Ultramarathon Runner Bri Jaskot Interview
For our next interview we wanted to shift gears and chat with someone who wasn't necessarily in the public spotlight or a sponsored athlete, but pushing the limits in her sport nonetheless! Our guest today is a true badass ultra-marathon runner. Help me welcome the woman with the fastest known roundtrip time up Mt. Whitney, the highest mountain the lower 48, Bri Jaskot! To stay up-to-date on Fastest Known Times, click here.
Here’s how to connect with her:
Instagram: @bri.jaskot
Strava
Peakbagger
Who is Briana Jaskot
Hey Briana! Do you go by Briana or Bri?
Bri usually just because it's one syllable people usually default to that.
Have you acquired any fun nicknames over the years?
Breezy i think i that’s one i don't know if that's fun but yeah breezy.
Can you tell us how old you are and where you live now?
I'm 30 and my husband and i live in Reno
I saw on Instagram that you’ve experienced the van life. How long did that last and what made you find a permanent home?
Yeah so long story short, we were in a lease in Ashland, Oregon and two months after we got into our lease the people said that they were gonna sell their house and we needed to move. It was just after we had moved obviously we've only been there two months so we're well we don't want to keep moving let's just do the van thing. So we had six weekends to build it so it's pretty rushed move into the van i was still working basically full-time and my husband was working full-time Monday-Thursday. Then we would leave every Thursday night and go to Crater Lake or Bend or Shasta because we had a lot of stuff that was within an hour hour and a half or a couple hours from us that was pretty awesome to go and explore. We just did the work thing Monday-Thursday and then left every Thursday night and come back Sunday night. We did that for six months and then we moved to Reno and it's just harder to do van life in Reno.
Yeah i think people glorify getting out in a van and living that life but what's something that you took away that was this reality of being in that space?
It's just a lot of logistics. All the little things… i'd say it's pretty easy to adapt to them but going to the laundromat regularly, making a point to go to the gym to shower (we had a snap membership which was 24-hour gym). It would have sucked to be in the van during COVID with all the gyms down, so just little stuff like that. You're just constantly planning okay well where are we sleeping tonight, you don't want to sleep in the same spot every day just to not annoy people we rarely slept in neighborhoods. We did a lot of BLM camping because where we were in Ashland was super close to a lot of BLM land so we had to drive 20 minutes or so which wasn't bad in order to be able to be on public land and not have to worry about anyone bothering us.
What are some of the activities you and your family get into?
Mainly trail running and i guess i'd say peak bagging. Just big days in the mountains but trying to combine summit days with trail running - ideally as many peaks as we can link up in a day. That'd be our main thing. My husband likes to climb, i kind of do, but i would never classify myself as a climber. I used to be a swimmer i grew up a swimmer, so i do open water swimming but i don't do it as much as i used. I learned how to surf last year which is a lot of fun but we're not really by water so unless there's really strong winds in Tahoe. Because people do surf the lake but you have to have some pretty gnarly winds in order to do so.
Balance as an athlete: Life and Sport
Does your family think that you're kind of crazy because you do these activities or did you grow up in that world of people pushing the limits of your physical body and climbing up mountains?
No, not so much. My mom was a runner but i grew up riding my bike when she would go and run so i think that was a big influence on me to want to start running, but no no one in my family does ultras or anything. And that's my ultimate goal is to start getting more into ultra distances like 50 mile or 100k.
For those who don’t know, what is ultra running?
It's classified as anything over a marathon so anything over 26.2 you know but then at the same time there's plenty of mountain marathons that even the people who are winning it could take them six seven hours to complete because the terrain is super technical and there's just a lot of vertical so you could even say that that's kind of an ultra. When you're out there for six seven hours, that's a long time! Some people are running fast 50 milers in eight hours you know so it's kind of in that time frame but typically anything over a marathon.
And then peakbagging… is just how many summit can you get and are you trying to get certain summits over a certain elevation? What's the peak bagging world?
