Free Inside

Allison saw her first ghost. Or a college student got into a car really fast. You decide.

She was driving home through the MSU campus, watching a woman with a Stanley Cup hug her friend goodbye and step into traffic. Allison locked onto her because she once watched someone get hit by a car in LA. Then the woman was gone. She didn’t cross, she didn’t open a car door, she just disappeared. I’m still on team “just a human,” but I’ll admit I don’t have a better explanation.

From there we go deep on ghosts. We cover the black mass Allison saw over the basement heater as a kid, the Savannah ghost that just wanted a Bible opened to the right chapter, and why you should never ask La Llorona what she needs. Allison explains how she mentally negotiated with dead miners on a candlelit mine tour in Georgetown, Colorado. We also rank the scariest things you could run into on a trail: the creatures of the Uinta Basin we won’t name, Bigfoot, werewolves, and a Hawaiian race photo that actually creeped Allison out.

Then Allison explains the MLB playoffs, including the mystery team “I L,” why she’s rooting for the Rays (Durham Bulls loyalty), and her review of Bull Durham (“way too much kissing”). We do baseball and football announcer impressions, which go about how you’d expect.

We wrap with Moab 240 and the flooding at Bridger Jack, and why Sinister Sports earned a lot of respect from Allison for how they handled a last-minute race change and refunded her entry.

We got married! After a week of wedding obligations, very little free time, and apparently sleeping about 10 hours a night, we’re back with a full wedding recap.

We talk about the parts that went well (especially having enough food), the choreographed first dance to Queen’s “Don’t Stop Me Now,” the ceremony stories from our officiant, and how Ted D. Bear—the life-size stuffed bear who has ridden shotgun on many of Jeff’s adventures—ended up at the wedding. We also revisit the early days of our relationship, including the time our friend Luke started asking when we were going to get married after knowing us for about six weeks.

Then we test our newlywed knowledge with questions about each other’s shoe sizes, favorite colors, hometowns, and families. One of us does a better job than the other.

This is a wedding recap, relationship update, and newlywed quiz all rolled into one Free Inside episode. And there’s a ghost story coming next week—Allison says she watched a woman disappear right in front of her.

With four days left before our wedding, Allison takes a very outdated test to determine whether she actually knows her future husband. The result: a respectable C+.

From there, we try to determine where all the paperweights went, investigate one of America’s most haunted houses, debate whether people can mentally create ghosts, and read horoscopes that want us to buy zebra print and knock down a wall.

We also get into disappearing TV remotes, lonely sock baskets, Yellowstone’s dangerously hot water, and the story of a ghost who may have helped solve a murder.

Just another completely normal conversation before marriage.

This week, Allison and I recap the third annual Montana Meltdown, including what we learned from watching people run in circles for 24 hours, why a completely runnable course can destroy you, and how consistency usually beats speed.

Then we quickly lose the plot.

Allison explains why she can only perform one accent at a time, takes us inside the strange world of theater school, and tells the mysterious story of the Jamison family disappearance. Somehow, that leads us into wilderness survival, cannibalism, and the proper freshness of human meat.

We also revisit one of our first dates, reveal why marriage is how you win the flirting game, and remember our first backpacking trip together—when I led Allison over a mountain to a dried-up lake, fed her an unreasonable amount of rice, and accidentally got us adopted by a tribe of mountain goats.

Also, our wedding is next week, and I still need a ring and an outfit. Everything is going perfectly.

Allison is back from her longest unsupported adventure yet: roughly 180 miles from Meeks Bay near Lake Tahoe to Tuolumne Meadows.

She carried all of her food and gear, refused trail magic, crossed Desolation Wilderness and Sonora Pass, and spent three nights trying to sleep in a bivy sack without a sleeping pad. The result was a series of freezing 20-minute naps, an increasingly slow third night and a very important lesson about ground insulation.

Allison shares what worked, what failed and what she would change next time—including carrying less water, packing simple carbohydrates and creating an actual sleep strategy. She also talks about reaching 72 hours with more than 20 miles remaining, having a panic attack when she realized the finish was much farther away than expected and finding a way to reset and keep moving.

Jeff and Allison also discuss the strange rules of texting, people who reply to every message, passive-aggressive thumbs-up emojis, Montana “howdy” culture and the danger of getting trapped in an endless goodbye loop.

A funny and honest breakdown of unsupported fastpacking, sleep deprivation, food mistakes and what happens when your entire world becomes taking the next step.

Allison Powell decided that her first solo backpacking trip would be the Wonderland Trail—a roughly 93-mile loop around Mount Rainier.

As an experienced ultrarunner, three 30-plus-mile days sounded difficult but completely reasonable. Backpacking quickly taught her otherwise. Her days stretched to nearly 14 hours, she arrived at camp around midnight, slept under the stars while a mouse ran across her head, attempted her first solo bear hang, hitchhiked to an off-trail campsite, carried far too much food, and learned that every unnecessary ounce matters.

