Southern Indiana Trails

A big man who usually has an unhurried gait, Stacey Moore picked up his pace to a near jog. It was, after all, what could   be one of the most important nights of his life.  Wearing a blue-and-white-striped dress shirt and black slacks, Moore led me through a maze of hallways connecting Pennsylvania’s Valley Forge Casino Resort with a Radisson Hotel. “This is big,” Moore said. He was generally a bit of a quiet talker, maybe on the shy side, with an affable smile that made it seem like he was always on the verge of a punch line. “Tonight is really big for me.”  Moore is commissioner of the American Cornhole League (ACL), a four-year-old operation that has helped turn a tailgate game into an organized sport. It was early August, and the league was hosting a nationally televised broadcast, featuring players from three countries,   as part of its six-day world championships . Live television has its obvious obstacles, but perhaps the biggest one for Moore...

The key to a good ski season is building   your endurance to ski day in and day out,   so you can develop your skills.   Get ready for a strong start on the slopes with these four fitness videos.  Get Fit for Ski Season in 7 Moves We’re getting pretty excited for ski season here at  Outside . Rather than sitting around while we wait for snow, we caught up with pro skier and trainer Crystal Wright   to learn some ski-specific workouts to get in shape. Not only will these moves help prevent injury, but they’ll set you up to rip from day one on the mountain.  A Quick Workout to Get Ready for Ski Season Doug Lawder, the owner of  Railyard Fitness  in Santa Fe, walks through a brief workout that will keep you fit through the holidays. Get Through Ski Season Injury-Free In this circuit, Lawder focuses on five exercises to help build strength and mobility.  Plus, if you need one for inspirati...

In matters of prestige, the New York City Marathon has always been the race—at least for the American distance running contingent. Yes, Boston has the historical pedigree and Chicago has a ripping fast course, but for overall opulence New York can’t be beat. It is the largest marathon in the world (not to mention the most expensive ). It’s the race with all the celebrities . The start, which sends over 50,000 runners streaming, zombie-like, over the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge , feels less like a sporting event and more like a gazillion dollar Jerry Bruckheimer   fantasy.  No wonder, then, that New York is where so many big names of U.S. running have chosen to make their 26.2-mile debut. Deena Kastor . Meb Keflezighi . Dathan Ritzenhein . Shalane Flanagan . Kara Goucher . The list goes on. In 1980, decades before he had his current sinister image, a 22-year-old Alberto Salazar announced himself to the marathoning world by winning NYC in near world-record time.  Measured...

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. by Outside Editors via Outside Magazine: All

In 2018, Hilaree Nelson and Jim Morrison made history by skiing off the summit of Lhotse, the fourth-tallest mountain in the world, standing 27,940 feet above sea level. This film captures the entire expedition, culminating in their 7,000-foot ski descent via the Lhoste Couloir. by Outside Editors via Outside Magazine: All

It’s one thing to reach the top of a mountain. It’s another thing to stay there for a long time, through good weather and bad. Serena Williams, Tom Brady , Lebron James, and Diana Taurasi are all notable examples of elite performers who have accomplished the latter. They’ve ascended to great heights, and, somehow, they’ve managed to stay there. They are perennial peak performers. Unlike these giants, you may not be the best in the world at what you do. But the truth is you don’t have to be. After  years of research , the best definition I’ve come up with for peak performance is expressing your fullest potential in a sustainable manner—and feeling good while you’re doing it. In other words, peak performance is an inside game. And it is attainable to anyone, whether that means winning Super Bowls and Grand Slams or finishing your local 5K and doing good creative work. It’s about getting the best out of yourself, over and over again. Though achieving this state ...

