Day Fire Podcast

Clint and Dawson this week sit down with Heather Kelly. Heather was born and raised in Alaska, where she still calls home today.A two-time NCAA National Champion in women’s rowing and voted CRCA/Pocock All-American her senior year, she still considers herself an athlete and loves everything from CrossFit to weight training to long walks in the woods.While studying at Western Washington University she earned a degree in Evolutionary Nutrition and went on to study at the Institute for the Psychology of Eating to become a certified eating psychology coach. Heather believes we all have a relationship with food, and that it’s important to cultivate a healthy, satisfying relationship with our diet for long-term health. She is the founder and CEO of Heather’s Choice® which produces healthy, lightweight, packable meals and snacks for adventurers worldwide. Every product is handmade in their dedicated gluten-free kitchen in Anchorage, Alaska. The Heather’s Choice mission is to put good food in everyone’s pack, no matter where their adventures may take them. One fun fact about Heather is she has rafted the Grand Canyon six times since 2011 and won't say no to a river trip.

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Clint and Dawson sit down with Shannon Keizer. Shannon had planned to hike the AT in 2020 with her daughter then Covid and her father in law passed away from cancer that May so the trip was put on hold. Shannon decided the best year to hike the trail was this year 2023 and even though her daughter could not join her she left in mid March and hiked the trail in under 170 days. Shannon lives just outside the Smoky Mountains National Park and whenever possible you can find her hiking in her "homewoods". Shannon has been happily married for 29 years, has three adult children and two grandsons. Shannon shares her AT story with us and also how her husband and family supported her on her AT journey. Shannon is an avid hiker who has hiked several long distance trails such as the John Muir and Benton MacKaye trails.

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This week Clint and Dawson sit down with Lea Mulligan. Lea' s trail running results read like a highly successful 40 year old runner except she is 25 years old. Lea was born and raised in Chattanooga and has enjoyed exploring the woods since she was a little kid. She ran cross country since she was 8 years old and got introduced to the Ultra-Running world when she was in high school. Since she was young, Lea was inspired by her mom's running career and loved sweeping events with her as a teenager. Lea completed her first 50K, Run Amok, her senior year in highschool, and she has been hooked on trail running since then. After running cross country at Maryville College and exploring the Smokies for 4 years, She decided she wanted to be more competitive with trail running. Lea signed up for Pinhoti 100 in 2021 and loved every piece of the 100 distance ranging from the snacks to the wonderful community. Working as an elementary school teacher has allowed her to explore trails all over the US in the summertime, and she spent this last summer living out of a minivan in Colorado training for CCC 100K in France. Lea says; "it was an absolute dream getting to explore the alps before and during CCC, and I am even more excited to keep chasing my running dreams with my friends."

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The week Clint and Dawson sit down with Jason Finnell and Josh Braun and take about their recent Caribou hunt out of Kotzebue, AK. Kotzebue is a city in the Northwest Arctic Borough in the U.S. state of Alaska. It is the borough's seat, by far its largest community and the economic and transportation hub of the subregion of Alaska encompassing the borough. They were also joined by Christian Jones who was not on the show. We talk about their transportation, the hunt itself, wolves, grizzly bears and delays with the bush plane picking them back up.

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This week Clint and Dawson sit down with Tim Bell. Tim was a multi-time TN state champion in Track and Field (Decathlon and High Jump) and SEC High Jump Champion and 2 time NCAA All-American and Captain of University of Tennessee SEC and NCAA Championship Track Teams 2001 - 2002 (4 titles during that time period). Tim was an avid Rock Climber after college (that is what brought him to CHA - V12 and 5.13c) then started Road Cycling in 2010 (cat 5 to cat 2 in 3 months). Tim was run over by a car in 2012 (and got into MTB more seriously). After that he started commentating events in 2013 (River Gorge crits, etc). Tim has now commentated on Hincapie Gran Fondos in multiple locations from ME, to PA, to SC, and of course here in CHA... Seven Bridges Marathon, Chattanooga Marathon, Chattanooga Chase, Cam Run 5k and Magnum Mile, Asheville Turkey Trot, Stump Jump 50k and 10 miler, TN State Cyclocross championships, and a number of criteriums around the south. We will do another show with Tim soon. He has so many great stories.

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This week Clint and Dawson sit down with Russ Clune. Russ just completed his first book, "The Lifer". Russ shares parts of his book, discusses writing styles and shares stories of his travels and climbing from around the world. Russ is a rock climber living in the Shawangunk Mountains of New York. His articles have been published in multiple journals, including Climbing, Rock & Ice, Mountain, Alpinist, Der Bergsteiger, Iwa To Yuki, The Patagonia Catalog, and Urban Climber. Clune has been climbing for over forty-five years and was one of America’s best rock climbers during his peak in the 1980s; he is also one of the world’s most well-traveled rock climbers. Clune was part of the employee group that created the leading climbing-gear company, Black Diamond Equipment, where he worked for thirty years. He remains an active climber and continues to travel the globe seeking new adventures.

