Obstacle Running Adventures

Rylan Schadegg won the  Spartan North American Championship  last weekend in Kelowna located in British Columbia, Canada!  This weekend he won the Palm Beach Deka Fit setting a new record and beating Ryan Kent by seconds! These are pretty impressive accomplishments but only some of the reasons why we wanted to have him on the show!  On previous appearances on other podcasts like Reinforced Running...

Spartan North American Championship was this weekend in Kelowna located in British Columbia, Canada! This is a new venue and it yielded a new podium! Taking 3rd place for the men was Shaun Stephens-Whale , an athlete we have only had on the show once back in 2018 but we remembered him having an interesting sports background which featured  tower running , and had heard that his training was very f...

Mike was invited back to cover  RuckFest  which is a competitive rucking event featuring a trail event, games events, as well as a team krew event.  They are all run by Brandon Welling  from TPK Endurance  and Mark Jones ! This time Mike stepped up and ran the 6.9 mile competitive trail course instead of the 3.1 mile fun run, and he brought Katelyn too!   After participating in the trail event bot...

Mike went up to Louden, New Hampshire to cover the New England Spartan Super and Sprint .  Since it was the weekend of his 10 year OCR anniversary he figured he would give the course a go as well and he is glad that he did! He was working on the Instagram story for the podcast as well as for The OCR Report while doing interviews but the show always comes first! Check down below to see the three di...

We have had our eyes on this celebratory moment for a while, had plans, and then of course had plans change! We hoped to have Rob Fournier aka the Muddy Warthog on the show since he was a very influential race reviewer at the time.  However, due to a family crisis he wasn't able to come on the show but will hopefully will be a guest for a different kind of semi-planned episode in the next year or...

We had Elvi Guzman on the show to talk about his 10 year anniversary of City Challenge Race ! City Challenge Race   has great obstacles , epic medals , a huge support system comprised of gyms and teams , and much more going for them!   Their next event in New York City will also have prize money for the first time! These events have been on Mike's radar for a long time and with Katelyn's family li...

We had Sofia Harnedy  on the show to talk about her experience at the Ode to Laz Backyard Ultra put on by Tad Mackrowiscz in Holly, MI! Sofia  has been a long time supporter of this show, Obstacle Racing Media , OCR Talk , The Running Public ,  I Am A Spartan Podcast , and those are only what we are aware of! We discuss how she got into obstacle course racing, how her thoughts on Spartan have chan...

After 2 years of wanting to have her on the podcast Mike finally pulled the trigger and invited Cali Schweikhart to be a guest on the show! Cali has continued to be vocal with her experiences dealing with disordered eating .  We are all about doing what we can to help reduce the amount of stigma in society when it comes to barriers that people face. We discuss how she handles it, how to identify p...

It's time to get Savage ! Mike and Katelyn drove to Barre, MA to run and cover their Boston event. Mike took on both the Savage and Blitz course with Angela and Jimmie while Katelyn busted some rust with finish line interviews! 0:00 - 3:23 - Intro 3:23 - 10:00 - Quick News 10:00 - 13:10 - Content Preface 13:10 - 14:24 -  Start Line Audio with Dustin Dorough 11:00 - 32:33 -  Interviews Before Podiu...

Samuel Koehler who goes by "Shades" has been on our potential episodes list for about a year now.  In last week's quick news segment we reitterated his recent post explaining the importance to keep your eyes on the road and on the look out for pedestrians . We had heard stories about him and saw first hand his grit and determination on the OCRWC course last year in Stratton, VT!  Samuel does well...

Katelyn had the opportunity to interview Miranda Huber ! Miranda talked about her her fifth place finish at the Savage Point Series , her experince at The 10th Indian Mud Run and being a member of the MudGear-BOTL Pro Team !   0:00 - 3:00 - Intro 3:00 - 19:35 - Not-so-quick News 19:35 - 20:20 - Content Preface 20:20 - 50:20 -  Interview with Miranda Huber 50:20 - End - Outro ____ News Stories: Roe...

After hearing that Bonefrog 's event season was going to wrap up after their Charlemont, MA and Stanhope, NJ events this year Mike blocked off the weekend for the New Jersey event and registered for the golden trident course! Bonefrog has been around for a while and offers a unique military feel to their course and festival area that other races do not. However, due to low registration numbers (wh...