In this episode, we talk about the surprising differences between ultrarunning and backpacking, going into a trip overconfident, doing something alone when nobody else is available, the reality of hiking big miles with a loaded pack, and the practical lessons Allison would carry into her next adventure.

There are also suspension bridges, enormous waterfalls, questionable trail math, a missing travel mug, two marmots fighting—or flirting—and a bag of carrots that became the greatest mistake of the entire trip.

This conversation feels especially relevant now because Allison is attempting her longest solo adventure yet: an approximately 180-mile FKT from Tahoe to Yosemite.

#Trailrunning #Runningnews #Outdoors #Outdooradventure

When Allison and I met, she didn’t own soap, shampoo, conditioner, a bed frame, enough underwear to make it through the week—or, apparently, pants. The strangest part is that she lived directly across the street from a soap store.

In this episode of Free Inside, Allison explains the environmental and financial logic behind her no-soap era, rescuing shampoo from a free box, and buying discounted soap containing pieces of packing tape. We also discuss shopping entirely on vibes, the irresistible power of a clearance sticker, Kohl’s Cash, ultra widows, homeschooling, colorblindness, reincarnated children, and why Allison might return as part of a chicken.

Free Inside is our weekly, unscripted conversation about endurance, life, whatever is inside our brains, and the rabbit holes we probably should have kept to ourselves.

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Allison is officially attempting her first FKT: roughly 170 miles from Lake Tahoe to Yosemite, carrying everything she needs and hoping to finish in around 72 hours—without a tent, sleeping bag, or sleeping pad. She explains why she chose the route, how she is handling permits, food, batteries, sleep, and the pressure of finally committing to it. We also discuss Jeff’s extremely important early-relationship dinosaur test, Allison getting caught cheating during homeschool, the many unlikely threats ’90s children were taught to fear, and the Andes plane crash that turned into history’s most famous survival-and-cannibalism story. A completely normal morning on Free Inside with Jeff Garmire and Allison Powell.

Jeff Garmire and Allison Powell return for another episode of Free Inside, the spinoff show where outdoor adventures quickly turn into conversations about Bigfoot, ghosts, questionable food, and everything else occupying our brains.

We recap our four-day, 72-mile backpacking trip through the Sierra Nevada, including swimming in alpine lakes, hiking part of the John Muir Trail, fighting with bear canisters, missing the store by 15 minutes, and carrying ham that may or may not have been safe to eat. Allison also explains how she beat Jeff approximately 100–0 in gin rummy.

Then Weird Allison’s Corner takes us into Bigfoot kidnappings, interdimensional Sasquatches, ghosts, reincarnation, not-deer, haunted limestone, and the disastrous first date where we somehow started discussing aliens.

Plus, our Appalachian Trail film Rewritten premieres on YouTube Friday, August 28.

This is Free Inside. We are both wearing pants.

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#Trailrunning #Runningnews #Outdoors #Outdooradventure

For three months, Jeff Garmire and Allison Powell were secretly training for the same nearly impossible Valentine’s Day plan: the Barkley Marathons.

Neither of them could explain why they were accumulating enormous amounts of vertical gain through a Montana winter, practicing map-and-compass navigation, waking up for middle-of-the-night training sessions or suddenly planning a trip to Tennessee. Then, on February 14, they both stood at the starting line inside Frozen Head State Park.

Recorded during their drive home from Barkley, Jeff and Allison can finally talk openly about the experience. They compare their secret training, the skills they believed they needed, their gear and fueling plans, and the strange challenge of preparing together without being able to tell almost anyone what they were doing.

Their races began together in the lead group before eventually becoming two very different Barkley experiences. Allison recounts fighting to stay with the veterans, descending through leaves and briars, searching for hidden books without GPS and joining a group of eight runners who worked together throughout the day. The group collected pages from all 16 books and completed the loop in more than 17 hours, outside the official cutoff, earning the names “Overtime Eight” and “Elite Eight.”

Jeff and Allison discuss what worked, what they would change, why accessible calories matter on terrain that never gives you a convenient moment to eat, and how teamwork transformed an intimidating race into an unexpectedly joyful experience.

This episode of Free Inside is about the secret Jeff and Allison carried together, the dream they finally shared at Barkley and the two very different experiences that unfolded after the cigarette was lit.

This week on Free Inside, we somehow go from coaching philosophy and running in two left shoes to an ultrarunning history quiz, terrible acting, our biggest pet peeves and figuring out which completely inappropriate companies we should sell out to.

But the real discovery of the episode is Marie Marvingt, one of the most absurdly accomplished athletes and adventurers we've ever heard of. She competed in everything from skiing and cycling to swimming and mountaineering, rode the Tour de France course after being denied entry, became an early pilot, pushed the idea of air ambulances and somehow kept adding careers from there.