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This week Dawson and Clint reach back into the Day Fire vault and share some of their favorite short stories with you! Some you may have forgotten and some you may have missed! Enjoy! 

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This week Clint and Dawson sit down with Luke Swab. Luke just completed the famed TNGA bike race where he took a 3rd place finish. Luke may have been the only person to ride the route in "Jorts"; haha. With over 56,000 feet (17,000 meters) of climbing, the TNGA is physically demanding, to say the least. But it’s not all about the challenge. The route is an incredibly beautiful stitchwork of roads and trails that explore the southern heel of Appalachian Mountains. It traverses a variety of landscapes that include pristine hardwood forest, fern-lined waterfalls, rocky ridges, and stands of pine. The TNGA is at times very remote and offers riders the opportunity be fully immersed in the Appalachian wilderness.

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This week Clint and Dawson sit down with Tab Tollett. Tab started road cycling in the mid 90s on up until the mid-2000s. Picked up mountain biking and almost immediately signed up for the Leadville 100 mountain bike race with a great group of guys. He did the Leadville 100 three times with two being on a single speed. From that point he did several other mountain bike races and stage races in Tennessee, North Carolina Georgia and Colorado. Also twice he did the La Ruta de Los Conquistador stage race in Costa Rica. It was all fun and good as a mid pack racer with the occasional surprised good result. Working full time and trying to train 12-14 hours a week to be reasonably competitive in my age group grew tiring and became stressful. He felt guilty training all of the time so in his early 50’s he hung up the bike. Later, Tab was lucky enough to secure a position on the Rock Creek All Mountain Team! He found this super motivating! At age 53 he signed up for a trail race in the Tennessee mountains called the Fiery Gizzard. It happened to fall on his 53rd birthday. He had never been a runner so he was starting from scratch. He figured he could get away with a lot less training hours and still stay in reasonably good shape. Then his daughter Camille, showed an interest in running and started cross country and track in high school. Since that first race in 2017, Camille and Tab have done a couple dozen half marathon-ish distance trail races together.

It’s been a great father/daughter time being able to train and race together. Surprisingly, In early 2021 I had a stroke. Obviously this caught his family off guard because he has always been reasonably healthy, eats well and gets plenty of exercise. It was a setback but Tab recovered. Tab started training again as soon as his Doc gave him the go ahead. Tab says he has done well over 60 trail races so far to date. Tab is contemplating stepping up to the 50-100 mile distance for his 60th birthday in 2024. Tab has always enjoyed having destination races on the calendar. So this year he found a cool tour company (Vagabond Tours) that offered trail running tours on the UTMB course which is also called the Tour of Mont Blanc. It’s a huge hiking destination as well. His wife and daughter joined in and they trained hard for several months to prepare. They basically did the entire Mont Blanc Massif (UTMB/Tour Mont Blanc course) over six days which was a little over 106 miles with 34,000 feet of elevation gain and loss. They carried their hydration packs with foul weather gear, running poles, food, and water. The tour company moved their bags from one refugee to the next. From their start in Chamonix, they stopped overnight in several small towns throughout the week-long trail running tour. The tour covers three countries including France, Switzerland and Italy.

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This week Clint and Dawson sit down with Luke Swab. Luke got his first dirt bike when he was 10, and when he was 12 he rode a Yamaha TW200 in Guyana South America. That started everything. He has ridden a motorcycle or moped in 35 different countries to date with traveling to 45 in total.

Luke's first solo trip was in 2009 where he headed from Texas to the Panama canal. (He didn’t make it). The trip went viral on Advrider.com and people started sending money through Paypal to help fund the trip.

In 2011 Luke rode from the southernmost point of Africa, Cape Agallius, to the northernmost point of Norway (Nordcape) Lots and Lots of breakdowns and logistical nightmares with border crossings. They had to sneak into Kenya and also Climbed Kilimanjaro. This story is "most of the podcast".

Around 2016 Luke got hired by RoadRunner to do some blogging, which morphed into writing Magazine Articles, with them sending me to Japan for a two week trip.

In 2019 Luke rode around Lake Superior with his Dad which was the most special trip he has ever taken. He wrote a story about it, and got his dad on the cover of Road Runner Magazine. A career highlight for sure.

Luke and Cameron Mullinburg during 2019 through 2022 did many amazing trips out west. Cameron made epic videos of the trips and Luke was the photographer and writer. They are all available online

https://www.roadrunner.travel/author/luke-swab/

Moab: White Rim Trail, Moab, Utah | Dual Sport Motorcycle Shamrock Tour® | RoadRUNNER Magazine

Kalispell Montana - Kalispell, Montana | Glacier National Park Motorcycle Tour | RoadRUNNER Magazine

Idaho Hot Spring Trip - Idaho Hot Springs Motorcycle Tour | RoadRUNNER Magazine

Chattanooga Chattanooga, Tennessee | Shamrock Tour® | RoadRUNNER Magazine

August 25th 2023, Luke flies to Alaska to work as a guide for MotoQuest for 3 weeks.

https://www.motoquest.com/

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