Latest / The Steep Stuff Podcast / #64 - Karina Anderson

Transcript

#64 - Karina Anderson · The Steep Stuff Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: What's up, fam?
• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Steep Stuff Podcast.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: I'm your host, james Lauriello.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Let's dive into a really fun episode.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: I'm so excited to have had a conversation with Karina Anderson as of right now Boulderite came on the podcast.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Karina is a young one, 21 years old, and already competing at a high level in the trail scene.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Back in 2023, she scored a top 10 placement at the Broken Arrow VK, but she has done so much in her 2024 season.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: Karina competed at a very high level at the Skyrunning World Series and was invited to go participate in the Skyrunning World Series final and she qualified both as a U23 athlete and as an adult athlete, which is pretty dope and, like I said, she's just getting started.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: She also has FKTs on Mount Hood as well as the Tour de Abyss, which is a pretty sweet high altitude route in Colorado.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: Karina also was a serious standout on the track and on the cross country scene.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: She ran for a couple years at CU Boulder, which is, for those of you who are in the know, that is the pinnacle of the cross country and track scene and, and most recently, um transferred to the Colorado school of mines, which is just as much a beastly program.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: Um, and she has a couple more years of eligibility left and she's competing on the tracks as well, so we can expect to see her both on the track and on the trails in 2025.
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: Um, like I said, really fun conversation.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: And did I mention she also does schema?
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: Um, definitely the future of our sport.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: It's so exciting to talk to people uh coming up in the sport and, uh, especially at such a young age, having all these resources available to them, uh, the sky's absolutely the limit.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: So I hope you enjoy this conversation, really appreciate Karina for coming on.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Um, hope that this is the first of many conversations as, uh, she's just getting started in her very bright career.
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: It's time.
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, we are live, people, earth.
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: Listen up.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: The Steep Stuff Podcast is brought to you by Ultimate Direction USA.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: I am so excited to be partnering with Ultimate Direction in 2025 as the official hydration solutions partner for the Steep Stuff podcast.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: Lots of fun things coming down the pike for this year.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: Ultimate Direction is going to be unveiling a brand new race and ultra vest that's going to be dropping in the next couple of months.
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: So excited to bring that to you guys If you are in the market right now for apparel, for a belt, for a new pack anything hydration solutions related, flasks, you name it.
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: They've got it.
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: They've got you covered.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: If you hop on to ultimate directioncom and use code steep stuff, pod, that's one word steep S?
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: T?
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: E, e?
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: P stuff, s?
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: T U F, f, pod.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: If you hop on to ultimate directioncom and use that code, that's going to get you 25% off your car, especially that we're starting to wind our way a little bit more closer to spring.
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: You guys are going to be start start to put together your race calendars and, uh yeah, ultimate direction is going to have you guys covered.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: So, whatever you need, they've got you outfitted from head almost a toe.
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: They don't do shoes yet.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: So guys enjoy yourself.
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: Have a great rest of your week.
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much, and check out Ultimate Direction.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: Been a pretty wild January so far.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: I just got back from Italy.
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: We were at the.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: World University.
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: Games and we're on Team USA for Schemo, so it was a super fun experience.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: Um, I hadn't done any Schemo racing this season yet, so that was me opening up my season a bit, and it was.
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: It was definitely a kick in the butt.
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: Um, the Europeans are amazing at SkiMo, but they're also super fun, super welcoming, so the whole experience was awesome.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: It was just such a fun time.
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: So that's been most of my January.
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: I didn't run much of that week but got back and running workouts have been going well, so SkiMo keeps you fit back and running workouts have been going well, so Schemo keeps you fit Absolutely, Absolutely Well.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: so for the audience that might not know who you are, maybe introduce yourself and just give us a little break, like a breakdown of your background and running and just how you got into the sport.
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, um.
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: So I'm Karina Um and I started running back in fourth grade in elementary school because cross country was the only sport my school had.
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: I was pretty bad at it.
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: I think I ran like a 13 minute mile at our cross country meet in like fourth grade.
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: Didn't really get serious about it until my freshman, sophomore year of high school.
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: I started running a lot faster Before.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: Before that I was middle of the pack or close to last in most meets and then got super into it, went to a running camp in Colorado here over the summer and fell in love with Colorado um, and that's when I decided I wanted to run in college.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: Specifically, I really got focused on running for CU Boulder, um, and I was nowhere near the standards you would need to be at to run for CU um like CU's was legendary like great distance program um, like historically top D1 um.
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: So I and I was.
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: I was not a D1 recruit at that point, um, but got super into it in high school, trained a lot through COVID.
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: That happened my junior year of high school, came out the other end and dropped a lot of time really fast, ended up walking onto the team at the last minute, came to CU and then ran for the team for almost three years before walking off the team last February.
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: Um, because I fell in love with the mountains and went trail running and schemo and other things and pursuing that NCAA D1 running at that level in that environment just conflicted a lot with those things that I like to do.
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: So I walked away from it for a bit and then this summer ended up deciding I kind of wanted to see what I could do.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: I hadn't done much in the NCAA yet and I still thought there was a lot of untapped potential.
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: So CU went through a huge coaching change and I didn't want to try to pursue that again.
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: So we're really close to Colorado School of Mines, which is a 30-minute drive south of Boulder um and I looked into their program and was super interested.
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: Um ended up transferring there.
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: This past year.
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: Um joined their team and so I've been getting back into that.
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: They're a great program, the coach is great and I'm having a lot of fun getting back into it.
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: So now I'm running for Mines, finishing up a computer science degree this December hopefully, and yeah, don't really know where I'm going after that, but I can never predict that.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: So yeah.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: I'm rolling with it.
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: Well, oh my gosh, like you've had so much success in such a small period of time and I think you're probably one of besides, like Benjamin Townsend and Rio Townsend, probably one of the younger people I've ever had on the podcast.
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: You're like what?
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: 2021?