We were looking for a reason to have Alex Walker back on the show since she has only been on for a couple quick interviews while covering North American Championships back in 2018 and 2019! Seeing her place 3rd at the 3rd Spartan North American Series resulting in her being 3rd on the current season leaderboard seemed like a great reason! We discuss how she got into the sport of OCR, texan spiders...

Starting with OCR America back in 2016 , Evan Perperis has been putting his body through insane ultra OCR challenges every year in order to fundraise, and see what he is capable of! This year it was OCR Everest where he ascended the elevation of Mount Everest (29,029 feet) while taking on Tough Mudder obstacles at their New England event in Stratton, VT ! We had him on the call to discuss how the...

When a name keeps popping up on podiums it starts to stand out, especially when we read podiums every week!  This is how Mike noticed Matthew Gill. He took second at Newbsanity's Mud Gauntlet as well as second  at Toughest Philedelphia the following week.  It wasn't until after we reached out to him that Mike also noticed his name on the Savage Series leaderboard as well! It was great learning mor...

Mike has been aware of the Wason Pond Pounder for many years and we registered for their final event (planned for 2020) back in 2019!  Of course 2020 was a rough year for events to say the least and their event was postponed again in 2021 due to picking dates that would have been difficult for attendance (one of them overlapping with OCRWC I believe). The final event finally happened though! We wo...

Very excited to have Kris Rugloski on the show again, this time longer than a few minutes! She had a phenomenal weekend which included winning the Hyrox World Championships in Las Vegas and then traveling to Big Bear to place third and achieve her first Spartan North American Elite Series podium! We discuss both of these races as well as how she handles recovery, her mind set for these competition...

We had plans with a great OCR athlete to have them on the show for a Mother's Day episode!  Got a bunch of questions together that I have been coming up with over the years for her/him and was good to go ... but never heard back on Sunday.  So then we extended our availability for Monday ... and still haven't heard back. So now our future backup idea for an episode became our current backup episod...

We were torn on what to have this episode focus on.  We intended to have someone call in from the Tri-State Spartan weekend but Mike was much more interested in the GORUCK Games after following it closely last weekend.  Luckily the results of our Instagram poll helped direct our decision! Jarrett Newby from Newbsanity  took second place at the first GORUCK Games !  We talk about his training and p...

We had Michael Wardian on the show for the first time!  Our paths have crossed a few times before on the Spartan Cruise and an Ultra Virus Virtual Race but we haven't had a good opportunity to have him on the mic before.  Starting on May 1st he will be running from West Sacramento, CA to Ocean City, MD along route 50 !  We figured this was an excellent reason to have him on the show and hopefully...

Katelyn spoke with Kati and Brian Turcotte from Derti Development in Northwood, NH. Listen to hear more about Derti Development's permanant obstacle course which is built on over nine acres of land. You will also hear about their most unique obstacles and  their obstacles with 3-4 difficulty levels.  0:00 - 3:10 - Intro 3:10 - 8:27 - Quick News 8:27 - 9:15 - Content Preface 9:15 - 1:16:48 - Derti...

Mike woke up at 6am to get to the start of the second to last FIT Challenge OCR event!  He may have missed the start but he was able to get interviews with the mandatory elite wave finishers, socialize with great people, run a lap with Angela and Jimmie, volunteer on the course, take down the obstacles, and interview some of the 12 hour ultra finishers. Hope you enjoy the interviews from Mike's 13...

We weren't sure what we would be doing for this weekend's episode but Matt B Davis  from Obstacle Racing Media texted us and said that he wanted to call in.  What he had to say though, well that's for you to listen to and find out! 0:00 - 2:19 - Intro 2:19 - 3:15 - Quick News 3:15 - 3:36 - Content Preface 3:36 - 7:11 - Totally Legitimate Call with Matt B Davis 7:11 - End - Outro ____ News Stories:...

Another rough week in OCR due to the poor reception of the first episode of the Spartan Games , the formal venue announcement of World's Toughest Mudder being in Alabama , the news of Kyle McLaughlin stepping down as the president of Tough Mudder , and Spartan athletes still demanding their prize money from last year.  We discuss all of this news and give our opinions on them. 0:00 - 3:10 - Intro...

It's pretty clear that OCR has taken a massive hit due to the outbreak of COVID back in 2020 but many were optimistic about a strong return after.  Unfortunately, things still aren't looking much better with low turnouts at many events, race brands rapidly downsizing, and from what we and other friends can vouch for a large hit to podcast listeners. Robb McCoy from FIT Challenge  has won awards fr...