Back of the Pack Podcast

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we open Season 5 with the full story of Garmin Kansas City Marathon weekend and a race experience unlike any Kyle has had before. After two packed days at the Union Station expo meeting runners from around the country, race morning arrived with nearly perfect fall weather and one very specific assignment: serve as the official sweeper for the full marathon. Instead of chasing a personal time, the goal was simple: stay behind the final marathoners, keep an eye on every blue bib, and help as many runners as possible make it...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, we continue our Nobody Tells You This series with a lesson runners usually discover only after enough finish lines: our fastest race and our best race are not always the same thing. We dig into why finish time tells only part of the story and why smart pacing, adapting to conditions, overcoming problems, fueling well, and simply executing the day we were given can sometimes matter more than a PR. From brutal weather and difficult courses to comeback races and days when Plan A disappears almost immediately, a slower...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are catching up on a busy couple of weeks with the Oktoberfest 10K, the Run for Paws 5K, and a very different kind of endurance adventure at the Octoginta Bike Ride. Kyle starts by wrapping up the Heartland 30K Series with one of his strongest 10K performances in quite a while, finishing Oktoberfest with his fourth-fastest 10K time ever and, more importantly, a run that simply felt good. From there, it is on to the Run for Paws 5K, where a race that looked small on paper suddenly exploded in...

In this week’s Second Wind, we continue our Nobody Tells You This series with a lesson every runner eventually learns: the race may officially begin at the starting line, but our race-day experience starts several days earlier. We talk about why the final 48 to 72 hours are not the time to squeeze in more fitness, but instead to protect the training we have already built through recovery, preparation, and a little good old-fashioned restraint. From banking sleep and staying consistently hydrated to eating familiar foods and avoiding the legendary pre-race carb-loading feast that leaves our stomach waving a white flag, th...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, Eric Fritz and Rhonda Hayden return to the show as we officially begin the countdown to December’s Rocket City Marathon in Huntsville, Alabama. With race weekend now just a couple of months away, registrations are climbing, the course is locked in, volunteers are being recruited, and preparations are underway for what could become the biggest Rocket City Marathon weekend yet. We get an inside look at an expanded expo featuring new Rocket City merchandise, Podcast Alley, interactive vendors, and even a little vendor bingo before turning our attention to what ru...

We’re kicking off our October Second Wind series, Nobody Tells You This, with one of the most frustrating truths in running: fitness does not improve in a perfectly straight line. We talk about why one bad run, ugly race, or sluggish week does not automatically mean all our training has disappeared, because fitness and that day’s performance are not the same thing. We break down the other pieces that can affect what shows up on race day, including fatigue, sleep, weather, stress, nutrition, travel, course conditions, and plain old day-to-day variation. We also look at why training can temp...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we start with a few updates from around the World Marathon Majors before getting to the race that was supposed to happen but never did. Kyle was scheduled to run the St. Joseph Half Marathon, but cold and flu symptoms made the decision for him and resulted in the dreaded DNS: Did Not Start. That missed start line becomes the jumping-off point for an honest conversation about one of the questions runners are notoriously bad at answering: When are you actually too sick to run? We break down the difference between...

In this week’s Second Wind, we wrap up The Ultra Curious by finally asking the question all this September learning has been building toward: if we’re actually going to try an ultramarathon, how do we choose the right one? We look at why distance alone tells us almost nothing about the true difficulty of an ultra, and why terrain, elevation, course format, weather, cutoffs, and aid-station support can completely change the experience. We break down the jump from marathon to 50K, 50 miles, 100K, and beyond, while making the case that a first ultra does not need to be a su...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are recapping a two-race weekend with the Kansas City Zoo Run 4 Miler and the Woodstock 10K. The Zoo Run brought nearly 90-degree heat, narrow zoo paths, plenty of congestion, and a unique course through one of Kansas City’s most recognizable attractions. The next morning, Woodstock delivered cooler temperatures but a 68-degree dew point and 93% humidity, proving once again that “cooler” does not always mean “comfortable.” Both races were well organized, both had plenty to like, and both left Kyle disappointed with his own performance. So after the race reviews, we turn to...

In this week’s Second Wind, we continue The Ultra Curious by tackling one of the biggest mindset shifts road runners face when stepping into the ultramarathon world: sometimes the smartest way to go farther is to slow down sooner. We explore why ultra pacing is less about chasing a specific number on the watch and more about managing an “effort budget” that has to last for hours. From power hiking hills to resisting the urge to chase other runners, we look at how restraint early can preserve the legs, stomach, hydration, and mental energy we will desperately want later. We als...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are back to a more normal race-review rhythm after Sydney, with one race from Hawaii, one race from Kansas City, and one very big milestone to unpack. First up is the Old Pali Road 5K on Oahu, a race that sounded like a fun Hawaiian bonus run until calendar chaos, time-zone weirdness, and a surprise 6:30 a.m. start turned it into a scramble before the first step. Kyle arrived late, missed the official start, chased the course on his own, climbed nearly 700 feet in the first half, passed 30 people, and...