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: Correct, yeah, so it's just crazy, like I don't talk to so many folks that are, just like you know, super young, but I've accomplished just so much, both in in the ncaa space as well as the trail running space.
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: Where are you originally from, are you?
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: You're not from colorado, are you?
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: no, I'm from california.
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: I'm from sacramento and I went to a boarding school for high school in southern california, so that's cool, yeah.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: So, all right, we can, we can walk this back a little bit because I'm I'm just very interested in, like your, your time at, like CU Boulder, just because, like that is one of I mean, I just I know so many people that have been at the top of our sport and they that have come out, like Allie Mack and quite a few folks, um, that have come out of CU Boulder and just have had amazing experiences there.
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: What is it like?
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: Running for you know, running there, Like at the collegiate level, Is it just like because they're kind of the best, I mean one of the best.
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was definitely at CU Boulder in a time where it got pretty complicated for the distance side of things.
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: I've distance and track in general.
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: Um, my freshman year I went into it and I was.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: I was super stoked.
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: I went to like altitude camp and flag staff for a month before coming to see you, um.
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: So I was like I'm going to be prepared, I'm going to come onto this team like walk on, I'm going to prove myself, um, since he was known for making walk-ons like the top d1 um, and I burnt out.
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: I burnt myself out a little bit.
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: Um, it was definitely hard training.
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: Um, very like simple, like nothing special or unique.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: We didn't do any like lactate training, not much heart rate stuff.
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: We did a little towards the end, um, but it was just a lot of hard training.
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: The team just being surrounded by people that are basically going to be pros or like almost pros, like I've had teammates that have gone pro we train with, like Val Consti in Olympian.
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: She's great there's just just being in that environment surrounded by people who are at the top of the sport.
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: It was awesome and that's where I wanted to be.
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: I wanted to be pushed by people that were better than me and so I loved it, even though I burnt out a bit my freshman year and then I had I was able to redshirt my track season's freshman year and then come back into it.
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: Sophomore year had a good start to my outdoor season, less of a good ending to the outdoor season, but gotten a good 10K time.
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: I'm hoping to knock that down a bit this year.
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: And then my trying to remember.
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: I guess it was sophomore year, cross country season, when CU started to be investigated for the issues with body composition testing um, and there's a whole case um lawsuit.
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: They interviewed a bunch of athletes about it um, and a lot of professionals came out in support of mark, mark and heather, our coaches, um, a lot of people were also on the other side of it um, saying the negative experiences they had there too.
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: Um, I try to come at this from an unbiased standpoint.
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: I think I did have a couple of negative experiences and I think it more came from just not clear communication.
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: I never thought that Mark and Heather.
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: I thought they always wanted the best for us, even if they were harsh or came across as pretty strict sometimes.
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: Um, sometimes maybe what they said didn't come out correctly in the end.
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: They wanted what was best for their athletes and they wanted their athletes to come out of this as good people, even if they didn't end up as professional runners, um, but they're also a program that takes it really seriously and it's, like you said, deep, like boulder is the top of d1.
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: Um, they were under a lot of pressure from the cu administration.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: Um, after that investigation and that was hard them, which was hard on the team, the CU athletic administration could use some work and that's not Mark and Heather's fault, but yeah, and then I left the team a couple months before they ended up leaving the program, couple months before they ended up, uh, leaving the program.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: And then cu has a new pad of track and field distance now and the ncaa is changing a lot because now there's these roster limits that are going into effect next year, where it's a like limit on scholarships, where there's more scholarships now but like not really spots for walk-ons anymore.
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: I don't totally understand the whole thing.
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: I it's kind of hard to explain too, but that's changing a lot of the sport and, yeah, I think the program's gonna shift.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: Ncaa running will definitely shift.
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: I think with less spots maybe those top runners might end up looking at d2 and d3 as valid options and those will get more competitive too.
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: But it was definitely an interesting time to be running for cu.
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: But all in all was a great experience and I look back and I'm like that was an awesome experience and I have teammates that are like my best friends.
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: Um, and running under bark and heather was like a legendary opportunity, so I'm definitely grateful for it, even though it was definitely like a wild ride.
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: So yeah, I have a question with nil, and I know because, like nil is more of a football thing, I mean, but like because I I understand, like as far as d1 goes and d1 running, obviously colorado is like kind of the top of the game.
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: Was nil ever a factor for athletes, for like in the track and field, like realm for you guys, or no?
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: it wasn't huge because track and field isn't a revenue generating sport.
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: Um, I have I'd have a couple teammates do nil deals with, like a protein powder company or something, so they could get like free stuff or like local restaurants, but we didn't have like.
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: It's not like football, where they get paid literally like millions of dollars for nil deals yeah we're not getting millions of dollars in track, but yeah, it's not a huge factor for those non-revenue generating sports well, you become a professional trail runner.
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: It doesn't get much better.
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I've already anticipated that.
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: Uh, how did you not to shift too much?
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: How did you find the trails?
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: Like, what got you excited about trail running?
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, um, I did a couple trail races back in like middle school and high school, just cause they were local races to do.
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: Um, I'd always been like hiking in the mountains a lot with my parents who went camping and hiking and stuff.
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: So I was in the mountains a lot and I never really thought about trail racing until coming to Boulder.
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: Obviously it's a big center for trail running and those sorts of activities.
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: But Mark and Heather would encourage us to do easy runs on the trails sometimes and I think I had one easy run where I was just like this is awesome and then I wanted to start doing trail races, um, and I started my first like big race was, I think, broken Arrow a couple years back.
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: I think I just did the individual and had a lot of fun, um, pushing myself and then started couldn't really do much like while I was in the ncaa, but really took off when I was on my ncaa hiatus this past year.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: So yeah, that's super cool.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: Um, yeah, I mean your results like speak for themselves, like being so young and having had some like I think you had a top 10 result in the women's VK.
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: Um a couple of years ago or two yeah, my second year doing that.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: That was a surprise.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: I did not think it was going to be top 10 in that, so that's amazing.
