Outside Podcast

On the new History Channel show Kings of Pain, Rob “Caveman” Alleva and cohost Adam Thorn get bit and stung by the nastiest insects, reptiles, and fish on the planet—on purpose. They’re following in the footsteps of entomologist Justin O. Schmidt, whoOutside profiled back in the nineties while he was developing the first-of-its-kind pain scale for stinging insects. But for the TV show, Alleva and Thorn are pushing this brand of experimentation even further by subjecting themselves to the agony-inducing defense mechanisms of snakes, fish, and lizards, with sometimes horrifying results. Outside* *Podcast host Peter Frick-Wright wanted to know: What’s it like to be in so much pain, so often? And why were they willing to take this job?

Author Richard Louv is best known as the author of Last Child in the Woods, his 2005 bestseller that established the phrase nature-deficit disorder and helped spark an international movement to examine the health benefits of spending time outdoors. His ideas were initially seen as radical—recall that in 2005, the iPhone didn’t exist yet—but today they’re ubiquitous. Now Louv is back with a new book, Our Wild Calling, that presents more radical ideas, this time about the need for humans to rekindle our relationships with other species. Outside editor Christopher Keyes spoke with Louv about the basis for his theories and why even the most serious scientists get that something special happens when we engage with wild creatures.

In our last episode, Peter Frick-Wright told the story of the time he broke his leg at the bottom of a remote canyon and was saved through the efforts of multiple search and rescue teams. Now, more than two years later, Peter is still processing what happened to him. Meanwhile, the rescuers who cared for him have participated in numerous other high-stakes incidents in the wilderness. This week, Peter speaks with one of the people who hauled him out of the canyon about the coping strategies that have worked—and haven’t—in the aftermath of a life-altering trauma. This episode was produced for the podcast Rescuer MBS, a show that aims to increase the resilience of the volunteer search and rescue community.

About two years ago, Outside Podcast host Peter Frick-Wright was canyoneering in Oregon when he jumped off a ledge and broke his leg. He was stuck at the bottom of a canyon, and it took an epic effort by search and rescue teams to get him out of there. The experience was rough on Peter and rough on the many volunteers involved with transporting him safely to a hospital. Many of them had to go right back to work the next day. This week we’re going to replay our 2017 episode about the accident to set the stage for an upcoming conversation between Peter and one of his rescuers about a part of the healing process most people don’t talk about.

Recent years have seen a surge in adult-recess leagues across the United States. By some estimates, there are now 1.6 million grown-ups participating in these leagues across the country, and they’re only growing more popular. Today’s adults are seemingly desperate for more playtime—and so we’re eagerly bounding outside after work for all kinds of kid-style activities, from kickball and flag football to capture the flag and cornhole. But it’s not all fun and games: some of the leagues are highly competitive, with team names, uniforms, and strict scheduling. To find out what’s really going on, reporter Mimi Montgomery and producer Alex Ward visit rec fields in Washington, D.C., and Portland, Oregon, to observe grown-ups at play.

No one has had a greater influence on modern recreational running than writer Christopher McDougall. His 2009 book Born to Run introduced the masses to barefoot running and became a revolutionary bestseller. As a result, the multibillion-dollar running-shoe industry went through a dramatic upheaval, and today runners have a broad range of shoe types to consider, from minimalist slippers to ultra-cushy maximalist fatties. Now McDougall is back with a new book that chronicles his work training a sickly donkey to be an endurance athlete (no, seriously). Titled Running with Sherman, it tells the story of an unexpected journey that was really good for the donkey—but also for McDougall. Outside editor Christopher Keyes spoke with McDougall about this surprising turn of events and whether it means the rest of us should be running with animals, too.

