178: IED Survivor To World Record Endurance Athlete | Mike Egan

29:51Nick Bare:so you're the one that stepped on it yeah stepped on it and then after that But it was just a lot of confusion, right? Pain doesn't hit immediately. And I just remember dust everywhere. It was just surrounded by it and almost trying to get back up and dust myself off. Like, what the heck was that? And then realizing, oh, I can't get up. and then just then it hit right the the pain struck and it was

30:39it's really hard to describe pain verbally but if I could describe it I would say it's like standing in a fire you can't put out and it was just like what happened to my body like what am I still alive. And what hit me the hardest was seeing the faces of my guys when they approached me and just seeing these hard dudes just break down because they thought I was dying. I mean, I was dying. And to see that shift in months of working together and them looking to me as a leader to thinking they're about to lose me was hard.

31:27Nick Bare:Did you guys lose anyone up until that point on the deployment? Our unit did lose people. We lost two guys just the day before the 27th. And we lost five guys on that deployment in total. But yeah, my squad, no, we didn't lose anyone in my squad. During that day, though, usually when they plant IEDs in the ground, there's tertiary IEDs somewhere around. And as my guys were working on me and putting on the tourniquets and trying to stabilize me, my interpreter stepped on another IED as well. So we were both injured at the same time. man when you came to after getting hit I mean did they have were there enemy forces that were waiting for that who started a firefight afterwards there were some firefights after I know that for a fact and I know the remainder of that hop was crazy but yes after there were firefights they came out you know, IED blast you can hear from miles away.

32:55So they pushed hard, but my guys came back with a vengeance.

33:04Nick Bare:So did your medic roll up to you as soon as you got hit and throw those tourniquets on you? Yeah, they, the only reason I'm still here is because they were so effective. like my corpsman was on it like tourniquets applied my lieutenant was on the patrol with me called in the nine line immediately i mean you're miles away from any help right the only thing coming to save you is a medevac and they did everything right and yeah he applied the tourniquets. He got me stabilized. He kept me awake. And I had another guy, Armstrong, just like holding me, just trying to keep me up and keep me talking. And it was hard being in that position as a leader because I was just thinking, I'm like, I still have a job to do, but I realized I'm like, that job is done now.

34:12And I just felt this shift of, like one, I felt life slipping away, literally. I remember,

34:27I remember a point where it felt like breathing was optional to where if I wanted to stop, I could.

34:43And I don't know how to properly explain that to people because it really did feel like a choice for me to stay at a certain point while I was out there.

35:01and I just realized I wasn't done and I want to stay here. And my guys, they made sure I'd stayed awake and kept fighting.

35:15Nick Bare:Do you remember that day pretty vividly? I do. I was awake the whole time and when they put me on the medevac, they put me in a medical induced coma. And then from there, I was in that coma for at least another week. So when you woke up, where were you? The first time I woke up, I was on a C-130, flying to another location to do more surgeries. And I just remember, I wasn't awake long. They put me back under. but I just remember seeing other guys around me that didn't make it.

36:04And then the next time I woke up, I was in the hospital stateside. That's crazy. Yeah.

36:14Nick Bare:That's crazy. They woke me up or they didn't wake me up. I woke up one time on the flight line. they were transferring me and I apparently attacked the doctor because I still thought I was in combat so I was like highly they thought I would go into shock and stuff so they kept me in that medical induced coma to make sure I was stable and not out of control did they put you in the coma initially

36:46Nick Bare:for the pain? probably so to some extent, right? There are choices of it. I have no idea, but I would imagine it's just shock or just keeping me in a stable, more comfortable position because over the next month or so, I went through about at least 30 surgeries, in total over 40 surgeries during my recovery. At any point on the objective, where you convinced that you were dead. Oh, yeah. Like you weren't going to make it. Yeah. When I reached that point of just like, it felt like I was slipping away. It really did feel like this was it. Like there's a possibility I don't make it out of here. And when they put me under, you know, they didn't tell me.