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: So, like some of your results have really stuck out.
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: Um, and you and I saw you had gone to Minotaur as well.
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: So, like you're dabbling, you're doing races yeah, minotaur was my worst race of last year.
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: I got some.
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: We ran through the creeks and I was wearing like cotton socks instead of nylon socks and then got some horrible blisters on that course because it's very scree and my feet were just like sliding around in my shoes and halfway through I was like why does it feel like there's sand in my shoes and I take off my sock and the bottom of my heels are just massive blisters.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: So that was a hard race.
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: I'd like to go back and maybe uh, situationally do a little bit better in that sometime, but probably not this year.
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: I'm a bit busy, so what'd you think of the course courses bananas.
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: Right, it is bananas.
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: I think I would have enjoyed it more if I wasn't in so much pain the second half of the race, but it was a super fun course and definitely want to come back and do it again I love those like the really technical downhills.
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: I started off I was a horrible technical downhill runner coming into sky running season this past year and then by the end like taking strava segments from like the top runners on the um Marathon Adults Demence course.
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: So I was like this is awesome, like I love downhill running now and that was a good course for it.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about cause?
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: I know you raced, you did series, and all too right.
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: What Did you do series, and all as well in this year?
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: Oh, I did that last year, that was last year.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: Okay, that was my first international race.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: It was okay.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: I had a big week.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: I mean you're talking like that's like the most competitive race in the world.
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: Like yeah, I know I had some people warn me about doing that race.
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: This is my first international race.
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: They're like there's better options no-transcript.
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: But I tried to do that five days before Sears and all, and it was a hard effort because I almost made it to the top before I had anything to turn around.
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: And then the next day a couple of my friends and I round-tripped Mont Blanc from the valley in like 11 hours.
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: So two big back-to-back days and then straight to tears and all was tough.
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: But it was super fun and I was just messing around too.
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: So it's good to experience that atmosphere and stuff in that race too.
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a crazy.
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's like the, like the top, the top, like that's the scene right there, like what did you think?
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: What do you think of the community like.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: And the other thing too is like, because that's the scene and because that's like the pinnacle race, in a lot of ways, like it doesn't get harder than that, like what did you think of the community?
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: And just like the entire atmosphere and everything yeah, um, sears and all.
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: I was a little like, I guess, overwhelmed.
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: I was just there alone and I didn't I didn't know anyone at that race directly.
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: I think I met some people.
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: I like I met rachel tomajic on the bus ride back, I think, um, but I didn't go into that race knowing anyone there, but it was a super like like electric environment.
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: Like the year like racing on the European scene is just crazy.
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: Like everyone's so stoked, um, and it was definitely like a crazy race.
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: I was like what am I doing here?
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: It was super hot too, um, in the summer, but yeah, it was definitely a really fun scene.
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: I was like I definitely want to do this again.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: Um, and then sky running this year.
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: That's where I was, like I love this community, like made a ton of new friends and like really felt like a part of the trail community and that was like super welcoming and just so much fun.
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: Um, so, yeah, it's definitely a really like fun group and it's definitely different from the ncaa.
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: Um, it's like trail running, still super competitive, but it feels competitive in a different way.
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: It feels like there's less pressure, I guess.
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: Um, but yeah, definitely a great environment I'm glad you enjoyed it.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: I'm glad you're you're loving it.
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: How, uh how, did you get into schemo?
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: yeah, um, I think I remember, like broken arrow one year, sophia lockley doing really well and she was, uh, like she's obviously a really good cross-country skier, um, so I was like maybe I should start doing these winter sport things um, and I moved to Boulder.
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: I'm like I need to learn how to ski, um, and I really wanted to just start doing ski mountaineering for the purpose of like skiing 14ers in the winter and I am trying to like build my skills in the alpine realm so I can do bigger objectives in the mountains climbing wise.
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: So I kind of got into skiing for that purpose, um, and I only learned to start like just downhill skiing in march of 2023.
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: So this is my second full season just skiing um, nice, but, um, yeah, the next, like that following season 2024, I started schemo um boulder schemo is this really good group going in boulder?
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: I know, oh yeah, you interviewed davide shout out to davide, yeah yeah, yeah, he, he got that going and so I was doing some of their clinics um the first year and I dove into it.
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: I had a ambassadorship with Dina fit so I had a discount on gear so I was able to get a setup which is really nice and I was kind of just doing it for fun as a way to.
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: It's like hard to run like 80 mile weeks in the winter when there's snow on the ground and it's cold.
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: It's much more fun to like ski that aerobic volume.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: So just started getting into it from the community here and I was kind of a little less stoked about it this year.
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: Um, just because it was kind of tough doing Ski Mo at CU and feeling conflicted with track and everything last year and I think I was like left a little traumatized from that and didn't do it as much this year.
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: But then going back to Italy and being really immersed in the international Schemo community got me really going strong about it again.
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: Hopefully in the future I'll try to make the national team and do some World Cup stuff.
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: So definitely stoked to get better at it I'm.
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: I am pretty bad at the sprint and mixed relay style races of schema.
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: Um, just a lot to learn, a lot of technical skills, but it's a really fun experience.
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: It is such a technical sport, like I think that's the thing like that that skiing is really set aside for me, like to, to understand, like just how I don't know it makes running seem so much easier and more simple.
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's definitely definitely a lot different, definitely a lot of gear things to learn.
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: I joke all the time.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: I'm like yo, I keep asking my buddy if I can borrow like one of his scheme, like his back country set up, so I could just do vertical races for fun.
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: I was like I mean, cause I don't, I'm not a proficient skier by any means, but I'm like I could just take the gondola down, Not a big deal, I could just race people in the vertical.
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, vertical is great, you don't have to transition at all too so you just go up.
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: That was my only good race in Italy.
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: I was like okay.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: I can just go up.
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: It's a cool sport.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: It's really exciting to see the traction it's getting with the olympics and things like that.