I kind of hate saying that name but because it just seems like you're just trying to go after and conquer all these mountains and i don't think that anyone's ever conquering a mountain. But yeah there's the peak bagger website has plenty of lists that you could go and tackle. So the i don't know that what it stands for but the SPS (Sierra Peaks Section) list is a big one there's 247 peaks in the Sierras that are on there and i think the lowest one's 11,000ft but they have tons of 11,000 foot peaks, 12k, 13k and 14k… all the California fourteeners- that would be a list that a lot of people would try. This summer with all the races being cancelled we've kind of made it our goal to do all of the Tahoe Ogul Peaks which are a bunch of peaks 63 of them throughout the Tahoe basin so kind of north of the 80 a little bit north of Truckee near Sierraville and then all around the lake and then a couple a little bit more south more obscure peaks and lesser known ranges.
Just as a backstory, I met Briana at the top of Mount Whitney, which is the highest mountain in continental United States located in Eastern California. Since it typically takes people 7 or 8 hours to hike to the top with backpacks filled with food and water, I was impressed to see her in running gear sprinting up to the top. She said she was trying to beat the female record to the smit and just missed it by a few minutes. Why don’t you tell us about that experience.
So when I moved to this area (Reno) in October I got a coach and this is the first time that I've really taken running super seriously and consistently. So he's mentioned he had mentioned before when the races started getting canceled maybe we should do Whitney as a hard effort possible FKT (fastest known time) effort and that had been thrown around the last few months or so but i got a last-minute permit on Monday of last week and just shoot texted him and told him that i was going down there and he never mentioned anything about the FKT (fastest known time) so i'm well i'm in a build right now i'm definitely not tapered so maybe he's not thinking that it's possible but i knew the time anyway of getting up there was 3:09 and then the round trip was 5:29 so i just had that in the back of my head and thought well i'm just going to go out and see what happens try and do my best. I'm hesitant to say i didn't feel super awesome. i don't know just honestly i didn't that day i feel that's just kind of how it goes- some days you feel really great when you're running and you're giving a hard effort feels i don't easy i guess or it doesn't feel as taxing i felt i was working from step one. I was totally gassed from the very beginning so i definitely had to push pretty hard to get up there and back down. I missed the ascent time by six six seven minutes; it's kind of weird cause Strava has an ascent time which is 3:08 but it stops at the hut at the top but that's not the true summit so then at the FKT site has the true summit ascend time just 3:09:30, so i haven't really looked at my GPS data to see what my time was exactly when i was on the summit versus the hut but i got to the hut in 3:15. It was a gorgeous day. it was my very it was my first time going up to Whitney i've been trying to get a permit the last couple years and that mountain's just incredible as soon as you pretty much get to trail camp and everything just opens up it's mind-blowing so if anything i just want to go back and hang out back up back there and not have to rush around because i was definitely i didn't want to stop i think i stopped once to snap a quick photo but other than that everything was on the go i was videoing on the go taking photos on the go so i would to go back and just enjoy Whitney.
How important is fear and failure to your development as a runner?
You know i still have little voices in my head telling me you know you're not a pro runner, you have no business going and trying to get the FKT up Whitney, so that definitely crashed my mind several times you know but i guess unless you try it you don't know i guess that's kind of how i approach that situation i guess but no it's definitely something that i struggle with for sure in terms of even setting big goals- my next one is to run around the Timberline Trail which goes around Mount Hood and i want to go sub 8 hours which would be a pretty good time and there's a big part of me that's okay but what if you get 10 hours or you just you say sub 8 and you put that out there into the world and then you just don't even get anywhere near that and that might happen you know you never ever know; especially with days that last multiple hours… You know on Whitney i was fully expecting to you know have my stomach go south and not be able to finish strong you just don't know what's going to happen at 14,000 feet i could have got super bad headache i could have just been throwing up and you know totally sidelined yeah so i guess that was my relationship going into Whitney
Do you even think about the time as being a failure at all or how does that kind of process for you?
Not hitting it the ascent time i think i can get it yeah six minutes isn't that right that far off or seven minutes so no i don't consider it a failure i just can i guess i look at it more as okay i could do these things better you know i could go in a little bit more rested. i think i could have fueled a bit better i felt definitely pretty drained at the top. i think i could just spend a little bit more time above 12,000 feet and just feel better at that altitude. so i think there's little things that if i really wanted to attack Whitney again i would change some things. So no i guess i don't see it as a failure but i know i guess there's part of me too where i'm not a pro runner i don't have a bunch of pressure on me. No one's paying attention to me so i guess for that reason if i fail it's not like there's a bunch of people watching.