In this episode of the Fifty , a project by  Cody Townsend  to descend the 50 best lines in North America, the pro skier links up with  Len Necefer and Connor Ryan to ski Utah’s Mount Tukuhnikivatz in Moab’s La Sal range. The trio gathers around a campfire and on the skin track to share the beliefs about the sacred lands on which we recreate. Plus, they find some remarkable skiing along the way.  by Outside Editors via Outside Magazine: All

My fiancée wrecked my brand-new Ford Ranger last week. I knew about it the second it happened, because Ford’s smartphone app sent me an alert. It’s a good reminder that while financing or leasing a brand-new vehicle might seem like a burden, it’s also the absolute best way to ensure your safety.  I’ve written about the false economy  that old-vehicle ownership represents. While it may seem like you can’t afford a new car, taking out a loan or a lease payment often makes much more sense than paying cash for an older vehicle. Not only do us regular folk earn money incrementally, which makes committing to a regular payment easier than dropping a large lump sum (and being on the hook for unpredictable repair bills), but new cars are so much safer than even models from just a few years ago that going brand new is probably the most important thing you can do to avoid massive, crippling, life-ruining medical bills. I know that because my credit remains so ruine...

On the morning of October 26, workers removed a long chain drilled into the side of Uluru, a block of sandstone larger than downtown London in the middle of the Australian outback. Since the 1950s, the chain has led millions of tourists up the rock’s sheer face to its summit, 2,800 feet above the desert floor. In stark contrast, at the base of the trail, a simple white sign read, “We, the Anangu traditional owners, have this to say: Uluru is sacred in our culture. It is a place of great knowledge. Under our traditional law climbing is not permitted. This is our home, please don’t climb.”  In spite of this plea, a hundred or so tourists climbed the rock every day. Some fell to their deaths, some relieved themselves on the rock, and all walked over a sacred site on their way to the top. Which is why, in 2017, Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park announced that it would officially ban climbing by the end of this year. That spurred a headline-grabbing wave of last-ditch visitors ...

Yosemite National Park hosts an annual average of 4 million visitors, who flock year-round to experience the hulking granite, tumbling waterfalls, and iconic trails of the High Sierra. As a guide in the Valley , I often see people who are ill-prepared for their trip. There are a few items we recommend beyond staples like a  backpack , headlamp , sun protection , and a pair of broken-in boots that will greatly enhance your experience in the granite gem of the West, no matter the season. Binoculars ( Photo: Anna Chandler) Thousands of Free Solo –inspired visitors come to admire the climbers on El Capitan . But without a decent pair of binoculars, they look like ants on the half-mile-high, mile-wide wall. Beyond El Cap , sights like the 2,425-foot-high   Yosemite Falls; Half Dome, which towers 4,800 feet above the Valley floor; and the 750,000-acre view of the wilderness from 10,850-foot Mount Hoffman merit detailed attention unachievable with the naked eye. A pai...

As a kid, I learned to fly-fish  at a small limestone creek in central Pennsylvania. Its clear waters teemed with rainbow and brown trout, and no wonder—a few hundred yards away from its banks was a concrete fish hatchery, where the state bred and raised hundreds of thousands of those species to maturity every year, then released them. As I got more into fly-fishing, I volunteered to help stock this stream and others nearby, following behind a tanker truck aslosh with fish, then carrying bucketfuls of trout down to the water before releasing them with a gentle tip. A week or so later, I’d join hundreds of other anglers in catching most of those fish and carrying home full stringers of hatchery-raised fish for the grill. A few years after I went to college, I learned that the hatchery had been closed down because it overflowed into the creek during heavy rains. The creek also had to be closed to fishing—the hatchery’s overflow polluted the water with nitrogen, ...

I’m not a big fan of commuting to work during the summer.   It’s too damn hot, especially in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where I live. I have to bring a full change of clothes, because I sweat through whatever I’m wearing, and it takes a full hour to cool down at my desk. But when falls rolls around, I’m all about pedaling to work. Cooler temps mean I can wear just one outfit and step into a nine o’clock meeting without overheating. Yes, I have to bring a jacket and use a light (thanks to shorter days), but these are tradeoffs I gladly make. Here are some useful pieces of gear that let me ride through the fall and into early winter. Velocio Merino 210 Long Sleeve Shirt ($120) ( Photo: Jakob Schiller) It’s no surprise that my first pick is a merino wool shirt. Merino is the ideal material for cool-weather riding: it’s warm but breathable, and because of its natural moisture-wicking properties, bacteria doesn’t linger and cause a stench. Velocio do...