37:43but it it all happened so fast that I just couldn't process any of it until I got to the hospital and then everything kind of flooded in did anything happen you know people talk about your your life flashes before your eyes or you have like this epiphany before like did anything like that cross your mind I didn't have like my life flashed before my eyes or memories of anything I just had a realization of like this could be it for me do I I felt like I had the choice of if I want to let go I could and I realized I came in the realization I wanted to stay and I fought however I could to stay awake and that was it there was

38:40it was really just coming to terms with like this might be it and

38:48Nick Bare:I didn't want it to be it yeah so when you woke up stateside then what are some of the first things you remember seeing or being told or experiencing

39:04first things experiencing I was happy to be in AC. I had, you know. You vividly remember that? Yeah, I vividly remember feeling AC again. And I was just like, oh, this is so nice. I had my family around me. I was happy. You know, people were encouraging me. They were talking to me. I knew I was alive. I was grateful, heavily medicated, and not fully comprehending what my life was going to look like after all this. I didn't even know fully my injuries. I think it took me quite a bit of time to process that. But once I realized, okay, my legs are gone, I had metal bars outside of my body holding my hip together because it had fractured in three different places.

40:02I had stitches all up my left arm, parts of my forearm missing. I had no feeling on the left side of my arm. My left, the blast was so strong that my left eye was actually to the side. TBI, I mean, you name it, I probably experienced it with that kind of traumatic injury. so it was just like where the heck do we go from here how do I recover from this and what does life look like now I had no idea

40:41Nick Bare:were both your parents there your mom and dad yeah my mom and dad showed up during part of the recovery my dad not so close with but he did show up for a period of time but yeah my mom my sister close friends family all came and were there and it just felt good to be safe and alive but I was also just consistently holding my breath to make sure like my guys got home and that was just like I couldn't relax until I knew they were home man I can't imagine And I'd love for you to walk me through. You wake up, you're stateside. Or were you Virginia? Originally in Virginia, yes. And then they had a facility in San Antonio at BAMC, where I eventually got transferred to.

41:50Nick Bare:I had a friend stationed at BAMC. you come to you wake up you're stateside I'm assuming that there's this initial gratitude of I'm alive but then how quickly did the lows kick in of realizing my life is completely changed I had very awakening moments throughout my recovery I would say the gratitude lasted a long time because I had so much presence and support around me that it was just like, everyone's happy I'm still here. They're happy to see me being alert and moving around and creating new milestones. It's almost like I was a baby again, and I had to relearn how to live life. And then every time I hit a new milestone in my recovery, people were clapping or cheering me on, like, you got this.

42:54And that was nice. And I would say it didn't really get hard until I was out of the military. That support of the medical staff at BAMC was gone. my family went back home and I started living on my own and there was silence and in that silence I started experiencing the realization of what life looks like on my own and how I was going to navigate life the questions of like what is my purpose like how am I going to move through life in this state and I didn't know the answer to that and it took a long time and a lot of coping in the wrong ways to get to where I am today. I grieved. I needed to grieve.

43:50I think grieving is an important process of recovery. And -

43:54Nick Bare:Do you learn that on your own or did someone teach you that? I did learn that on my own and that's why it took longer than it should have. and I wish I had that guidance of someone saying it's okay to I would say the first person that really brought that to my attention was my sister and she's the one that encouraged me to write and to explore the emotions that I was experiencing because it's okay to not be okay and no one told me that. They just wanted to see me happy and I appreciate that but I needed to face my new reality and no one was helping me do that. And it took a long time. How much time was there between the accident and you being home, living on your own?

44:49Probably about a year and a half. A year and a half. I'd say I'd spent about a year on base recovery, doing work with prosthetics, working with PT, OT, working on my hand dexterity. You know, I tried walking prosthetics, running prosthetics. You know, they were amazing. The support that they provided me during that time and they pushed me. And I just remember one of the PTs pulled me aside. He's like, hey, you should slow down. because once you check all these boxes, they're going to send you on your own and you might not have access to all this stuff. And I was just like, but I don't know how to slow down.

45:35I want to progress and I want to move on. So once I got out of the military, I realized I was like, oh yeah, I see what he was saying. Now I got to figure this out. So essentially you stay in the military

45:51Nick Bare:until you reach certain milestones within recovery. Once you've reached those milestones, they then transition you out, send you home, and it's like you are officially medically retired from service. Yeah, it's like an independence checklist, right? They want to make sure you're functioning at a level to where you're successful in your day-to-day. And they have a good blueprint, but it's that transition out of the military that's lacking for a lot of guys.

