Show Notes
In this episode of Peaceable and Kind, host Derek Vreeland speaks with Tara Dower, an endurance athlete and ultra runner who recently set the fastest known time (FKT) on the Appalachian Trail. They discuss Tara’s journey as a runner, the challenges she faced during her FKT attempt, the importance of crew support, and the kindness found within the trail community. Tara shares insights on nutrition, mental health, and offers advice for beginners looking to get into trail running.
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Transcript
Narrator: Welcome to Peaceable and Kind, the podcast where we explore the transformation. Each week your host, Derek Vreeland, will delve into the stories, scriptures, and practical steps that help us embody these essential Christian virtues.
Derek Vreeland: Welcome back to another episode of Peaceable and Kind. I am your host. Derek Vreeland, and I’m glad that you have joined me for this episode. We’re going to have a great conversation today. But before I jump into introducing my conversation partner, I would love to have you subscribe. If you haven’t subscribed already, and if you are enjoying the kind of content that we’re creating here at Peaceable and Kind. Would you consider sharing a previous episode with a friend? Or maybe if you get a lot out of this episode, if you’d like to share that, I would appreciate it. And today I have a conversation that I know you are going to love, but it’s something a little different. In addition to my passions as a pastor, a Bible teacher, an author, I absolutely love the outdoors. For over 15, 16 years now, I’ve been an advid runner. I always tell people that I’m not a fast runner, but I am a consistent runner. It has become a part of my life Uh it’s a part of not just my physical well-being, but for my own mental health. I have to get at least three runs in a week. And I love running outside. I have a treadmill and so here, if it gets icy and snowy, I might be forced inside, but I love running in part because it gets me outside. And so I’ve been a runner for a number of years, and I’ve also loved hiking and backpacking. And since 2012, I have had a fascination with the Appalachian Trail. Way back in 2014, 10 years ago, my brother and I and a mutual friend, we hiked the Georgia section of the Appalachian Trail. And since then, I’ve done short hikes in Virginia and New Jersey. I’ve done a little short hike in Pennsylvania. And today I have a conversation with someone from that world My guest today is Tara Dower. Tara is an endurance athlete, an ultra-runner, long-distance hiker, and YouTuber. I am one of her nearly 34,000 subscribers on her channel Teratrex. She has completed and won multiple hundred-mile races. She completed a through hike of the Appalachian Trail in 2019. Which is documented on her YouTube channel. I watched that. She also holds the FKT, which stands for Fastest Known Time on Multiple Trails. And on September 21st, 2024, she set the overall supported FKT. on the Appalachian Trail, completing 2197. 4 miles of that trail and check it 40 days, 18 hours, and 6 minutes. She has posted clips from her 41-day journey on her YouTube channel. I find her interesting and inspiring, and I’m thrilled that she has joined me today. Tara, welcome to Peaceable and Kind
Tara Dower: Yeah, thanks for having me.
Derek Vreeland: It’s so good to meet you virtually uh face to face after watching you so many years. At the time of this recording, we are about three months post-FKT. So how are you feeling these days?
Tara Dower: Yeah, I’m feeling pretty good. I’m actually feeling really, really good. It took a little bit to feel okay. Um, I was feeling really tired. I was eating a lot. I had a lot of brain fog for a while and it was It was getting pretty tough to like not be outside not to be running every day um when I finished and it was also like dealing with the the aftermath of finishing such a incredible FKT, uh, thanks to my crew. Like, I mean there was a lot of response, there’s a lot of media and just like Adjusting my life to that was new. Coming off the trail and being completely isolated than to be completely on display for everybody was new. Um
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, I imagine so many of us in the kind of media world interested in the outdoors and running and and and backpacking and all that were probably just all reaching out to you. Uh wanting wanting to have a conversation.
Tara Dower: Yeah, and I think that’s that’s really exciting. Um, but I think it just like took a little getting used to. But I’ve pretty much felt I’ve never felt better recently. Like I’ve been training really hard. I’m getting ready to run Black Canyon 100K in February and been training really hard for that and I just ran a fifty K yesterday and set a course record on this route and was second overall and PR’d my 50K. So I still feel pretty good three months removed. I was quite surprised that I did so well. Happy, happy, but surprised.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, I caught a number of your interviews um after FKT and you talked about the brain fog and I can only imagine that You you’re in this routine uh for 40 plus days and you were averaging anywhere from what was it, maybe forty-five to sixty-five miles per day?