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: I know I talked to a lot of athletes and I know different folks have like different like reservations about like vertical and, um, you know certain aspects of the right of it not being in the olympics.
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: But I mean, my only thought is like it'll probably just continue to grow from here and hopefully those things.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: I don't know why they wouldn't have a vertical race in the olympics.
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: That doesn't make any sense to me, like it's like a 20 30 minute race tops yeah, there's been a really big movement, just this like past couple weeks, like hashtag save schema, with like um people are not happy that there isn't like individual or vertical in the olympics.
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: But I don't know.
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: My take is that it's good, that it's good we have sprint and mixed relay.
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: I don't think vertical individual are going to go away.
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: Like we have the World Cup circuit and I think it's only going to encourage like the growth in the World Cup and maybe they can add it in future races.
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: I think, it's just like I don't know how the Olympics work.
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: I don't organize the Olympics.
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: But if it's like the NCAA like, schema is probably a probably a non-revenue-generating sport in the Winter Olympics and so they only have a certain amount of budget to put on certain Schemo races.
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: So that's my suspicion, which could be totally wrong, but I think it's good that it's getting included.
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: So I think you're right and I feel the same way.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: I don't know, it's interesting to me because I I think about it from like, um, almost like a sellability perspective, right, like if I'm watching something on tv like why wouldn't I want to watch cam smith and remy bonet battle on an uphill route?
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: Like not that I don't know if they even would, but like watch it.
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: Or David Sinclair, like watching, like you know, some of our contingent battling on like this amazing vertical route and with this beautiful Italian Alps in the background, right, like that's great television right there, yeah, yeah.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: But I guess I don't know, I don't know how they think about it from like a TV rights perspective or how that stuff works, but like I don't know.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: It's the same thing with, like trail running, like I could see trail running eventually become an olympic sport.
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: I think it would be significantly more watered down, it would be like 24 hours on a track or like more track stuff.
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: Or you know, I can see a hundred mile mountain race and you know, or even even a 23k mountain race, let alone like in the olympics.
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: I mean maybe, but I would yeah, I would highly doubt that.
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: I feel like that's a lot tougher to make an Olympic sport and I feel like we have plenty of world circuits anyways to trail running.
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: It's definitely not something I associate with the Olympics, but maybe they'll push for it in the future.
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know.
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: I see a lot of people pushing for it now, but it's like eh, we have world mountain running champs.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: It's like we could just make that our Olympics.
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: Like have, yeah, we have world mountain champs, it's like that we could just make that our olympics, like why, you know, yeah, why make, why make it complicated?
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: I guess right, yeah, feels like that was given to.
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: I mean, they have world cup, that's huge, um, and I guess, like sprint mix really are good olympic formats since they're shorter.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: But yeah, it'll be interesting to see how it evolves.
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: I think it will be, it will be.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: let's, uh, let's, pivot to your like running now for minds Like how has it been, um, there?
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: Is it more flexible with being able to kind of pursue this trail career of yours that you you're looking at, or is it a little more rigid, like, what are your thoughts on that?
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's definitely.
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: It's definitely a lot more flexible than um the CU program.
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: Cu program was um.
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: Our current coach is awesome.
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: He's historically been an amazing coach.
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: Um team has won national title a lot um and I love the training that we're doing now um my first season.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: I ended up getting a grade four femoral stress fracture in j?
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: Um this past year right after my sky race in Peru.
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: So I came into the season and cross like trying to build back um from that stress fracture Um, so I didn't end up racing towards the end of the season the like nationals races.
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: Instead I ended up finishing the Skyrunner World Series, which was awesome um that I was able to do that.
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: I'm so grateful that our coach let me do that um because it was really good to like feel like I had finished that um and yeah, it's definitely a lot more flexible.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: I mean I came to minds because I I still want to race in the NCAA and I still want to like see how far I can push myself in that space.
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: But I think I do best when I am allowed.
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: That flexibility um and being able to be my full self is going to help me perform better on the track.
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: So hopefully we'll see.
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: I haven't done a track race yet.
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: I have my first race this Saturday oh wow, indoor.
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: So it's historically been a race that I've done bad at.
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: So hopefully, coming back my fourth year with a new I don't know how to put it but new mindset, new kind of setup for running, so we'll see.
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I'm really enjoying it and the team's great.
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: It's a lot more flexible.
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: I also commute to school every day, which is it's a bit hard.
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: It's kind of a long commute sometimes so I don't attend like practice on easy days like we did at CU, having practice every single day.
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: Meaning, at the same time, it's a lot more flexible.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: I'm usually just there on workout days, so that helps a lot too, making it work nice.
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: How many more years of eligibility do you have left?
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: I have through next spring technically.
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: Um, I am trying to graduate in December and I, if I graduate in December, then I probably just wouldn't use the rest of that eligibility.
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: I think I kind of just want to explore my career and maybe do a like, actually have a full start to finish year of trail running in 2026.
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: So maybe do Schemo stuff, world Cup Schemo stuff, so yeah, and that's if I graduate in december.
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: Um, currently the plan is I have to take 60 credits over the course of this year to graduate in december oh wow and I'm on track, but it's.
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: It's only january, so we'll see um, but yeah, I'd probably be.
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: I'm assuming this is my last track season and trying to do my best this season in case it is, but it's not for sure.
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: Nice.
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: Is it difficult to balance?
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: Because, like, dude, when I was in college I mean I would.
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: I was not a good college student, I was never a good student to begin with.
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: But like, how do you balance?
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: Like a computer bachelor, I would imagine a BS in computer science.
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: How do you manage balancing all that coursework with training at a high level?
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I haven't always balanced it that well, I will say Just accepting that fact too is really helpful and just the quality of life you're living and it's really great.
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: I started as a mechanical engineering major and I was mechanical engineering my whole time at CU and just switched this last semester to CS and CS feels a lot more flexible than mechanical engineering, which is great.