In this week’s Second Wind, we continue The Ultra Curious by asking what really changes when everyday road runners start looking beyond 26.2 miles and toward the ultramarathon world. We break down why a 50K is more than simply “a marathon plus five miles,” and how pace, terrain, elevation, and time on feet can completely change the way we approach the day. We talk about learning to view walking as strategy instead of failure, loosening our obsession with mile splits, and understanding that sustainable effort matters far more than chasing traditional road-race pace. We also dive into the very different world...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are back from Australia and finally diving into the big review of the 2026 TCS Sydney Marathon. Kyle opens the episode running on jet lag, very little sleep, and the aftermath of a trip where nearly everything that could go wrong did, including a travel nightmare that turned the road to Sydney into its own endurance event. After delays, missed connections, an unexpected 24-hour layover in Vancouver, baggage issues, and arriving in Sydney just 24 hours before the marathon, the race weekend started with a missed 5K and a rushed trip through...

We’re kicking off a brand-new Second Wind series called The Ultra Curious, where we start exploring what happens when everyday road runners begin looking beyond 26.2 miles and into the strange, fascinating world of ultrarunning. For our first stop, longtime friend of the show and frequent guest host Karin Velez of the award-winning Just Grow Something podcast takes over the mic while we’re still traveling after the Sydney Marathon. Karin is usually the one bringing the science, but this time she is digging into the history behind one of ultrarunning’s most recognizable traditions: the finisher belt buckle. Why do so...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, Kyle is off in Sydney, Australia chasing another World Marathon Major, so we are turning the microphone over to guest host Sierra Morris from The Run, Shattered Podcast. Sierra, also known as ShatteredRunner, brings her focus on mental skills, resilience, and the psychological side of running to a topic every runner needs: confidence. This episode dives into how confidence is built, why it matters in training, and how runners can strengthen their mindset before they ever reach the start line. Sierra explores the mental tools marathoners and ultramarathoners use to stay...

With race weekend finally here, The Final Stretch comes to a close from Sydney, Australia, just two days before the TCS Sydney Marathon. At this point, there is no more fitness to build, no more missed workouts to chase, and no more cramming left to do, which means readiness has officially stopped being a question and become a decision. We talk about the last things we can still control, from hydration, nutrition, rest, and race-week logistics to making sure a Saturday 5K does not become an accidental dress rehearsal for disaster. We also tackle jet lag, unpredictable weather, race-day nerves...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are recording the final episode from the United States before the podcast heads across the world for Sydney Marathon Week. Before the passport panic takes over, Kyle recaps the Head for the Cure 5K in Overland Park, a massive Kansas City-area event supporting brain cancer awareness, research, and families impacted by the disease. From there, we turn the spotlight to the TCS Sydney Marathon presented by ASICS, breaking down the race, the history, the course, the logistics, and why this new World Marathon Major matters. We talk about Sydney’s Ol...

With the TCS Sydney Marathon now just nine days away, **The Final Stretch** reaches the point where the heavy training is finished and the challenge becomes learning to **Trust What You Built**. At this stage, there is very little we can do physically to dramatically change race-day fitness, but there is still plenty our brains can do to completely sabotage it. We dig into taper brain, the strange urge to question everything we have done, and why one ugly workout or bad race somehow gets more attention than weeks of solid work. Instead of replaying the blooper reel, we look...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are recapping a packed mid-August weekend with two charity races, one major run club push, and Sydney now less than two weeks away. We start with a quick heads-up that the 2027 Tokyo Marathon lottery is open, along with a reminder that Tokyo is incredible, but not exactly built for back-of-the-pack comfort. From there, we head to Lawrence, Kansas for the Rexy Run 5K & 10K, where the podcast community showed up strong for Baby Jay’s Legacy of Hope and the new 10K course brought hills, wetlands, heat, volunteers, and one ve...