Tara Dower: Uh it came out to fifty-four miles a day. Yeah.
Derek Vreeland: And so how early were you starting um in the morning to get that many miles in in one day?
Tara Dower: Yeah, I would start at three I would wake up at three AM and begin my days at three thirty PM or AM, not PM Um, and then go pretty much the whole day until around like eight thirty, anywhere from like eight thirty to ten PM I would be moving. So it was on average about seventeen and a half hours a day
Derek Vreeland: That is that is absolutely uh insane. But I think doing something like that and then setting the overall record I can see why uh your your world’s probably blowing up a little bit. And by the way, congrats on signing the new deal with Ultra. That’s awesome.
Tara Dower: Thank you. I appreciate that.
Derek Vreeland: That’s wonderful. Well, I’m imagining a lot of uh my listeners are just new to the AT in general. Mm-hmm. So the Appalachian Trail, this continuous footpath from Georgia to Maine, or Maine to Georgia, almost 2200 miles. And you can start northbound, start in Georgia and hike north, or you can start in Maine, hike south. And I think your 2019 through hike, you were a northbound hiker, is that correct?
Tara Dower: Yep. I started in Georgia and went to Maine.
Derek Vreeland: So with your FKT you started though in Maine and hiked ran south, what uh what went into making that decision to go southbound?
Tara Dower: Yeah, I mean part of it was just wanting to see the trail in a different direction. I had already gone northbound, so I wanted to see it going southbound. And I also knew like anxiety wise and my motivation um my motivations would be conducive to going southbound because I would be getting the hardest part of the trail done with sooner. So getting Southern Maine, New Hampshire done uh soon would be nice. I could kind of, you know, if things went haywire, which they did during those sections, I could kind of make up time, but if you’re going northbound and you get, you know, into a sticky situation, the whites, um, and you’re kind of pushed back, like there’s not a lot of room once you finish Southern Maine to like make up time. So I just knew like for my personal motivations and anxiety I’d feel better getting The hardest part done with first.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, that makes sense. I I follow vloggers on the AT every hiking season. And mostly northbound hikers. Every once in a while I’ll kind of latch on to a southbound hiker. And I’ve been doing this probably ten years or so because YouTube’s really taken off now. Oh yeah. But I’ve I’ve noticed for northbound vloggers Their vlogs get shorter and shorter the further north they get. Um, in part because I think their bodies are just worn out and they’re just too tired to to film and record. And uh so yeah, I wondered if you were thinking maybe the harder section, southern Maine, into the whites knock that out first. That makes a lot of sense.
Tara Dower: Yeah, absolutely. That was definitely the the main motivator to going southbound.
Derek Vreeland: And the White Mountains are notoriously brutal. Um for local hikers, section hikers, uh through hikers going north or southbound. And I appreciated that when you when you wrapped up your FKT You were posting um clips uh nearly every day, I believe, of your FKT experience, and you were pretty vulnerable that the whites were were were pretty tough. So take us back to those rainy days in the White Mountains. What was that experience like?
Tara Dower: Yeah. Well, I mean, looking back at the entire FKT, we got extremely lucky with the weather. except for the whites in southern Maine. It was kind of wild that the section that you don’t want to have the like bad weather for we got it. you know, right when we didn’t need it. I I think it was like six days where I hadn’t seen the sun and I think I saw it for like four minutes for one day when I was going over Franconian notch. And those rocks, once they get wet, they get slick and it’s hard to keep a consistent pace on those rocks once they’re wet. They’ve got um you know, stuff growing on ‘em so it makes it slippery. And if you’ve ever hiked in especially New Hampshire, but like anywhere in the northeast, it’s these big boulders you’re navigating over and It’s hard to just hike, but you know, to then h be on like a a schedule and uh trying to set a speed record and it’s wet and it’s hard to navigate, it just gets gets difficult. Uh so I fell a lot. I had I had a pretty tough time in New Hampshire and also like I think a lot of people struggle with this, but like the seasonal depression where it’s like, you know, if it’s rainy for day after day after day, it’s like you don’t feel I I don’t want to speak for everyone, but I don’t feel like my best self. I don’t feel overly happy. Like it’s dreary and it’s sad and you know it gets to you. And especially in these first like the first two weeks of an FKT. It’s um that adaptation time. So a lot of times you are struggling to I mean, your body’s just adapting, so it’s struggling. Um having n southern Maine, New Hampshire in the first two weeks with it being rainy and slick, it just is the perfect storm. It was difficult, it was hard, it was the hardest part of the trail. And Rascal often says that She watched me become a shell of a person.
