are wrapped with plenty of time. This is an area that I always need to focus on to ensure we stay 15 minutes or less. I remind the guests once we are done recording when it will be posted and that takes care of recording day.

Post Production has a few steps which start with editing. Editing can be pretty simple (removing some umms and ahhs) but it gets more complicated if I was bad with my timing. I look to edit out repeat information and that sort of thing. The goal with editing is to go unnoticed (like a good umpire!) and I really try to keep it to a minimum.

After editing I write the newsletter post that will be used as the “podcast notes”. This includes making sure everything is linked properly. I’ll create graphics from photos that guests have provided and use that in the post as well. That graphic can be used in various formats for social media and for the Youtube version of the podcast. I set the release time for Monday at 3 am (Pacific) and start promoting! Promoting is done over all the social media accounts mentioned above and most of the time the guest will share on their feeds as well.

The podcast has been a ton of fun and something I’ve really enjoyed doing. I wasn’t sure what to expect, and I still am figuring it out as we go, but it seems to be finding its feet, and that’s quite exciting.

Going paid

I’ve turned on the option to pay after careful consideration. If you contribute to the newsletter you will help the growth and evolution of the community. Nothing is going paywalled, as that’s not the point, but for those who want to contribute, the option is there and income would allow the show to grow and get better on the technical side as well. I’ll make sure to send you a thank you note in the post to wherever you call home (I can also mail you a potato if you’d prefer, and we can test that theory).

Paid membership or not, the plans for year two are simple, to continue creating content and adding value to one of our favourite things, the trail running community. The goal, in the beginning, was every two weeks and that still feels like a good pace. I might go heavier on podcasts as opposed to written pieces, as I’ve really enjoyed them. The written pieces have been fun too, but I need to ensure I’m writing something interesting and not just publishing for the sake of it. I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve written so far and I will not force it. One of my favourite written pieces was the two-parter about why you all love to trail run:

Excerpt:

We’ve headed up another climb before we know it and Mandy mentions how much she loved the discomfort of running at altitude in Pattee Canyon in Missoula and Jeff shares a story about running the JFK 50 miler and letting runners pass so he could enjoy the ridgeline views of the Appalachian Trail. We continue over the technical terrain and Jeff speaks again.

“For me, trail running is all about being disconnected and unplugged from the artificial digital world that we are pulled into through most of our day. Being on the trail allows you to disconnect from all of that by simply allowing you to connect to the natural world around you. You are able to connect to who you are, how you were created to be, to live, to breathe and to exist. It isn't an escape, so much as it provides freedom to be.”

Excerpt:

We’re making our way over technical singletrack with rocks, roots, and bridges. This has a distinct Pacific North-West vibe all of a sudden. I introduce myself to the newest runner I’ve come across, Sandra Louie (Burnaby, BC). She must have overheard the conversation or just knew exactly what to talk about.

“On the trails, you aren't so concerned with pace and time but more on your effort. I take in the beauty around me and appreciate the vistas. It's really a great feeling being in the woods and running mountains. The terrain can be quite different in the summer vs winter and even spring and fall so you can run the same trail but it will be different!”

These pieces were so much fun because I got to read what trail running means to so many of you, and then had the privilege of weaving them together in some kind of coherent manner. This community is so passionate about the outdoors that it constantly encourages me to be better. Thank you all for making Community Trail Running part of your running life.

Highlights from the year

I wanted to highlight a few pieces as part of the year in review that I really enjoyed, and I’ve linked a few above already, so here are a few more:

This was another crowd-sourced piece that I thoroughly loved putting together. 31 trail runners from 7 different countries gave their best tips for trail runners and I organized the list into 4 groups (Rookies, Sophomores, Regulars, and Veterans). Once again it was a blast to see what you all had to say and then find a way to make it all make sense for the readers. This piece certainly took time to put together, nearly 40 hours, but it was worth it. All of your tips were great and I think the piece made a lot of sense in the way it was put together. The feedback for this one was awesome!