With the TCS Sydney Marathon now just two weeks away, The Final Stretch continues with a question every nervous marathoner eventually asks: can we make up for lost training at the last minute? This week, we tackle the urge to cram for a marathon, from missed long runs and shortened workouts to those summer races that suddenly start looking like evidence that everything has gone wrong. We dig into why panic training can create more problems than it solves, especially when the body should be shifting toward recovery instead of punishment. But this is not quite a black-and-white conversation, because...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are celebrating a major milestone: 300 episodes of race reviews, community stories, road trips, charity conversations, bad decisions, emotional moments, and back-of-the-pack chaos. Technically, this is Episode 299, but with Episode 300 dropping Friday, we are taking this Monday episode to pause, look around, and talk about what this podcast has become since it started as a simple “I make the mistakes so you don’t have to” running show. We look back at the race reviews that became the bread and butter of the show, the community organizations and race directors who gave u...

With the TCS Sydney Marathon just three weeks away, we are officially entering The Final Stretch and asking one deceptively simple question: what does being “ready” actually mean? Most runners expect readiness to feel like confidence, control, and unstoppable momentum, but marathon preparation usually arrives wearing fatigue, uncertainty, random aches, and a suspiciously bad attitude. In this episode, we look beyond one missed workout, one rough long run, or one ugly summer pace to examine the full body of work behind race-day preparation. We discuss why nervousness is not proof that we are unprepared and why experience often makes us more...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are catching up on a busy stretch of running, volunteering, night racing, and hot-weather half marathon chaos. We start at the Matt Mason Cowboy Up Triathlon at Smithville Lake, where Kyle traded in his race bib for a volunteer shirt and got a firsthand reminder of just how much work it takes to keep athletes moving safely through swim, bike, and run events. After surviving GPS confusion, a packed race morning, and a blazing-hot aid station shift, the episode shifts to the other side of the table and why every...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, we wrap up our July Why Are We Like This? series with Volunteering for the Chaos. After spending the month talking about the wonderfully strange things runners and endurance athletes do, we finish by looking at the people who help make race day happen. This episode takes us to the Matt Mason Cowboy Up Triathlon, where volunteering at an aid station turned into a front-row seat to heat, hydration, grit, gratitude, confusion, and full-on endurance chaos. We talk about what it is like to be on the other side...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are joined by longtime friends of the show for one of our favorite annual conversations: The 2026 Rexy Run Preview. The Rexy Run 5K & 10K is coming up on August 15, 2026, in Lawrence, Kansas, and this race continues to be one of the most meaningful events on our calendar. Race director Kristina, Erica from Baby Jay’s Legacy of Hope, and Colby, the mother of this year’s Honorary Rexy, join us to talk about the race, the mission, and the family at the heart of this year’s event. Rexy Run benefi...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, our July series Why Are We Like This? continues with a topic every runner eventually meets: FOMO, the fear of missing out. Runners and endurance athletes love filling the calendar with races, run clubs, team events, traditions, medals, group photos, and shared suffering, but sooner or later, life gets in the way. Whether it is a scheduling conflict, family responsibility, injury, illness, weather, travel, burnout, or simply needing rest, sometimes we do not make it to the start line. This episode digs into the emotional weirdness of a DNS...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, Kyle calls an audible from the planned episode to mark a milestone that changed the entire direction of his life: the ten-year anniversary of his first open-heart surgery. For longtime listeners, this is a story that has been referenced many times, but for newer members of the Back of the Pack community, this may be the first time hearing how a heart condition, a failed valve, and two surgeries became part of the foundation for everything that came after. Kyle looks back on the dreams that changed, the warning signs that...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, our July series Why Are We Like This? continues with a look at the social side of endurance sports. Runners and endurance athletes bond over some very strange things: hills, heat, porta-potties, chafing, finish lines, race medals, bad decisions, and the phrase “never again” even though we are absolutely going to do it again. This episode dives into how shared suffering can create fast friendships, whether it happens during a rough race, on a brutal hill, at mile 10 of a half marathon, or through the shared heartbreak and celebration of s...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we recap one of the hardest and strangest endurance weekends of the year: the Argo Half Marathon and Kyle’s first official bike race, Lizard Under the Skillet. First up is Argo, the infamous “finishers only” half marathon on Argo Road, where the hills are rude, the sun is merciless, and the shirt at the end is earned the hard way. With a 9:00 a.m. July start, full sun, 60% humidity, a dew point of 71, and a finishing heat index of 102 degrees, this year’s Argo was even nastier than expected. Kyle walks th...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, our July series Why Are We Like This? continues with a look at the endurance decisions that sound terrible on paper but somehow end up on our calendars anyway. With the Argo Half Marathon and its 2,900 feet of elevation waiting on Saturday, followed by the Lizard Under the Skillet 31-mile bike race and an Evanescence concert on Sunday, this episode asks why runners, cyclists, and endurance people keep signing up for things that sound more like warnings than weekend plans. We talk about why hard courses tempt us, why...