Derek Vreeland: Oh man. I can only imagine. But I totally agree with the the sun. Seasonal depression is a real thing. So I’m I’m here in the Midwest and we have some dreary winters And there might be some personality types that like that, but uh it’s for me and my wife, we we need the son like I understand why ancient cultures worship the sun, because if I go a couple of days without sunlight, I’m not myself. Oh, absolutely. Well, you so you mentioned Rascal and uh she uh w led your crew. Talk to me a little bit about the role, because again, some people don’t understand the entire process of not just ultra running. But then doing a speed record like this, it’s not just you out there. This was a supported uh record that you set. So talk to me a little bit about Rascal and your crew and and their role in all of this.
Tara Dower: Yeah. So I mean the crew plays a huge role in this entire FKT. I I often talk about them a lot when I do these interviews because it was a team effort. Truly it was a team effort. My name is the one that comes up when you search like fastest known time on the Appalachian Trail, but I view this as, you know, a team effort, Trump Change is what we called ourselves. And I view this as Trump Change FKT. It’s um a team effort. And I was just another part of that team. So Rascal, for instance, she was the crew chief. She was the one making the decisions. She was you know, the one doing the trail math and making the schedule for the day and she was coordinating. My mom was a crew mom. Uh Amy and Steve, they oftentimes were the cooks and JP was the lead pacer and I was the runner. I was just another COG in this machine. Um and without all of that help I don’t know if it would have been a successful FKT I contacted Rascal about six months before actually starting the FKT and I felt a lot of pressure. I felt like this was all on me. And I was like, I need this to be a team effort. And We kind of switched gears and really started uh viewing this as like a team record and that just took off a lot of pressure for me. And I knew, you know, Rascal and I knew a lot of people who were on this crew. They were competitive and determined and dedicated, so I could trust them. Um and so that just alleviated a lot of stress for me
Derek Vreeland: I think in one of your videos um you you describe how because you would meet your crew at trailheads or campgrounds or road crossings. And I think in one of your videos you said Well, my crew, they they cleaned me up, they fed me, and they put me to bed. Um So they’re like they’re and they were literally because you have video clips, they’re literally feeding you like they’re sticking food in your face, saying, here, eat this How in how I’m just curious, as one who’s trained for half marathons and at least one full marathon, like how did you get enough calories in your body to fuel your body? for for running seventeen hours a day.
Tara Dower: Yeah. I mean that was, you know, not I didn’t have to worry a lot about that. That was Amy’s job and You know, when Amy and Steve left for a little bit, that was Fresh Ground’s job, and then Flipper came in and that was his job. And So it was really it was really one person’s entire job to make sure I was they were counting my calories, they’re making sure I was eating the right things, protein, fat dense objects, and I wasn’t just eating these empty calories Um, and that was just one person’s entire job. So I oftentimes I people just handed me food or put food in my mouth and I would just have to eat it because they were the one keeping track. I was not keeping track of when I needed to eat or what I needed to eat. So I lost a lot of autonomy there and pretty much with my entire body besides when I wanted to use the bathroom Uh which made it very easy on me. I do well with that. And I was just being fed by people and I did have a couple things that I wanted my crew to stick to when I started. I wanted to make sure I was drinking a protein shake. at every road crossing. And that was uh advice thanks to my coach and mentor, uh Carl Meltzer. and he has set a previous record on the trail and uh he gave me an gave me contacts for uh first endurance and they gave me a bunch of ultra gen protein shakes so it’s like 320 calories and a whole bunch of carbs and a lot of BCAAs, a lot of good stuff. So I was getting I was getting a lot of protein, like six to seven times a day I was drinking these really dense protein shakes. So that was one thing I did contribute to like the whole nutrition plan. But Beyond that, it was just the crew making sure I was eating enough calories, fats, proteins, all that good stuff
Derek Vreeland: And that was something you had learned from a previous FKT I heard in an interview when you did Mountain to Sea Trail that you didn’t really pay attention to the nutritional value. uh fueling your body and and it wasn’t the same kind of experience.
