Hiking The Pacific Crest Trail: Mile 395 – Day 24 - Colin Arisman

Note: The Pacific Crest Trail is a 2650-mile wilderness pathway that stretches from the Mexican to the Canadian border across California, Oregon and Washington. Colin Arisman, a 23-year old Vermonter, is thru-hiking the trail and will be posting updates on Muscles Not Motors as he makes his way northward.

On April 18th I began thru-hiking the Pacific Crest Trail with Casey Gannon, a life-long friend and fellow Montpelier native. At 5:30 in the morning we arrived at the door of a hiker from San Diego who had thru-hiked the PCT in 2009 and now provides rides to the trail…

Catching up with Liz Stephen, Off-Snow - Carrie Baker

Carrie Baker, one of our in-house Spokes at Muscles Not Motors, sat down with Olympian, cross-country skier and MNM Spoke Liz Stephen to talk about her rockin’ ski season that just ended in April. During Liz's short visit home to Vermont, they enjoyed some spicy Thai food on a sunny day – a nice contrast to Liz’s winter on snow. MNM: Liz, welcome home for a short break before you start up your season again! We followed you and the entire U.S. team this season and it seemed like a home run – can…

Practicing Mindfulness While Climbing - Tina Centofante

As a mountain biker, I live for the adrenaline rush of going downhill. There’s just something about finding the flow of the trail, gliding past the trees, and feeling my bike absorb obstacles while my body moves to find balance. This creates a certain sensation that I basically need on a daily basis. But in order to go down, I need to climb up some sort of hill first. And sometimes it’s hard to find a “flow” while slowly grinding up a long hill, whether it’s techy singletrack, muddy logging roads,…

Preparing for Belgium’s Road Furniture - Andrew McCullough

I’m sitting at the airport terminal in Burlington, Vermont, somewhat in a daze and trying to collect my thoughts. My next stretch of the season is taking me to Oudenaarde, Belgium, an area that is known for bike racing. That’s what I hear at least; I’ve never been there before and honestly have no idea what to expect.

The anticipation has been building for some time, but the past few days have been particularly anxiety-driven. I've spent a lot of time abroad before, primarily in Italy where I studied and…

My Saturday Unplugged - Dan Mahoney

As we are all still trying to digest the horrific atrocities that occurred at the Boston Marathon this year, I wanted to share an experience I had just two days before this all occurred. I decided to give back and get some extra credit in the good karma bank by volunteering for bike patrol for the RunVermont Half Marathon Unplugged.

The Unplugged is a training race for a lot of runners for the Keybank Vermont City Marathon. It starts in Airport Park in Colchester and snakes through a few neighborhoods and cul-de-sacs before entering the Island Line…