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: I had multiple teachers tell us at the start of the semester like you can be a straight a student if you spend your whole life doing school work for us, but like that's your choice if you want to like spend your whole life doing school work and like we
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: don't blame you if you aren't like a straight a student, everything um like have balance in your life.
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: So that's definitely been something I tried to learn and I was like really into my.
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: I was really type a my freshman and sophomore year with training and with school, um, I was like trying to be 4.0 student, trying to hit every workout, would freak out if I missed a run, freak out if I like didn't get an A on something, and then kind of swung entirely the other way in my junior year and I guess now I'm finding a pretty happy medium between doing well in school and doing well in running.
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: It's definitely hard but I feel like, just like accepting you're not going to be perfect in everything and just trying to do your best and then being happy with what you have in the present has worked well for me and this semester is going a lot better than some of the previous ones that I've had, school-wise and training-wise Nice.
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: Life's about balance right, being able to find that balance.
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: It's not an easy thing.
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: It's interesting.
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: I I talked to a lot of people and like I've talked to everyone, from, like people that didn't even go to school to people that have, like, phds and like are at the top of the game and everything, and I'm like how the fuck do you do that?
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: like it is not easy yeah, I'm definitely on the go like all the time and working to to fund this sky running thing is another added stress, um, but let's talk sky running really quick.
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: I sorry to interrupt you I wanted something I actually earmarked to like ask you about.
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: So I know you had done.
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: Meet the Minotaur.
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: You did, did you?
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: You did Cordelia Blanca down in Peru, correct?
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: meet the minotaur?
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: You did, did you?
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: You did cordelia blanca down in peru, correct?
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I started with mexico sky challenge, um, and then did minotaur and then at minotaur.
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: Oh, I met mercedes at mexico sky challenge and then at minotaur.
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: She was like oh, let me talk to the race director of the cordelia blanca race, because I was unhappy with my performance at minotaur and I wanted to do another sky race.
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: She's like oh, they can probably give you free lodging.
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: And I was like okay, I'll go, I'll go to peru if they can get me free lodging.
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: And so she was able to pull that for me, which is awesome, um.
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: So I went to peru and then thought my season was over because, because of breaking my femur and then the n, I was like I'm going to prioritize this.
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: But then decided like, like, the team didn't need me on the national roster this year.
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: And I was like oh, I could do this one last sky race and then race the finals, and I could race either U23 or the senior finals, cause I had done the four races for the senior finals, um, and I also done the two races for U23.
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: Um, and I also done the two races for U23.
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: So I was like I guess I'm just gonna send it to Turkey and Spain like a week before.
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: That happened in November, so it was an unexpected season, um, from the start, I think, but I'm definitely grateful for it, um, and it was a super fun experience the whole time.
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, what was?
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: that.
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: What was that?
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: Like, like getting to race at a finals, like for like, I mean, sky running is one of the like the premier.
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: Um, I guess you could say like the premier groups, if you will.
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: Besides, like golden trail and stuff like that.
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: Like, what'd you think of the final?
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, did you think of the final?
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the final was.
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: It's crazy.
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: I mean, just even just starting in my first sky race, I was like what am I doing here?
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: I'm in mexico, on the line with a bunch of pros that I've looked up to, like I'm like hillary gerardi standing like right there, that's crazy, like stuff like that.
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: I was like, wow, this is insane.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: Um, then, like it was really unexpected getting fifth at that race.
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: I was like, okay, this is awesome.
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: Um, and then like keeping going with that, and then to the final.
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: I was like I don't know, it was just kind of surreal the whole time being.
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: I'm like these people I've just like looked up to is like pros.
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: And now I'm just like Emma Clark is helping me like unpark my car when I'm stuck in neutral on the hill and like her boyfriend's like helping me get like out of this situation.
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: I'm like what's going on, um?
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: So yeah, it was definitely like a surreal experience, um, and it's honestly like awesome.
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: Getting to learn from like these people that I've looked up to and hanging out with them and just hearing about how they got into the sport too, um, has just been great.
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: And then meeting the other U23 athletes and just seeing other people kind of getting into the sport and being in the same place as I am is super awesome and it's good building like an international community there.
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, the finals um, that race was organized super well and it was like a super fun environment.
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: So I definitely had a great, great time and stoked to be coming back to sky running this year too, so hell yeah, what I'm curious to see like.
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: What inspired you more about like sky, or sky running versus like because someone at your ability level could, could very well go compete like the golden trail world series right, do your series and alls and yours agamas and stuff like that.
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: What was it about?
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: Um, like sky running that really appealed to you?
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: yeah, um, golden trail felt more like the ncaa to me.
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: Um, it's just the races feel more like trail races.
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: The mountain races, um, especially some of the like marine races that they had like they're a lot flatter, they feel a lot less technical um than sky running, and so I was just looking for something that was more different than the NCAA.
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: As I was coming out of it, and I don't even know how I heard about sky running in the first place, I like can't remember how I decided like I was going to mexico.
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: I do remember it was like a last minute decision.
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: I was being coached by david roche at the time, so he was kind of just rolling with whatever I decided to do.
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: Um, but it was a kind of last minute decision to join that series.
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: But I've always gravitated to the more technical and steeper mountain races versus the trail races.
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: Um, but I do, I do want to do golden trail at some point in the future.
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: Um, they just seem so fast.
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: I was like, wow, I mean I was never the top of the NCAA.
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: I'm like I'm not like those like top of top fast runners, but I can like grind it out over a long period of time, um, get down and dirty with sky running, so, um, that's kind of why I went down that path that year and sky running was a lot more, a lot more flexible, just getting into races and like welcoming me into the series.
• 38:26
  Speaker 2: Um, I didn't really try with golden trail this year, just didn't work out my schedule, um, and it won't.
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: I'm not doing it this year either, but it's definitely something I want to go back to in the future.
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: Um, definitely a different style of racing and they're evolving too.
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: It was cool to see sky running like evolve.
• 38:44
  Speaker 2: I had so many races this past year compared to the year before.