Tara Dower: Yeah, absolutely. You got that right. Um yeah, I was basing my nutrition plan off of a through hikers diet And I mean, you know as well as anyone else, you see the diets in through hikers videos, it’s very not a lot of great food. Very empty calories. I mean it’s backpacker food. You can’t keep fresh food out there. Um so I was basing it off of that. So I I really struggled. That was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I don’t remember a lot from that trip. My brain was like scrambled eggs is what I say a lot and that was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. So I learned my lesson. I was like, nutrition is so important. I need to do a lot of research on this. I need to make sure I’m taking this and incredibly seriously and picking a crew that like takes us seriously as well.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, I love that you have um attributed this FKT to your crew, even in your final video that you posted about your FKT when you’re you’re standing on the the summit of Springer and you’re at the finish line and you’ve completed this great thing, you are Thanking the people who were in your crew and you were acknowledging that this wasn’t just your FKT, but it was shared. And I thought that was such a great microcosm for I guess our best selves. I think we are our best selves when we recognize our interdependence, that we need other people in our lives, that we we can’t do everything on our own. We need other people.
Tara Dower: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I I mean I try to do a lot of things on my own and it has worked out, but I just find that When I have a good support system, I feel happier personally, and I feel like I do better in athletic endeavors when I have a good support system.
Derek Vreeland: Yep. Yep. And one of the things about the um hiking community that I have encountered, hiking on the East Coast, hiking out in Colorado, even hiking locally here in the Ozarks in South Missouri. or in Arkansas, which is more regional for me. It just seems like hikers are just some of the best people in the world. I mean, there’s there’s knuckleheads out there, because there’s knuckleheads in the world. But it just seems like people who love trails and they love trail running or backpacking. They just seem to be the best people in the world. Talk to me a little bit just about the kindness of of the trail and trail communities and maybe what you experienced in both your FKT and your through hike.
Tara Dower: Yeah, that’s a great point. That just got me thinking. And I have obviously lived a full life before I was trail running and through hiking. Um, and I obviously had a community, but once I started getting into this through hiking community, like really diving deep into it in twenty I mean I mean I found out about the trail in twenty thirteen, but really started diving into the community around twenty seventeen. When that happened, I honestly truly felt like I I found a solid community that I could connect with. And it wasn’t only connecting with them. It was just like, you know, I had some of the best conversations out there on these trails. And so over time I have accumulated this large network of trail runners and through hikers and hikers um you know on social media but in person as well and so you know by the time I was announcing that I was gonna do this FKT. I announced on social media and to friends, people came wanted to come out and help I mean, it was people were excited to help. It wasn’t like I was, you know, pulling any legs to get people to come out. People were asking, like, how can I come out and help? And people I didn’t know, people I knew really well were coming out. And so you know, rascal. I mean she made a call to like several friends and they just came out and helped. So they’re just like really stoked. A lot of people are just really stoked for this FKT. Um, but I think they’re just stoked to help like another trail runner, another like um through hiker. They’re stoked to like help a fellow a fellow friend. Um it’s a great community. You’re right the through hikers are great down to earth people. Most of the ones that I’ve met are just really good down to earth, even keeled people.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, part of what I’m trying to do with this podcast is just create a lot more peaceableness and kindness in our world. And I just noticed that Both watching on YouTube and then my own hiking experience. Um just this the kindness in these trail communities And I wonder how we can how can we reduplicate that in our in our kind of normal lives? I wonder what we can do to kind of take you know, that kindness of of the trail and spread that to others. I mean speaking of kindness, you had a fundraiser uh that you were um sponsoring during your FKT Girls on the Run. You raised over fifty five thousand dollars. That’s fantastic. And so I’m thinking like things like that. Like, what are other things that we can do to kind of spread kindness in our world?