At midlife, food writer Jeff Gordinier felt like he was sleepwalking. His marriage was crumbling, and he’d lost his professional purpose. Then he got a curious invitation: René Redzepi, the superstar head chef and co-owner of Noma, in Copenhagen, one of the world’s most influential restaurants, asked Gordinier to join him on a quest to Mexico to find exceptional tacos. Thus began a yearslong series of global adventures—foraging for sandpaper figs in Australia, diving for shellfish in the Arctic, seeking cochinita pibil in a remote part of the Yucatan—that reawakened Gordinier passion for both life and food. In his book Hungry, Gordinier describes how Redzepi’s raw energy and philosophy of constantly moving forward were an intoxicant as well as a kind of medication. For this episode, Outside’s Michael Roberts spoke with Gordinier about the wildest moments along his journeys with Redzepi and his new habit of saying yes to just about everything.

The odds of getting seriously injured by a bear in North America are slim. There are just a few dozen bear attacks on the continent every year, and only a handful of them put someone in the hospital. But bear-human encounters are on the rise, in part because more people than ever before are heading out into bear country. This year in particular there have been a lot of stories of people fighting off attacks in dramatic ways, including that guy in British Columbia who ended up killing a black bear with a hatchet. But Colin Dowler has the most incredible story of them all, and his tale offers potentially lifesaving lessons for anyone venturing into the wild.

Recent months have seen a media frenzy around the return of great white sharks to the waters surrounding Cape Cod. And with good reason: over the summer, great whites were routinely spotted off the iconic vacation destination’s most popular beaches. In 2018, a Cape boogie boarder died after being bitten by a shark—the first fatal attack in Massachusetts since 1936. But behind the headlines about freaked-out tourists and angry locals, the real story on the Cape is about how we learn to live with fear—or, just maybe, get past it. Produced in collaboration with our friends at the Outside/In podcast, this episode investigates the extreme reactions we have to living alongside one of the world’s most terrifying predators.  

The 2018 Carr Fire was one of the worst wildfires in California history. By the time it was contained, it had burned 359 square miles, destroyed close to 2,000 buildings, and killed seven people. It also spawned a massive fire tornado—only the second ever recorded. Meteorologists examining the damage afterward estimated that the vortex had generated winds of up to 165 miles per hour. When a blaze like that is coming your way, the only sane thing to do is run for your life. But Gary and Lori Lyon did the opposite, staying to defend their home. Outside contributor Stephanie Joyce has the story on why, in an era of increasingly intense fires, someone would dare to stand and fight an inferno.

In the world of athletics, the idea is that if you want to be the best, you have to specialize young and maintain near laserlike focus. The archetypal example is Tiger Woods, who, as the legend goes, started swinging a golf club before he could walk. More recently the focus has shifted to grit. The secret to success, we’re told, isn’t skill or raw talent but the ability to persevere. But that may not be the whole story. In his new book Range, author David Epstein challenges the arguments for specialization and grit, arguing that a more generalized approach is the surest route to excellence. Outside editor Christopher Keyes spoke with Epstein to about the advantages of doing a bit of everything.

Doug Peacock took an unlikely path to becoming an icon of conservation. Following two tours in the Vietnam War as a Green Beret medic, he sought solace and comfort in the American Wilderness, where he began observing and then filming grizzly bears. He believed the bears saved his life, and he felt compelled to return the favor. Many people know Peacock as the inspiration for George Hayduke, the infamous character inThe Monkey Wrench Gang, the 1975 novel by Ed Abbey. Over the years, Peacock authored a number of books about his journey. At the 2019 Mountainfilm festival, in Telluride, Colorado, he sat down with veteran radio producer Scott Carrier to offer an enlightened perspective on the history of bears in this country, share some hysterical stories about his own encounters with the animals, and give his take on the big challenges that grizzlies face today.

Water is critical to human life. Our bodies are more than 50 percent water. We can survive months barely eating, but even a few days without water and we’ll die. Water flushes toxins out of our organs and cools us down after a workout. But how much do really need? And how much is too much? Lately there’s been a lot of attention on the internet to what’s known as the Water Gallon Challenge: drinking a gallon per day for a month, with the promise of glowing skin and a lot more energy. Outside editor Aleta Burchyski took on this challenge, which for her was all the more daunting because she hates the taste of plain tap water. In this episode, we talk to her about her quest and check in with a leading hydration expert, who explains that we don’t know as much about how water effects our bodies as you might think.