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, it's definitely they change all the time and I just prefer sky running this year because it was more technical, not aspect.
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: So no, I love that.
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: I love the reason to hear you know that you're choosing it and hearing more people going, gravitating towards it, because I think there's it's.
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: I think people get confused that like there is a significant stylistic difference between the two and it's like no, no, no, these are two very different kinds of races.
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: It was.
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: It is cool that Skyrunning has really expanded and even now we have two North American races and we'll see what we get.
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: Maybe we get another one in North America at some point in time, which would be dope, but it's pretty rad.
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: I'm a big fan.
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: Do you think so?
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: Next year will you be competing U23?
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: Do you still have that option, or will you compete as an adult?
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: How does that work?
• 39:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I've signed up as an elite in the u23 series already for sky running um, and have three races.
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: They change it you need three races for u23 now.
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: Um, it's actually interesting.
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: One of the sky running races I'm doing this year was a golden trail race last year, but it was the one they didn't finish because there is a massive thunderstorm the tatra sky race oh, yeah, in poland right yeah, so now it's a sky runner race um, which is interesting.
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: I did think it was interesting.
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: That was a golden trail race, since it was a sky race last year, but now it's a sky race um but still cool yeah, still cool, I'm like I'm down to do that, um, but yeah, I'm definitely.
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: I forgot what the question was.
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: I totally got distracted with that.
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: I forgot.
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: I forgot what I asked.
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: Oh, it was signing up for signing up for huge for you 23 versus yeah, so I'm doing the 23 and I have the.
• 40:30
  Speaker 2: I have three races.
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: I might do a fourth.
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: I might do matterhorn old tracks.
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: That's a sick race.
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: I've always wanted to do that race.
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: It's so cool.
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: Um, I need to ask sky running if I could get entered in it.
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: Um, my teammate jackson has done it I think twice now, two years in a row oh yeah jackson cole.
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: He's a freak, he's a great he's awesome.
• 40:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I've been in a next show.
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: He's cool to jackson um, but yeah, that course is bananas.
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: It's so hard, yeah no but, and I'm going for the matterhorn fkt again this year, but I'm going there and I'm buckling down for like six weeks and dedicating myself to that.
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: So it'd be cool to like do that and then do the race.
• 41:11
  Speaker 2: Um, still works out with my school schedule, but I'll see how I'm feeling like at the end of the summer after that too.
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: So let's talk FKTs Cause I think, for those that don't know, you know who you are like.
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: You have two pretty notable FKTs, like one in Mount hood and one for um.
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: What is it?
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: The tour de abyss, which is a pretty respectable route, you know that was a funny week.
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: Um, yeah, uh.
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: Tour de abyss yeah, that's a super fun route.
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: Connects to popular 14 years in Colorado.
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: Um, mount blue sky and Mount beer sat in this scrambly six mile loop.
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: Um, I did that in my one and only a hundred mile week ever.
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: My coaches were not happy that I did that on an easy day and then went to longer on the next day.
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: But yeah, um yeah, I just got into FKTs.
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: I think I did Mount Hood because I was living in Portland that summer working for Nike and Mount Hood is you see it every day.
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: It's like the only thing there.
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: I'm like well, this is the mountain I have to work with so I like skied it a couple times and was like I guess I'll go for the like FKT on this.
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: It was another kind of crazy back-to-back thing.
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: I had done Mount Rainier, just climbed it not like FKT style the day before, got back to Portland at like 1 am, slept for four hours, woke up and did theut FKT.
• 42:37
  Speaker 2: So I wasn't like really prepared and like planning everything very well.
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: I think my FKT like someone can go and smash that personally Didn't quite make the right gear choices on that too, but yeah, I was like it's fun to just like push yourself on a course that isn't a race and is more technical too.
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: I do like I like how those FKTs can be more technical than races up to a certain point.
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: Like I think that's a super fun aspect of it too and like with the Matterhorn that being my like huge focus that's a technical route.
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: Extremely.
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: What inspires you about that route?
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: I huge focus.
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: That's a technical route um extremely.
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: What inspires you about that route?
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: I asked myself that too.
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: I don't know how I got super obsessed with the matterhorn.
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: I did that summer.
• 43:27
  Speaker 2: Um, that I did.
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: Mount hood was like the summer.
• 43:31
  Speaker 2: I was like really into the matterhorn and it's just such a cool mountain like I feel like feel like the FKT, the women's FKT, could go down a lot.
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: I want to get it a lot closer to the men's FKT on it and I just think it's a super fun scrambly route.
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: I've loved like exploring the area and you're up there.
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: So yeah, just like something I can't really like really actually describe.
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: No, it's epic, it's absolutely.
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: Does KJ still have the FKT, or didn't Nadir get it this year?
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: No, I think it's still killing.
• 44:10
  Speaker 2: I think Nadir missed it by like a couple minutes.
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: I remember I think I ran past him or scrambled past him on the ridge when I was out scouting for it one day, cause he was out scouting the same summer and I was like, oh wow, I didn't know.
• 44:25
  Speaker 2: That guy was like I got to run like 257 round trip on this thing, oh yeah he's a monster.
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, super crazy.
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: I'm super stoked to get back out there.
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: This I was going to go this last summer until I broke my femur, so I'm excited to get back out there and really put a lot of time and I have a time goal for it, so kind of going for that.
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: That's amazing.
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I wish you the best of luck on that project and definitely we'll follow along and I can't wait to see you smash yeah.
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: If anyone's in Europe listening and wants to help.
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: It's hard to do FKTs I think Jack Kunzel mentioned this because they did Jack Nantz and Mont Blanc FKTs on skis and it's hard to like organize this stuff when you're not in the country and like it's a completely different community and putting in these massive FKTs takes a lot of work and a lot of the conditions aligning.
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: So it's definitely a hard thing to do with the Matterhorn, like it helps to have like with Killian and Nadir, like having the guides like hold people from some sections while you're going down so you're not like tearing by people on these like single lane rope sections.