Plus: Cliff Young, Western States history, the Barkley Marathons, why running an ultra is really just "going around your elbow to get to your ass," what makes a good coach, and why Allison apparently has very strong feelings about people saying "Tailwinds."

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Janji (code: Freeoutside): https://snp.link/a0bfb726

CS Coffee: CSinstant.coffee

Garage Grown Gear: https://snp.link/db1ba8ab

Subscribe to Substack: http://freeoutside.substack.com

Support this content on patreon: HTTP://patreon.com/freeoutside

Buy my book "Free Outside" on Amazon: https://amzn.to/39LpoSF

Email me to buy a signed copy of my book, "Free Outside" at jeff@freeoutside.com

Watch the movie about setting the record on the Colorado Trail: https://tubitv.com/movies/100019916/free-outside

Website: www.Freeoutside.com

Instagram: thefreeoutside

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#Trailrunning #Runningnews #Outdoors #Outdooradventure

What do a Hall of Fame baseball player who chased fire trucks, mysterious blobs falling from the sky, and a 200-mile ultramarathon hallucination have in common?

Apparently... this episode.

Jeff and Allison bounce between the strangest stories they can find, including the unbelievable life of Rube Waddell, the mystery of Washington's Oakville Blobs, hallucinations during Moab 240, childhood adventures in the woods, camping stories, the Headwaters Relay, hiking the Teton Crest Trail, FKTs, movies, and a whole lot of conversations that somehow make perfect sense.

If you enjoy curious rabbit holes, ultrarunning, the outdoors, and conversations that go completely off the rails, this one's for you.

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Subscribe to Substack: http://freeoutside.substack.com

Support this content on patreon: HTTP://patreon.com/freeoutside

Buy my book "Free Outside" on Amazon: https://amzn.to/39LpoSF

Email me to buy a signed copy of my book, "Free Outside" at jeff@freeoutside.com

Watch the movie about setting the record on the Colorado Trail: https://tubitv.com/movies/100019916/free-outside

Website: www.Freeoutside.com

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#Trailrunning #Runningnews #Outdoors #Outdooradventure

What starts as a conversation about whether we'd ever run Badwater quickly turns into designing some of the most ridiculous endurance events imaginable.

This week on Free Inside, we debate extreme ultramarathons, Allison's lifelong dream of swimming the English Channel, why long-distance swimming might be the world's worst spectator sport, and how we would completely redesign track and field if anyone were foolish enough to let us.

Along the way we cover:

• Badwater 135, Arrowhead 135, and other extreme endurance races
• Open-water swimming, the English Channel, and Alcatraz swims
• The Travis Walton "Fire in the Sky" UFO mystery
• The best and worst spectator sports
• Why ultramarathons should include puzzles and escape rooms
• How we'd fix track and field with chaos, fire, glow-in-the-dark skeleton suits, and moving walkways
• Strange race ideas we'd actually love to see
• Why endurance sports don't always have to take themselves so seriously

Whether you're into ultrarunning, trail running, hiking, endurance sports, triathlons, backpacking, outdoor adventure, or just enjoy two people turning normal conversations into increasingly absurd rabbit holes, there's something here for you.

If you've ever wondered what happens when two endurance athletes are left alone with microphones for too long, this episode is your answer. Expect laughs, weird stories, questionable race design, and the kind of conversations that somehow start with Badwater and end with aliens, puzzles, and glow-in-the-dark runners.

One topic somehow became ten. We discuss world records, NASCAR, weird sports, celebrity shoe sponsors, bad haircuts, trail running, and one of the wildest survival stories we've ever heard. If you've ever wondered what a normal conversation between us sounds like, this is probably it.

Support our Sponsors:

Sawyer: https://sawyerdirect.net/

Janji (code: Freeoutside): https://snp.link/a0bfb726

CS Coffee: CSinstant.coffee

Garage Grown Gear: https://snp.link/db1ba8ab

Subscribe to Substack: http://freeoutside.substack.com

Support this content on patreon: HTTP://patreon.com/freeoutside

Buy my book "Free Outside" on Amazon: https://amzn.to/39LpoSF

Email me to buy a signed copy of my book, "Free Outside" at jeff@freeoutside.com

Watch the movie about setting the record on the Colorado Trail: https://tubitv.com/movies/100019916/free-outside

Website: www.Freeoutside.com

Instagram: thefreeoutside

facebook: www.facebook.com/freeoutside

#Trailrunning #Runningnews #Outdoors #Outdooradventure

Welcome to the very first episode of Free Inside.

This is our new weekly show where we sit down with no guests, no script, and no real agenda—just whatever we've been thinking about, experiencing, or laughing about that week.

In our first episode, we introduce ourselves, recap Allison's fixed-time race win and immediate decision to sign up for a 200-miler, talk about why fixed-time races deserve more love, share recent bear encounters and European adventures, answer some very questionable soccer questions, and somehow end up debating what Jeff should wear to our wedding.

Maybe the show will become reading reddit comments or Allison teaching us math, but either way, it should be fun