Episodes

Grand theft auto? Podium finishes? Master’s degree? Episode 34 featured Maria Steinhauser and her journey through single parenting, grad school, full-time teaching, and podium finishes. We shared an hour laughing and reliving some of her adventures. Maria is a driven, successful, compassionate, and hard-working human. Her pacers might have accidentally stolen a car while she was running as well! Tune in to hear how it all played out. Don’t forget to rate and review. Subscribe to our Patreon for ...

Jamil Coury joined us for Episode 33. We dove right in and discussed the good, bad and ugly that came from a year of pandemic race directing. We touched on the 2021 Barkley marathons and how Jamil’s day(s) unfolded. Mike is running Cocodona 250 while Jess and Greg are crewing him. We were itching to get all the extra details for this race. It is going to be a great week built on years and years of planning. Download to hear the full conversation. Rate and review! COCODONA 250 runners: Don’t for...

For our 32nd episode, we sat down with the E3 Epic Endurance Events crew Chaz Sheya , Abbey Drake, and Sean Flannagan to get the inside scoop on the 2021 CANYONS ENDURANCE RUNS. The race is on but in a whole new way. Take a listen to this episode to get all the details. Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/themile99interview)

For our 31st episode, we sat down with Bay Area Ultrarunner, Race Director, Running Coach, and now JamOnTam200 FKT holder, Michael Li. Michael just completed a record-setting 21 ascents up Mt. Tam, covering 200 miles, 57,162 feet of vert in 108 hours, 24 minutes, and 20 seconds. But Michael has not always been the lean, mean, climbing machine we all know and love. Leading up to 2008 he had built a successful IT consulting and training company, speaking at conferences worldwide. But his busy and ...

During 2020, we saw the rise of FKT attempts while so many races had been cancelled and postponed due to the pandemic. The 2021 FKT season is off to a blistering start with the Death Valley N-S standard route crossing (off-trail) FKT being taken by Sarah Estrella, a local runner from Davis. Sarah joined us for episode 30 to talk about this this multi-day challenge in the famed Death Valley and what it took to take it on and get it done. Along the way, we also learned about her mental and physi...

In this episode, we sit down again with Bruce Nguyen. We spoke to Bruce last November in episode 18 after his amazing Moab 240 finish. We asked him to come back to discuss his gear. Specifically, all the gear it takes to run and crew a successful 200+ mile multiday race. Bruce just returned from crewing his buddy Michael Li on his amazing JamOnTam200 Fatass, where Michael completed a record 21 repeats with over 56K feet of vert from the historic 1929 Lytton Square Clock in Mill Valley, CA to th...

For our 29th episode, we sat down with two fixtures of our trail running community, Karen and Kjell Framnes! You can count on seeing Karen, Kjell and their daughter Olivia at pretty much any trail race in Northern California from 50k up to 200 miles in length, both racing and volunteering. They are true ambassadors of the sport, and we talked to them to find out all about how they got their starts, how they met and fell in love, what they've been up to the past few years and what big plans are...

On the First 99 Gear Review we usually talk about gear attached to your body; shoes, clothing, watches, stuff like that. But today, we are sitting down with Auburn’s very own Doug White to talk about the gear, time, and volunteers it takes to pull off the successful Dusty Corners Western States Endurance Race Aid Station. Mile 38 of the WSER is no joke. Dusty Corners is a hot, dry, and dusty place (except for the year of snow and hypothermia). When you finally make it through the high-country s...

In this episode, Jenny Maier joined us to talk about her unique approach to combining personal training, strength and mobility work and yoga to help build balanced runners with longevity in the sport. We got some great insights into her approach for helping runners achieve their goals and also how she made a big career change in her life from fast-paced attorney in the Bay Area to personal trainer and yoga teacher. On top of that, Jenny also led us through a short sequence of hip-opening yoga p...

Mike kicked off our Mile 99 crew favorite gear review. We peeked into a lesson from Turner’s Theory of Net Energy Balance. It led him to favoring a Gore brand windstopper vest. It has a low back and pockets originally used for cyclists. He mentioned his glasses hook up from Cody Johnson in Salt Lake City who fit prescription lenses in racing glasses. They auto-tint and he wore them for 34 hours at a race. Dakine 8L waistpack is a recent purchase that Mike wants to use for snacks so it is likely ...

In this episode, we were joined by Western States Endurance Run race director Craig Thornley, race medical director Dr. Andy Pasternak, president of the board of directors Diana Fitzpatrick, and vice president of the board Tim Twietmeyer. We were glad to welcome them back after first talking in early December to find out more about plans for the 2021 Western States race. Back in December, there was a great deal of uncertainty that made it difficult to decide how to plan for 2021. In this episod...

In this episode of the First 99 Gear Review, I sit down again with our very own Greg Larkin for Part 2 of his Winter Off-Season Cross Training Plan. During Part 1 we dug into Greg’s indoor workouts including rowing on the Concept2 and Zwift virtual bike racing on his smart trainer. In Part 2 we head to the White Wonderland for some full body winter cross training activities. As mentioned in the last episode Greg was born in Upstate NY and moved to New Hampshire as a kid. Snow sports go back man...