• 45:34
  Speaker 2: It's definitely it takes a village to like have these fk teams go well.
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: So that's something I'm working on organizing too, but sounds like I have a lot of chemo friends that want to help out now in europe, which will be fun, but yeah that's amazing.
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: Let me ask you this does the, does the grand, excite you at all in america?
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: I did actually think about going for that the same summer as put in the Matterhorn.
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: I went up there um a couple times.
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: I made the drive from Portland which was like 10 hours long.
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: It was a horrible like long drive, and I just needed a lot more time to scout that route than I had um.
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: I like tried to go for it and got super lost like my second time going for it, so it's definitely something I want to like go for in the future.
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: Um, maybe, if I like work in jackson for a summer or something, I see myself kind of not really being tied down after I graduate, so it's definitely an fkt I would really love to go for in the future and I thought about it yeah, yeah it's.
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: I mean it's, it's one of those ones you got to know what you're doing.
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: Like it's it seems like like michelino, like turn, like he literally had names for every freaking rock going up that mountain, like it's kind of absurd, like how dialed some people get for some of these things.
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: It's crazy yeah, yeah, it's a lot like the matterhorn with the, with that aspect too, and I had friends like tell me oh, the route going up the Grand is super straightforward, like you'll be all good and like I got lost every single time I went up there.
• 47:05
  Speaker 2: So what everybody says it definitely requires a lot of scouting, and Jack was there going for the FKT that summer too and he did a lot.
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: He was there for like over a month, I think, scouting it out.
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: Um, so it definitely takes a lot of effort to like plan those things and have it super dialed let me ask you this um, just because, like you're like a like a great example, have you applied for the trail team for this year?
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: um, no, I occasionally like run with.
• 47:36
  Speaker 2: I ran with them kind of right when they were starting out and, like I talked to Andy quite a few times, CU alum, I love the trail team.
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: They're like it's super cool, like the community they have going.
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: It just hasn't like super worked out with being in the ncaa at the same time.
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: I might apply for the community aspect of it because I don't think being in the ncaa the rest of this year and then being an elite on the trail team would work.
• 48:08
  Speaker 2: Um, but yeah, I definitely like thought about that and I I think it's a good reminder.
• 48:14
  Speaker 2: I think I was gonna do like apply for the community thing.
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I've worked with them in the past and run with them and they're an awesome group.
• 48:20
  Speaker 2: So yeah, they don't have a lot of sky runners specifically um, but could bring that.
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: I like getting more people stoked on sky running in america, so no, I think you bring a really good take to it and I think you're like, you're one of these folks that are competing at a very high level in the NCAA, so it's that that's a beautiful crossover, especially like into the trails, which is cool, so definitely something to think about, sweet.
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: Well, we're almost, we're getting close to an hour, so we'll start winding down with some, some questions.
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: I'm very curious to see who inspires you.
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's a good question.
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: Um, gosh, honestly, that's a good question, gosh.
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: Honestly, just, I feel like I'm inspired by a lot of people.
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: I don't really have a specific person that I look up to in mind.
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: I guess I'm trying to think, um, but seriously, like every person I've met through trail running and like my peers, like everyone like has their own story and it's super cool to see people like pursuing this sport in so many different like avenues, coming from so many different like backgrounds, so that just in and of itself is super inspiring.
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: I don't really have a specific like person or people that I've looked up to.
• 49:46
  Speaker 2: I've looked up to a lot of people like everyone in the sky running, all the pros I was running with in the sky running world series, like I've looked up to them forever.
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: But like, yeah, it's just like a lot of people in general that have kind of contributed to that, and I've also like getting into alpinism more.
• 50:02
  Speaker 2: I found it really hard to find like role models to look up to in that regard, just because there aren't a lot of women doing the things I want to do in alpinism.
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: Um, and that's been a somewhat of a source of frustration.
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: There are there are a few, but not like a ton, so that's definitely a field where there could be more role models and sources of inspiration, I think um.
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: Have you met, Aaron?
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: Tanya tone.
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: I haven't met her in time.
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: I pronounced her name.
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: It's ton.
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: I mispronounce her name every time.
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you haven't met her yet.
• 50:37
  Speaker 2: I haven't met her in person oh we got to get you guys connected.
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, definitely need to get you guys connected because she's she's a great example of like, especially on the FKC, fkt scene, of just pushing it forward and just like redefining what it means for women in the space especially from like an alpinism perspective.
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it'd be super cool to like partner with her or something in the future.
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: Yeah, all right.
• 51:05
  Speaker 2: So let's, let's, let's talk music here.
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: What's your like?
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: Pre-race hype song.
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: Pre-race hype song.
• 51:07
  Speaker 2: Um, that also changes a lot.
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: Um, in italy we got some new songs.
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: Um, from the polish team we learned I don't even know what the song is called, but it's 21 can you do some for me in polish?
• 51:24
  Speaker 2: And it's really like, it's really kind of a vibe we were.
• 51:29
  Speaker 2: We were getting psyched to that song.
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: It's called talk to a less yellow.
• 51:33
  Speaker 2: Um, it's the polish version of it.
• 51:36
  Speaker 2: Um, I do like doja.
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: Doja Cat's always a go-to.
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely changes a bit, though.
• 51:49
  Speaker 2: Okay, I would say I fall back on Doja a lot, though it's good choices, solid choices, doja and Polish.
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: All right, I'm going to shift this one, because this is a little bit more serious, especially coming from a computer science major.
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: What's your take on AI and AI taking over the world?
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: What's?
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: going to happen?
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so I love AI.
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: Ai is my thing in computer science.
• 52:10
  Speaker 2: I don't see it taking over the world per se.
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: The challenge with AI is the fact that it can't think logically like a human.
• 52:26
  Speaker 2: Like if AI took an IQ test, its IQ would be it's usually less than the average human IQ Because it has great like it can pull from so much data that it's trained on, but it can't make those like logical inferences yet that, like humans make.
