The Buzz

Dan Patitucci is a professional mountain-sport photographer and athlete whose images for Patagonia, Black Diamond, and others helped shape the look of modern trail running, and who, with partners Janine Patitucci and Kim Strom, built ALPSinsight and designed the Via Valais, the Alps' first trail-running grand tour. In this conversation, Buzz and Dan compare the three mountain ranges Dan knows bett...

At seven years old, Hunter Leininger talked his way into his first adventure race; by ten he was a national champion, and he's spent the eighteen years since turning a childhood obsession into a profession, holding the fastest unsupported traverse of Iceland (370 miles), the FKT for the 1,110-mile length of Florida, and a Guinness World Record for climbing all fifty state high points. In this conv...

Nancy Hobbs founded the American Trail Running Association in 1996, helped establish USATF's Mountain Ultra Trail Council and chaired it for decades, and has served on the international boards governing trail and mountain running for some thirty years. Buzz and Nancy get into the underbelly of the sport: the governance. They cover how the USATF Mountain Ultra Trail Council grew from a $750 annual...

Danelle Ballengee is one of the most decorated endurance athletes in American history, a four-time Pikes Peak Marathon champion, two-time Adventure Racing World Champion, and six-time US Athlete of the Year across four different endurance sports. In December 2006, on a routine training run near her home in Moab, she slipped on black ice on the Amasa Back trail, fell roughly 60 feet, shattered her...

Matt Carpenter is the most decorated mountain runner in American history, 18-time Pikes Peak champion across twelve marathons and six ascents, holder of the Pikes Peak Marathon course record at 3:16:39 since 1993, and the man who took 90 minutes off the Leadville Trail 100 record in 2005 with a 15:42:59 that stood until 2024 when broken by David Roche. In this conversation, Matt walks Buzz through...

Dave Mackey is a two-time USATF Ultrarunner of the Year, former rim-to-rim-to-rim Grand Canyon record holder, JFK 50 champion, and, after a freak fall off Bear Peak in May 2015, thirteen surgeries, and a voluntary below-the-knee amputation in November 2016, one of the more improbable comebacks in the sport. Buzz and Dave recorded the first part of this episode on the exact rock Dave fell off, on t...

Jason Blevins is a veteran journalist at the Colorado Sun who has spent nearly three decades covering outdoor recreation, public lands, and the mountain communities of the Colorado high country. In this conversation, Buzz and Jason dig into the slow-motion crisis unfolding across the Rocky Mountain West, a snowpack at 61 percent of normal, a 103-year-old Colorado River Compact straining under the...

Buzz sits down with Karl "Speedgoat" Meltzer, 50-time 100-mile winner, previous Appalachian Trail FKT holder, and the man behind one of trail running's most iconic nicknames , for a conversation about a career that has never followed the obvious path. Karl is currently at 93 hundred-mile finishes, closing in on a goal he set four years ago: 100 finishes by the summer of 2027, with Hardrock 100 as...

Sean O'Rourke holds a PhD in computational physics. He also lives in a Ford Transit Connect, bathes in hot springs, and has climbed roughly 2,000 peaks across the American West, South America, the Alps, and Central Asia, mostly alone, entirely self-funded, and almost completely off the radar. He goes by Dr. Dirtbag, a name he's been writing under since 2010. This conversation is about what happens...

Ski mountaineering just made its Olympic debut at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Games, the first new sport added to the Winter Olympics since 2002. Nikki LaRochelle, former U.S. Ski Mountaineering National Team member and color commentator for Olympic Broadcasting Services, joins the show live from Milan to break down everything that happened. The headline for trail and ultrarunners: mountain run...

Check out all the shows on the Ultrasignup Podcast Network! The Buzz is supported by Wahoo.  Max King might be the most versatile distance runner on the planet. A World Mountain Running champion, a 100K road world champion, a Mount Marathon winner, a top finisher at Comrades and Sierre-Zinal, the range is almost absurd. But when Buzz sits down with Max, the thread running through all of it isn't a...

The 44th annual Ultrarunner of the Year Awards are in, and this year delivered one of the deepest fields of women's performances in the history of the award. Buzz Burrell talks with John "Tropical John" Medinger, who has administered the vote when he took over Ultrarunning Magazine (sold in 2024 to Jamil Coury), about the full results, the voting process, and what made 2025 such a standout year. K...

Ski mountaineering is about to have its moment, and if you're a trail runner, you should be paying attention. Skimo shares DNA with our sport: the relentless uphill effort, the technical descents, the mountain culture, and a surprising number of athletes who race both. After decades as a European-dominated discipline, skimo makes its Olympic debut at the 2026 Winter Games in Italy. Nikki LaRochell...