In this episode, we are joined by Clint Welch and his daughter Halle. Clint has been a fixture on the Northern California ultrarunning scene for a number of years, and his daughter Halle has taken up running to follow in his footsteps. We talked to both of them about the experience as Halle decided to take on this sport, what she likes, what she doesn't like and how she is coached. We got a good sense about how to approach encouraging your children just enough, whether in running or any sport, ...

In this episode of the First 99 Gear Review, co-host Mike Turner sits down with our very own Greg Larkin to chat about winter cross training activities. It’s the New Year, and the time to start planning our race and training schedules. But many of us have found over the years it’s essential to take time off and let the body heal. Balancing staying fit, letting the body heal, and staying sane is the key to years of healthy adventures. In this two-part series we discuss off-season activities and ...

In our final episode with Rebecca Sperry, she joined us for a live wrap-up interview as she recently completed her twelve rounds of chemotherapy and is starting a new phase of cancer treatment. During the interview, we reflected on her journey since we first reached out to her to ask if she would share her story with us. It has been difficult for her and getting harder with each round of chemotherapy, but she has maintained a positive attitude and desire to keep her fitness as much as possible ...

Katie Grossman, an accomplished professional mountain ultrarunner, advertising creative, soon-to-be mother of two and assistant RD of the Angeles Crest 100, sat down with us to talk about her early life, running and racing at the highest levels, life/family balance and the importance of protecting our open spaces. She and her husband Dominic and their family have built a life in the mountains, surrounded by beauty, that allows them to focus on what matters most and strip away as much as possibl...

In the last of our prerecorded episodes with Rebecca Sperry, a hiker from New Hampshire who was in the midst of hiking all of the trails in the White Mountain National Forest until she received a breast cancer diagnosis in August 2020, she joined us with an update on how her cancer treatment has been progressing as she nears the end of her rounds of chemotherapy. This episode focuses primarily on her planning, gear and nutrition that she uses for her hikes, whether it was a planned hike to chec...

Jocelyn Watson joined us for our 24th episode to talk about her running career starting all the way back in middle school, through high school, into college and beyond. She started out in track and cross-country but eventually found her way to trail running and now thoroughly prefers that discipline. She has an impressive racing resume (including the steeplechase in her track days!) and is looking forward to her first 100 miler. Jocelyn is also a manager at the Fleet Feet store in Folsom, CA an...

In this episode of the First 99 Gear Review, co-hosts Mike Turner and Greg Larkin talked to gear reviewer and ultrarunner Brian Goldman about the Coros and Garmin running watches, their features and modes and of course, strengths and weaknesses! Garmin is the established player in the space with excellent brand recognition, and while Coros is relatively new on the scene, they offer incredible battery life that can be extremely useful for long ultra distance running races and other activities. ...

The modern-day Forlorn Hope Expedition Team sat down with us in this episode to talk about the genesis, planning and execution of their recently-completed journey from Donner Memorial State Park in Truckee, CA to Johnson's Ranch in Wheatland. Their route closely mirrored that of the original Forlorn Hope team that left the stranded Donner Party on December 16th, 1846 in an attempt to find rescue for the starving settlers. The original Forlorn Hope party faced an arduous trek through the mountai...

Rebecca Sperry, a hiker from New Hampshire joined us for the third of several episodes talking about her redlining goal in the White Mountain National Forest when she was temporarily sidelined by a breast cancer diagnosis in August 2020. In this episode, Rebecca updated us about her 9th round of chemotherapy and how she has been handling that. We then spent time talking about the people in her life who support her through her cancer diagnosis and treatment - her mother and her husband Jason. R...

Auburn resident Eddie Schmidt sat down with us for a great conversation about his early years as a runner and how much family and the ultrarunning community means to him. Eddie started running seriously later in life after some inspiration early on from his sister and then meeting several people over the years. He was joined by his daughter Hannah, a new convert to ultrarunning with support from her dad. She was a key part of his 2010 Western States experience where at the age of 15, she paced ...

In this episode of the First 99 Gear Review, our co-host Mike Turner delves into the Topo Athletic Trailventure trail running/light hiker shoe. He explores the reasons he decided on this shoe initially and then the experiences he had with it running and hiking all over the harsh trails of the Northern California river canyons and volcanic rock formations of the high mountains. Tune in to hear the whole story! Topo Athletic Trailventure shoe models: https://www.topoathletic.com/search?keywords=...

Rebecca Sperry, a hiker from New Hampshire joined us for the second of several episodes talking about her redlining goal in the White Mountain National Forest when she was temporarily sidelined by a breast cancer diagnosis in August 2020. In this episode, we got an update from Rebecca about how she has been feeling through her 7th week of chemotherapy out of 12 total weeks. She also described in more detail what the original month-long diagnostic process was like and the eventual surgery that s...