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: And there recently have been some crazy developments actually in this space with open AI creating this new model that did actually pass this logic test that everyone's been trying to pass forever, but it's.
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: I don't think it's ever gonna take over the world and like there's always a place for humans like I can't go and like do like all these like jobs that, like people are doing.
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: It can replace people in some aspects, but then it creates more jobs too, like it's a trade-off, but I don't think there should really be a fear of it taking over per se and I I was joking a little bit, but I think I think yeah, no, but like that's the and people are like legitimately like concerned about that, but I think it's a super cool field and like I could see myself starting my own like business with ai.
• 53:46
  Speaker 2: I like to do research and like researching into new models.
• 53:49
  Speaker 2: Um, and working on that logic component is super fun, so I think it can really like benefit society.
• 53:56
  Speaker 2: Um, it's just it's a lot.
• 54:00
  Speaker 2: There's always limitations, like you're limited by the processing power that you have to to like run these models, or limited by our environmental impact of that processing power as well.
• 54:12
  Speaker 2: It's huge environmental footprint and that can create more jobs and research and like finding ways to combat that too.
• 54:19
  Speaker 2: So it's I think it's a resource and can be a really good tool if we use it well and, um, it should require a lot of like political management as well.
• 54:30
  Speaker 2: Should like there should be like a as it grows bigger, like we should have more like regulations for that too.
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: Um, for sure, yeah, yeah, it's, it's, it's crazy's crazy.
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: Um, yeah, yeah, it's gonna be interesting to see like where, where it goes.
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: I I like I saw like open ai and fields uh, what was it?
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: Those new, not a the hell.
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: Was it called like the super agents or something like that they're calling it.
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: They could basically do that's like some of the tasks of like um, your average like worker, which is crazy.
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: It was like holy shit.
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: It's crazy that it's like this is going to be here in the next few years, so yeah, okay, yeah, rapidly, rapidly innovating in that sense.
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: So yeah all right, let's shift gears back to racing.
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: Um, it's kind of crazy because you've already done like my pinnacle race and series and all but like if you could pick.
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: Like what what's?
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: What's a dream race of yours that you'd love to do.
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: Like is is there anything on the on the board that really excites you right now?
• 55:25
  Speaker 2: Um got a couple, so I'm going to do a qualifying race for OCC this year so I can race it next year.
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: Um, with UTMB changing their sponsors and like, oh, I want, I want to do this series now, Um, so I really want to do that next year.
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: Obviously that's huge popular um dream race of a lot of people.
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: So that race um trofeo, kima, which is a great race yeah, they don't have it this year because it's every other year, but hopefully that one next year.
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: Maga sky marathon also looks super cool.
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, just kind of discovering like there's a lot of cool like european races that are just not like these big ones but still super fun.
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: So just discovering new races, but those three are probably like the big ones that I want to go after and then I definitely want to do ultras at some point in the future.
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: Uh, hard rock would be like super cool one day, but in the sky running scene right now.
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: So nice, nice.
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: All the future is bright.
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: I'm so excited for what you're going to do in the sport.
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: It was great having a conversation with you and, like I said, I can't wait to see where things go.
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: Um, you know, wishing you the best of luck the rest of your season and at your meet was it this weekend or said, or tomorrow?
• 56:43
  Speaker 2: yeah, the best of luck with the rest of your season and at your meet, was it this?
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: weekend or tomorrow.
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, best of luck there and yeah, really excited to have another conversation again sometime soon.
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: Awesome.
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, thanks for having me on the podcast.
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no problem.
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no problem, karina.
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: What'd you guys think?
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: Oh, man, what a fun episode.
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much to Karina for coming on.
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: Um, just like I said, absolutely is a bright star coming up in our sport and really want to wish her the best of luck in her track season, as well as uh, as she starts to put together her plans for her 2025 trail season.
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: Um, guys, before you get going, do me a favor hop on Instagram and give Karina a follow.
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: You can find her on Instagram and underscore Karina.
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: That's K A R I N a dot Anderson.
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: Instagram and underscore karina that's k-a-r-i-n-a dot anderson.
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: Um.
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: You can also just type in karina k-a-r-i-n-a.
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: Anderson and you'll be able to find her handle.
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: She's got some great pictures of her competing all over um at uh some races, just like the meet the minotaur, the mexico sky challenge, um and uh all over some of the other sky races, um in 2024.
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: So definitely a fun follow.
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: I want to wish her the best of luck.
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: Just some housekeeping stuff, guys, if you wouldn't mind, before you tune out from this episode, if you happen to be on Spotify, apple or YouTube, please give us a thumbs up and a five star rating and review.
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: I would really appreciate that.
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: That's how we can continue to get this podcast to new listeners, as well as get this out to the world, so we can continue to continue to uh share the great stories from the athletes in our sport and cover the great sport of sub ultra.
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: Um, best sport on earth, that's right.
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: Um, and very, very last but not least, um, if you happen to be on um Instagram, if you wouldn't mind sharing uh this episode so we can uh continue to elevate the profiles of these athletes.
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: It would mean an absolute lot.
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: So, guys, have a great rest of your week.
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: We've got three episodes scheduled for this week, so it's going to be a big one.
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: Tomorrow, an episode is going to drop with go beyond racing.
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: They have a new sub ultra race that they're going to be dropping.
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: Go beyond racing is a Pacific Northwest based race company and they're the same race directors as, like the volcanic 50k that used to be used to have nar nar and some cool races like that.
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: So they've got some fun new sub ultra stuff up their sleeve, so keep an eye out for that.
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: And then, very least, or very last, jesus yeah, I was gonna say last, but certainly not least our boy, cole campbell, is on the steep stuff podcast and that's going to be dropping on Friday, just as he gets ready to toe the line in the next couple of days at the Black Canyon 100K.
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: So we want to wish him the best at that.
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: So, guys, hope you have a great rest of your week.
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: Thanks for tuning in.
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: Take care, thank you, we'll see you next time.