  Buzz previews 2026 with Zoë Rom, coach Scott Johnston, Western States Race Director Craig Thornley, and Allison Mercer of FastestKnownTime.com. The panel digs into the Courtney DauWalter, Tara Dower, Katie Scheide showdown at Hardrock 100 and what the growing competitive depth in women's ultrarunning actually tells us (spoiler: progress is real, but parity isn't here yet). Scott Johnston makes t...

Can a sport built on dirtbag ethos survive the arrival of real money? In this end-of-year special, Buzz gathers Zoë Rom, coach Scott Johnston, Western States race director Craig Thornley, and FKT manager Allison Mercer to make sense of 2025. They dig into the paradox of professionalization, $275 super shoes, UTMB live broadcasts, Ironman private equity, while Zoë points to the data that says the g...

Camille Herron is the only athlete to win all three IAU Ultra World Championship distances, the only person to win both Comrades and Spartathlon, and the holder of world records from 50 miles to six days. But beyond the numbers, Herron is a scientist with a master's degree in exercise and sports science, a recently diagnosed autistic and ADHD athlete, and someone who has navigated more than her sh...

Olympic marathon medalist Molly Seidel joins host Buzz Burrell for a candid conversation about pressure, injury, and her shift into trail and ultra running. Molly unpacks her decision to drop out of the New York City Marathon, the long rebuild after breaking her kneecap, and why the trails feel like the right competitive home for the next phase of her career.  She talks openly about identity, the...

This week on The Buzz , Buzz Burrell sits down in Moab, fresh off the finish of the Moab 240, with newly crowned Triple Crown champion Kilian Korth. In a season that redefined what's possible in ultrarunning, Kilian swept the 200-mile series, Tahoe, Bigfoot, and Moab, setting a new cumulative record and proving that success is built on years of setbacks. He opens up about how pulmonary edema, DNFs...

Kilian Jornet joins The Buzz to talk about his States of Elevation project—72 U.S. 14ers in 31 days, covering 400,000+ feet of vert, 600+ miles on foot, and 2,500 miles by bike. He shares what he learned about the American landscape, endurance, and the body's ability to adapt, plus reflections on public lands, culture, and why the U.S. mountains feel like home. Thanks Arc'teryx for supporting The...

In this episode of The Buzz , Buzz Burrell sits down with ultrarunning icon and race director Candice Burt, the woman who put 200-mile races on the map. From founding the Triple Crown of 200s to tackling self-supported FKT attempts on Colorado's infamous Nolan's 14, Candice has redefined what "too far" really means. They talk about what it takes to stay awake and moving for days on end, the psycho...

Public lands are where we run, where our races unfold, and where many of us feel most at home. But what happens when those protections are rolled back? In this episode of The Buzz , Buzz Burrell talks with Kat Baker, Executive Director of Runners for Public Lands , about the fight to keep 58 million acres of Forest Service land under the Roadless Rule, why iconic races like Western States, Wasatch...

At this year's UTMB, it wasn't just about who won, it was about what the event has become. In this episode of The Buzz , host Buzz Burrell talks with longtime running journalist Brian Metzler about the transformation of UTMB Week into the sport's most competitive race series, biggest trade show, and all-out cultural festival. From Jim Walmsley's sprint finish at OCC, to Courtney Dauwalter's gritty...

Take our listener survey! What does it take to thrive at the top of ultrarunning today? In this episode of  The Buzz , Buzz Burrell sits down with Jeff Mogavero, fresh off his blazing Western States debut and heading into UTMB, to talk about how training has evolved from "just running when it feels good" to heat chambers, high-carb fueling, and precision hydration. Jeff shares the story of running...

Take our listener survey! It only takes five minutes, and you help us make better podcasts.  Adventure runner Fritz Sitte isn't chasing podiums, he's chasing experiences. In this episode of The Buzz , Fritz joins Buzz Burrell to share the story of his 6,400-mile, eight-month run from Cape Town to the northern tip of Africa, completed alongside his brother on a bicycle. They talk about the challeng...

Take our listener survey: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeCgLdj8-92G_pLDxkPfuJ0-r477MzZPieRx_qlj1cmP2oybA/viewform?usp=header Trail running is evolving fast—and this episode takes you inside that transformation. Recorded live at TrailCon, host Buzz Burrell sits down with four unique voices shaping the sport: David Callahan , co-CEO of UltraSignup, on why "Tahoe Trail Week" could be Amer...