Tara Dower: I think we in, you know, I’ll say this like society, uh, but like when y you don’t meet people on trail, like we isolate ourselves very well and we We isolate ourselves to the groups that we want to interact with. Um we stay in our cars and we honk our horns when we don’t like something. We go to the drive-thru. We barely talk to anyone. in these interactions, but on trail you’re kind of you’re not forced, but y you feel maybe a little more open to talk and communicate with individuals you wouldn’t normally communicate with. So I think there creates like a little more understanding, you know, more down-to-earth folks. So I think like having conversations with people and not isolating yourself to these communities that you want to like feed into, but like talking more talking to more people. And I’m talking to myself too because I mean I I can get You know, especially on a day like this, like I talked about how it’s cloudy and gloomy and I just want to stay inside. You know, I could go somewhere and have a conversation with a random person. Um, but you know, oftentimes we’re isolating ourselves. So I think just having conversations with diverse groups is important
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, and just getting outside. I think you’re so so true. It’s it’s so true that if we just get out of our little bubbles, because yeah, like in my house, you know, I drive you know, my car into my garage, you know, close the garage door and I’m I’m so isolated. But yeah, when you’re when you’re outdoors with other people who are outdoors, it seems like there’s not a barrier. And those conversations take place a whole lot easier. Um, I was I lived in southwest Georgia for about twelve years and I went back for a wedding and I was flying into the Atlanta airport and I got a really early flight and I checked my schedule and so I rented a car and I drove up to uh Mountain Crossings and just to hike up and down Blood Mountain. Because I had time before I had to get down to South Georgia. And yeah, got up there, actually got a pack of sandwich and went up there to eat lunch at the uh the Blood Mountain shelter. And I was finishing up lunch and then here comes a hiker. And I saw he had an AT hiker tag, but it was the previous year’s tag. And so yeah, he’s just standing around looking. And so I just went up and said, Hey, you a three hiker? Yeah. And then we had this just great conversation on Blood Mountain. And it just seems like in our normal day-to-day life, we maybe feel a little awkward about that. You know? Just walking up to complete strangers and having conversations. But on the trail it seems like it’s a little bit more natural.
Tara Dower: Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I mean when I was just through hiking, I remember we were I was just talking with so many different kinds of people. You know, it it it didn’t m matter what our labels were. We were willing to like have conversations and listen. I I don’t know if that’s just the people I I hope you know, that’s the people I like to surround myself with, but I also like to hope that’s just the community in general. People are like more willing to listen.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah.
Tara Dower: I think that’s an important thing.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, and I think it’s listening like it’s listening without judging, you know, when when we and I’ve experienced that too just in the outdoor kind of community. If we kind of have this common interest and love of the outdoors or trails, but when we encounter each other, we’re not labeling or judging each other. We’re just kind of open. And that kind of openness, I think, creates a lot of kindness. I love that. Love that about the trail community. Let’s get back to your um FKT though. I want to kind of talk about the end. Um, because I love that you were releasing your videos. I think they were, I don’t know, every day, every other day. And I just couldn’t wait for that last video. Uh because I wanted to see how it ended. But In your final push, you covered 129 miles in, I think, 43 hours, if I got the numbers right.
Tara Dower: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Derek Vreeland: And so I just I’m amazed by that because I mean just set aside the physical feat, the physical endurance, but I’m curious about your mindset during that final push. I mean, what’s going through your mind? And then where does that drive, that that kind of mental, emotional drive come from to keep going to the end? Hmm.
Tara Dower: Yeah, I mean I didn’t know if I was gonna get the record or not. Like anything could happen. Something I’ve learned from racing is you never know what’s gonna happen. Like you could break your kneecap. like ten miles before the end and it’s so painful you can’t finish. Like I mean with racing I’ve been passed with a quarter mile quarter mile left in a fifty K race. So like anything could happen and I’m not gonna get to that point where I’m like, I got this in the bag because it’s not over until it’s over. So, I mean my mindset was really just like I was doing a lot of math. I was figuring out what was necessary to get this record, like w how many how many miles per hour did I need to complete? Like what did I need to do to finish in in a certain amount of time? And I was just moving forward, honestly. The the thought when I finished or when I started that push uh the starting of the 43 hours that the mindset was, you know, it’s gonna be really uncomfortable. You’re gonna have like this this two days of discomfort for like a lifetime of comfort. and not that like I’m gonna be comfortable forever, but it’s going you’re if you push and it’s gonna be really uncomfortable, like it’s you’re gonna have essentially like this glory with your crew. And um so I just kept thinking of that, just like be lean into this this state, be uncomfortable and it won’t last forever.
Derek Vreeland: And what was your kind of back to the physical side of it, what was your fatigue pain level at you know, on that on that last day when you’re when you’re approaching Springer. I mean, as compared, could you’ve done hundred-mile races. So compared to that, where was your sort of pain fatigue level?
Tara Dower: Yeah, I was pretty exhausted. Uh there’s a lot of compounding exhaustion. The night before I only got like three to four hours of sleep. I completed the night uh that night before like eleven thirty, woke up at three three three thirty and started the day and only slept for like twenty-three hours or twenty-three minutes um in that last forty-three hours. Uh so I was there was a lot of exhaustion, especially at night. Once it was dark, that was really hard to like s keep going. Um, not keep going. Like I was always gonna keep going, but it was just like physically hard to like keep my eyes open, um and continue. Like there’s a lot of times where I’m dozing off or I’m just like so exhausted I can’t even put another foot in front of the other.