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we recap a busy Fourth of July weekend full of fireworks, frantic huskies, Patreon gratitude, race reviews, and questionable scheduling decisions. Kyle starts by thanking new Patreon supporters and talking honestly about how listener support, social media interaction, and community engagement help keep the podcast moving forward. From there, we head to Clinton, Missouri for the Old Glory Days 5K, a small-town Friday night race attached to a much bigger Fourth of July festival full of carnival rides, food, music, fireworks, and classic small-town America energy. The course may have ended...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, we kick off our July series, Why Are We Like This?, by asking why runners insist on turning holiday weekends into race weekends. With the Fourth of July upon us, we look at the wonderfully weird tradition of waking up early, dressing in red, white, and blue, charging the Garmin, checking the weather, and voluntarily sweating through a shirt before breakfast. From the Olde Glory Days 5K on July 3rd to Ward Parkway 4 on the Fourth on July 4th, this episode celebrates the strange little joy of patriotic races...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we are catching up on a very busy June with a stack of race reviews, a heat warning, and one massive personal announcement. We start with the big news: Kyle is officially heading to the 2027 London Marathon, which will complete his original World Marathon Majors journey after Chicago, New York, Boston, Berlin, Tokyo, Sydney, and finally London. From there, we dive into the June race review backlog, beginning with the Heroes 4 Hospice 5K in Overland Park, a meaningful race supporting hospice care and one of the few local 5Ks still skipping...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, we wrap up our June Running MythBusters series by taking on the gear, gadgets, gimmicks, and shiny little running trinkets we all love to buy, wear, track, trust, and occasionally blame when the wheels fall off. We talk about the myth that the “right” shoe, watch, supplement, sock, vest, belt, or gadget is what magically makes us better runners. Good gear absolutely matters, especially when it comes to shoes that fit correctly and help keep us healthy, but carbon plates do not come with fitness installed. We also dig into...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we take you with us to the Outpacing Melanoma 5K, where the podcast set up on-site for a morning of racing, conversations, interviews, and community connection. After previously having the race team on the show to talk about the mission behind the event, we had the chance to be there in person, meet the people behind the cause, and hear directly from those impacted by melanoma and skin cancer. Throughout the morning, we spoke with dermatologists, doctors, nurses, survivors, supporters, runners, and families who all brought their own perspective to why...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, our Running MythBusters series continues with a look at race day rules that may need to be retired, or at least loosened up a little. We talk about the classic “nothing new on race day” advice and why it is good guidance, but not a federal law carved into a Garmin screen. From new shoes at Little Rock to mystery fuel at mile 8, gas station burrito chaos, weather adjustments, hats, hydration plans, and Gatorade versus Powerade, this episode reminds us that race day success requires preparation, flexibility, and common sens...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we were supposed to be reviewing the Clinton Historic Half Marathon, but severe storms, lightning, heavy rain, and flooding had other plans. After the half marathon was cancelled on race morning, we turned a missing race review into a much-needed conversation about runners, weather, and knowing when toughness crosses the line into bad decision-making. We talk about the difference between uncomfortable weather and dangerous weather, because a little rain is one thing, but thunder, lightning, flooding, tornado warnings, and falling tree limbs are a whole different beast. From there, we dig...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, our Running MythBusters series continues as we take on the training lies runners keep believing. With summer training heating up and fall marathon cycles getting underway, we break down the idea that more suffering automatically means better training. This episode tackles myths like “more miles always means better,” “rest days are weakness,” “no pain, no gain,” “every run needs a purpose,” “the watch is always right,” and “walking ruins the workout.” We talk about why mileage only helps if our bodies can recover from it, why rest is where training actually cashes...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast, we head south to learn all about the Rocket City Marathon Weekend coming up this December in Huntsville, Alabama. We are joined by Eric Fritz and Rhonda Hayden from the Rocket City Marathon team to talk about the history of the race, the growth of Huntsville, and why this 50th running is shaping up to be something special. We dig into what makes Rocket City such a strong destination race, from its mid-sized field and downtown host hotels to the rare indoor finish at the Von Braun Center, complete with food...

This week on The Back of the Pack Podcast: Second Wind, we kick off our June series, Running MythBusters, by taking on one of the oldest and most ridiculous myths in the sport: the idea that there is a magical checklist we have to complete before we can call ourselves “real runners.” We break down the nonsense that says real runners have to be fast, never walk, look a certain way, run long distances, race every weekend, or love every single mile. Spoiler alert: myth busted. Whether we run, walk-run, race 5Ks, chase marathons, train on our own, or simply lace...