It seems through doing an action you're kind of eliminating a fear that might just increase in someone's mind right and the act of doing kind of releases that because you're not doing it and then setting realistic goals for yourself and learning from them turns a failure into an incentive or motivation right.
totally yeah it can completely
We’ve all heard about “runners high”, when you’re in a state of euphoria and can’t feel much pain or anxiety. But when you’re running really long distances, does your body go into a higher runner’s high?
Honestly i don't know if i've gone far enough to know the answer to that question the longest i've been out is 10 hours…
Bri, that’s a really long time LOL!
But a lot of people do 24 hour you know 100k. A 100k will take 24 hours or longer, 36 hours for some so i don't feel like i've ever experienced super low lows followed by a high high but i have definitely just felt awesome running on the trails and yeah nothing hurts but then a lot of times i feel a lot of my running is done super easy. i don't go out and hammer all the time. Over 80 percent of my running is easy so it always feels pretty good okay i'm definitely not part of the no pain no gain.
Let’s bring the average person into your world for a minute. For those who don’t understand the amount of time it takes to train at your level, can you give us insight into your normal routine?
I'd say probably average between 50 to 70 miles a week and then depending on the time of year like in winter that could be you know seven hours of training where right now i did 74 miles last week and that was 16 hours of training just because most of it spent in the mountains and the terrain’s just a lot slower; and then you add in a lot of vertical and that just makes your time on your feet a lot longer. But yeah running wise that's about how much i do and then i also do a lot of band work and core work.
From what I understand, you went to University of Hawaii and studied psychology, but also nutrition.
i was a very confused college student and i changed my major i'm not kidding i switched it back and forth between psychology nutrition four times. Because of that i graduated two years late but yeah i spent a lot of time in nutrition as well.
How have those studies helped you with your mindset and recovery, and how has that changed over the years?
In terms of nutrition, i definitely put a huge focus on that now. When i was in college running or even high school I was in full-on standard American diet, absolutely terrible food choices. Now, i really do try to make a point to eat healthy. However with ultra running it's super hard to get in enough calories so i try to do that first and foremost so calories first and then try and make it as healthy as possible second because if you're not getting enough calories just because you're putting more importance on eating healthy and eating high nutrient dense foods, then you're not gonna have the energy to go out and run and complete the training. So that’s i guess my philosophy there. Then mindset wise… i mean i didn't go to class as much as i should have so i don't know if my psychology degree really did much there. I feel i learned the most from just watching people like the Solomon videos. There are so many inspirational ultra running videos on youtube or just online or even the docu-series so i feel like i've learned the most that way just watching other people suffer and say “i want to do that what can i do what am i capable of.”
Many people are joining the outdoor recreation world since the pandemic started. People are seeing nature as an escape, and they’re getting outside. What message do you have for people who may be interested in running but might be intimidated?
i feel always start start with what you are comfortable with you know it doesn't have to be super complicated i this isn't me that i'm just reiterating what rich role says but i listen to his podcast a lot it's the ritual podcast and he has people ask him that question all the time and his biggest thing is just don't complicate it it's not about the shoes it's not about the watch it's not about the pack and i completely agree you can have all the gadgets in the world you just got to go out and do it and maybe that's just starting around your block running a half mile around your block and making that a habit and then ramping it up to a mile making that a habit and then ramping that up to three miles you can't start at 100. you got to work your way up there
Ultra-running used to be an outlier sport with grassroot races. Now there are full-fledged events with hundreds of participants. Where do you see the sport of running headed in the future?
i think it's totally just going to keep on growing more and more races are becoming super competitive before you used to be able to just sign up last minute for a race now you have to plan your year out know exactly when the race opens up for registration so you can get on register which i think is awesome i think it's great that the sport's growing and because it is there's only going to be more demand for more races but yeah i think it's great that people are hitting the trails and getting out there and pushing themselves yeah i think our lives are just not challenging enough in terms of physically anymore you know maybe they're stressful in other ways i think that's why a lot of people really are you know wanting to push themselves outdoors or in whatever capacity they can or want to outside.
How can people follow you and support you on your journey?
Instagram: @bri.jaskot