When Mirna Valerio first began running ultramarathons, she immediately got a lot of attention, but not for the reasons you might expect. Because of her body size, she didn’t fit the accepted image of a long-distance runner. Her story isn’t about an average athlete trying to get better. It’s about what happens when people assume that someone can’t possibly be an athlete because of the way she looks—and then how they how they react when she takes on enormous challenges and finds a way to keep going and going. This episode kicks off the second season of the Athletes Unfiltered podcast from Strava.

Earlier this year, Outside contributing editor Rowan Jacobsen wrote a feature that questioned whether our efforts to avoid skin cancer have caused us to develop an unhealthy relationship with the sun and sunscreen. Looking at controversial new research that challenges established guidelines for sun exposure, Jacobsen suggested that more direct sunlight on our unprotected skin might actually be good for our health. The story struck a nerve, becoming the most popular article in the history of Outside’s website and provoking some pretty loud criticisms. Outside Podcast contributor Stephanie Joyce talks to Rowan about his reporting, his response to critics, and whether skipping the SPF 50 is really a good choice.

A large and growing body of research has found that time outdoors makes us happier and healthier, but there’s relatively limited science explaining why. According to findings published last summer in the journal Emotion, a big part of the answer may be awe. Studies conducted by psychologists at the University of California at Berkeley showed that feeling awe during a nature experience has a singular ability to lower stress and improve our overall well-being. Even more compelling, the research suggests that we don’t need to climb a mountain or run a river to get the healing power of awe—the simplest moments outside are all it takes. For this final episode in our Nature Cure series, we talk to the scientist who led the Berkeley study, as well as a man who says awe saved his life.

For the past few years, journalist Leah Sottile has been looking at the question of who owns public lands in the West. Her reporting began with the Bundy family, which infamously challenged the authority of the federal government on its ranch and then with an armed occupation of Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. That investigation resulted in the award-winning audio series Bundyville. Now, Sottile is back with a new project that begins with the case of a man named Glenn Jones, who in the summer of 2016 blew up the house of a friend and former coworker in the tiny town of Panaca, Nevada. To her surprise, she would come to learn that that bombing had roots in the very same conflict that began with the Bundys.

In recent years, a grassroots movement of physicians have begun prescribing time outdoors as the best possible treatment for a growing list of ailments, from anxiety and obesity to attention deficit disorder and high blood pressure. Meanwhile, research institutes for nature and health are opening at major medical centers and a couple bold insurance companies are embracing the idea. For this third episode in our Nature Cure series, we sit down with science writer Aaron Reuben, who reported on this emerging trend for Outside magazine. The question now, he says, is what it will take to convince big health care that free medicine is the way of the future.

A while back, Outside contributor Meaghen Brown noticed a strange phenomenon among the elite ultrarunners that she was training with. Runners would come on the scene, win races and smash records, and then a few years later succumb to a mysterious ailment that left them a shadow of their former selves. Top athletes were suddenly lethargic, depressed, and unable to train, and doctors couldn't tell them why. Their problem, it turned out, was overtraining syndrome, or OTS. One researcher called it "The scariest thing I've seen in my time studying athletes." And it’s not just runners that are at risk. In this episode, we look at how OTS can afflict anyone who takes a more-is-more approach to their sport.

About six years ago, ecologist Chris Morgan was sitting in a doctor’s waiting room when he picked up a copy of Outside and read the cover story, “Take Two Hours of Pine Forest and Call Me in the Morning.” The article, written by Florence Williams, explored the scientific basis for something that Morgan had intuitively felt all his life: being in nature is inherently healing and leaves us feeling more alert, alive, and content. Ever since, he wanted to have his own guided nature experience. For this second installment of our Nature Cure series, Morgan shares a story from his new podcast The Wild, in which he goes forest bathing in the Pacific Northwest, then asks Williams, What happened to me out there?