Welcome to episode Twenty-Five of the “It Matters To Me Podcast”! I’m your host, Adam Casey, and joining me for this one is Jeff Garmire, record-holding thru-hiker, backcountry enthusiast, and newly-minted trail-runner.
Jeff’s introduction to thru-hiking came during his college years when he up and decided to traverse the Pacific Crest Trail and soon after fell in love with everything the experience offered.
Since that inaugural hike, Jeff’s gone on to complete an astounding list of dream adventures that are too lengthy to list here but some of the highlights include the Calendar Year Triple Crown, which is hiking the Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail, and Continental Divide Trail all in one year, climb all the 14ers in Colorado, and very recently finishing the Cocodona 250 in 95 hours and 28 minutes.
That last part is how I first heard about Jeff after watching Dylan Harris’ amazing documentary about Cocodona’s inauguration that I’ll link to in the show notes and can’t recommend enough.
Once I started to go on a bit of a deep-dive into Jeff’s background, I knew I had to have him on the show. And I’m so glad it worked out because Jeff was such a fun and inspiring guest who you can tell has a litany of stories from all the stuff he’s done that would take two lifetimes to tell.
There are so many personal topics we could’ve spent the whole episode talking about but one of the biggest takeaways I got was the unmistakable power in embracing the moment you’re in, both the good and bad. And how as cliché as we all know it is, the hardest part of almost any endurance challenge is the mental preparation you put into it.
Additional Links
Jeff Garmire (Website):
http://freeoutside.com/jeff-garmire/
Jeff Garmire (Instagram):
https://www.instagram.com/thefreeoutside/
“Free Outside” Book”
It Matters To Me (Instagram):
https://www.instagram.com/adamcasey/
It Matters To Me (Website):
https://itmatterstomepodcast.com/
Cocodona 250 Documentary by Dylan Harris:
https://youtu.be/2sCvvBReOlk
“Endurance” by Alfred Lansing:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/139069.Endurance