This podcast featured Katie Mills, Hilary Spires, and Tara Holland after they finished 1,2,3 at Whistler Alpine Meadows 100km race. It was a super fun challenge for me to host a podcast with three guests at once, and the women were fantastic in sharing their stories of race day. I actually felt like I was part of their group on the course at points during this interview. It’s not easy to interview multiple subjects and I certainly gained a huge amount of respect for those who do it on the regular. Having said that, I’m looking forward to more opportunities of interviewing multiple subjects!

I could put a link to pretty much every piece here as I really did enjoy this whole year, but that’s not the point :-) You have all been so incredible with your support, it’s easy to want to put out more material. This has been a fun journey and I’m stoked to keep on keepin’ on with you all. Onwards and upwards into year 2!

Thank you all from the bottom of my heart for your support.

You. Are. The. Best.

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Music by Skilsel from Pixabay

If you enjoy this podcast, I would really appreciate it if you could like, share, subscribe, or comment! I’m trying to make this the best trail running podcast it can be and I certainly appreciate your time. Thank you all and happy trails :)

We know from last week with BC AdventureSmart Executive Director Sandra Riches that when we adventure into the backcountry, there is a basic checklist we should take care of:

"We want you to follow our three T’S. We want you to trip plan, train, and take those essentials with you.”

Sandra continues the conversation this week and gets into some winter-specific tips for those adventures. She tells us about Avalanche Canada, an “industry cousin” that provides incredible winter/avalanche education and she also tells us what to expect from BC AdventureSmart in the coming months as we finish our conversation from last week. This will help explain her enjoyment of the “current” weather in the interview. Things change fast, don’t they?

Sandra was a fantastic guest and I’m grateful for all the great information she passed along. BC Search and Rescue Association is a great follow on Twitter and that is how I was able to connect with Sandra, so check out the profile! AdventureSmart is an excellent resource with trail-running-specific tips, but also tips for any other outdoor activity you may be participating in where Search And Rescue may be deployed.

SAR is entirely volunteer, and we are incredibly fortunate to have them so that we can play out there. They risk their lives for us to play and that’s pretty damn awesome. If there is anything we can all do to make sure they get called out as infrequently as possible, we should.

“We hope, we say this respectfully, that you never see any of those 3000 volunteers. Ideally, they don't want to meet you. You don't want to meet them in the best-case scenario. However, they're great people, don't get me wrong. You do want to meet them in another sense because they're amazing and trained and skilled and highly professional. Unpaid professionals.”

Thank you SAR volunteers everywhere!

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If you enjoy this podcast, I would really appreciate it if you could like, share, subscribe, or comment! I’m trying to make this the best trail running podcast it can be and I certainly appreciate your time. Thank you all and happy trails :)

The three T’s are simple enough, aren’t they?

* Trip Plan

* Train

* Take Essentials

BC AdventureSmart Executive Director Sandra Riches joined me for a two-part chat and we talked all about AdventureSmart and its mission. She gives some great tips on what we can all do out there to ensure we are being as smart and prepared as possible, and she also gets into how they create the education that they do. They have an incredible amount of data available to them and by using this data they are able to generate outdoor education that makes sense.

“That collection of data allows all of us, SAR groups, individual members, BC Search and Rescue Association, myself at BC AdventureSmart to jump into that data and look and see what's going on. What's happening, what's consistent, what's seasonal, what is regional. How do we pull out of that and create outdoor education?”

Sandra was a fantastic guest and I’m grateful for all the great information she passed along. BC Search and Rescue Association is a great follow on Twitter and that is how I was able to connect with Sandra, so check out the profile! AdventureSmart is an excellent resource with trail running specific tips, but also tips for any other outdoor activity you may be participating in where SAR may be deployed.

SAR is entirely volunteer, and we are incredibly fortunate to have them so that we can play out there. They risk their lives for us to play and that’s pretty damn awesome. If there is anything we can all do to make sure they get called out as infrequently as possible, we should.

“Our main objective is to increase awareness for outdoor enthusiasts so that we can reduce the number and severity of search and rescue calls in the province of BC.”

Let’s all do our part to help out this great cause, no matter where we are in the world, shall we?

Part two:

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Music by Skilsel from Pixabay

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