Derek Vreeland: So I was pretty exhausted. I can only imagine. And and you and you took these um ninety second dirt naps. Um I heard you talk about that. Um so Uh did do you I mean do you fall like asleep asleep in ninety seconds and then just wake back up?
Tara Dower: Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes I just needed a reset, so I just close my eyes and would just reset. Um, but oftentimes I did fall asleep fully and I would have dreams, like really quick dreams in these 90 seconds. And oftentimes it was about the pacer who was timing my nap. And them telling me it’s time to wake up. That was a pretty consistent dream that I had where I dreamed that they were telling me to get up and start moving again. And I realized, oh, I’m dreaming. And I try to maximize the remaining seconds of my sleep. But yeah, I mean, it was honestly like you’d be surprised where you can fall asleep when you’re that exhausted.
Derek Vreeland: I bet. I bet. Well then take us to the finish line Springer Mountain. Um it’s late on the 21st of September. You you touch the plaque. What are you feeling in that moment?
Tara Dower: I Honestly was just I was really excited to be done. I mean, I was okay, like physically and mentally. I was like okay. A lot of people ask me what I was thinking. I I think it was just like another part of the journey. Like it was important. It was an important part of the journey, but I think like all of these moments leading up to it, the start You know, memories in between and the finish it’s all part of the journey, so is just another step in the journey
Derek Vreeland: I love it. I love it. Now, what would you say to someone who’s maybe hearing about this maybe for the first time? They’re just not familiar with trails, trail running, um ultra running, uh FKTs. But if someone was interested, just kind of wanted to get started, but felt a little intimidated, whether it’s either to get on a trail or get out and run What would you say to them? What would your advice be?
Tara Dower: Yeah, I would say like, I mean, the first step to that is like if you have curiosity and interests, like that’s the biggest part of the like getting started because you’re not gonna continue with something you’re not enjoying. So if you have a natural curiosity to do this and interest. I think it’s easy to get back out there day after day. So I think like, you know, leaning into the fact that you’re a beginner, if you if this is your first time, like leaning into the fact that you’re a beginner and just like not rushing that process, but enjoying the journey of being that beginner. And I guess, you know, for something a little more physical, I would say like if you want to get started and you want to be successful, I would not I would probably like be open to a lot of different types of products. So like shoes, for instance. A lot of people see like, oh, I’m a I am a hoka person or I’m an ultra person or I’m an on person and it’s like you haven’t fully tested out those shoes Oftentimes I see people who are just diehard fans and it’s like you haven’t even tried any other shoes. So I I just recommend people going to a specialist store that you’re able to test and try and like return the products um if it’s not working for you in a reasonable amount of time. I think that’s like a more uh physical like starting tip but definitely think like that curiosity is important to like a beginner as well.
Derek Vreeland: The the shoes are key. I say the same thing to everyone. I ran in cheap running shoes for years. And finally I said I’m going to a specialist get fitted to find what fits my foot. That’s so So important.
Tara Dower: It’s it’s so important to like aligning your entire body um if you have the shoes that feel right. And if you’re getting new shoes, if you’re you know using them for the appropriate amount of time. I I mean it’s just gonna keep you injury free, which is extremely important.
Derek Vreeland: So important. And I always tell people like and I appreciate you you mentioned enjoying the process and and stay curious I always tell people just look what’s in your area in terms of like parks, local parks, city parks, state parks. Just find a park close to you and uh and just get out and start walking. I think starting to move outdoors and then let then let the outdoors do its magic.
Tara Dower: Mm-hmm. Yeah, exactly.
Derek Vreeland: Well Tara, thank you so much for joining me for this episode of Peaceable and Kind. And in addition to your YouTube channel, Teratrex, where else can people find you online?
Tara Dower: Yeah, I’m on Instagram under terra-t-a-r-a dotdower d o w e r. I’m also on Facebook. I think it’s under Teradower as well. There’s a Facebook page on there. Um, but I post a lot of like my vlogs on Uh the YouTube that you uh just stated, Teratrex. Yeah, that’s how you can find me.
Derek Vreeland: All right, so everybody go and subscribe to her YouTube channel, follow her Instagram Facebook. Tara, good luck to all your future adventures. I’m certainly going to be following.
Tara Dower: Yeah, thank you so much for having me.
Derek Vreeland: Alright, that’s all we have for today. Thank you for joining us for this episode. Go in peace and be kind.
This transcript was generated with AI and may contain errors.