46:27I saw a psychiatrist. I talked with people as well but it's really that aspect of no one told me how hard it was going to be to repurpose my life after the military and how was I going to be a functioning member of society in a world that just didn't make sense to me anymore. I didn't see things the same way I didn't trust people the same way I was constantly scanning the rooms and I was just not in a place to where I could operate in an environment that was safe because it just didn't feel safe anywhere

47:08Nick Bare:What was the plan when you got into that house living on your own for the next chapter of your life? I really just just approached it as like what do other people want me to do or like how how what would be successful and to the people that care about me I'm like I'll go back to school um I went back to college didn't enjoy it I I did it I was like because once I commit to something like I I commit to it um you know like I said I changed degree like a couple more times landed on psychology got my bachelor's and never used it. And then after that, it was just like, okay, what the heck do I do now?

47:55Like I did the thing that most people do and I'm still not happy. I don't feel fulfilled. I don't feel a purpose-driven approach to life right now. How do I fill that void? Like I had a passion of helping people, like being of service somehow. And that's why I was like, psychology is a great fit. And I realized I'm a super introvert and I empathize with people wholeheartedly. And then I have like no energy left once that's done. And I was like, I can't do this as a career path. I was like, I need to find another way to be of service to others that is fulfilling to me, that doesn't take away from me.

48:37and that's where I really started approaching fitness and coaching and really found a passion there.

48:47Nick Bare:That introvert realization is a really important one. I think a lot of people think that I am an extrovert based off of what I do for work. I am also an introvert and if I spend a lot of time with people or at events or these large social gatherings, I'm tanked after those. And the way that I recharge is alone, on my own, doing something without engaging with others. And I think people have to really understand if they are introverted or extroverted and then take care of themselves accordingly. Like how do you recover? How do you recharge? for extroverts it's around other people for introverts it's alone that's I think a necessary recognition realization that is critical for long term health and wellness yeah you can't you can't show up for the people you care about if your battery is drained right you know especially like family life you know it feels selfish almost sometimes to go out and recharge the battery, but you also know after you do that, you can show up so much more and have presence with everything that you do.

50:08So it's a balance and it is a strong realization. I think a lot of people need to find.

50:16Nick Bare:So what was the next thing or things that changed your life? How did things start getting better? I really leaned into coaching, being a personal trainer. I felt good helping people hit their goals that they had set for themselves. I found passion in fitness. I found it was good for my mental health. I found it helped with my depression. I think fitness is one of the best ways to cure depression. I know it's worked wonders for me. and I really leaned into the coaching aspect and finding a strong purpose in that. And then one day I did that for a few years. I had a potential client come up to me who had a disability at spina bifida and he's like, hey, I'm interested in working with you.

51:13I see you have this disability. I want to work with someone who understands that we're different. and I said absolutely I would love to train you I know how to safely and effectively train myself I want to learn how to do that for you so I went out and did research on how to work with people with disabilities and I found an organization that was doing a seminar like two weeks from when I met that guy and I was like oh heck yeah they're training you how to work with people with disabilities It's like, cool, I'm going to go sign up for that. And I show up and it was a very eye-opening experience of stuff I didn't even realize that I could be doing.

52:00And that two-day seminar was a huge shift for me in how I looked at fitness, how I could be of service to not just a normal able-bodied person, but also people who have disabilities, people who may want to recover from injuries and push beyond what is seen as societally acceptable for people with disabilities. I think the standard is really low for what someone with a disability is capable of. And when I attended that seminar, they're like, no, you can do so much more. And I was like, I want to be a part of this. and through that seminar it was very functional movement based very like CrossFit-esque training but more so functional fitness movements and they took me through a workout during lunch because they were like hey you got big arms like why don't you come work out with us during lunch I was like sure and they smoked me and I loved it and I was like I want to do this and they're like you should compete in CrossFit and I was like I don't know I was like, I never really saw myself as an athlete, but I enjoyed being a coach so much that I'm like, what's the number one thing I learned in the military is that in order to be a good leader, you need to lead by example.

53:23And I'm like, okay, I'm going to lead by example. I'm going to go do something that's out of my comfort zone. Because if I want to ask someone to do that, I want them to be able to say, he did that. So that's kind of where I started my competitive ventures.

53:40Nick Bare:What year was this? That was 2021. Okay. About five years ago. When do you meet your wife? I met my wife through that article I wrote. Yeah, I read about that. Yeah. What year was that? Oh man, that was 2014, 20. Yeah, about 2014, I believe. or 2013 we started talking and then we eventually met together in 2014. So you wrote this article, it got picked up, it got shared. Your now wife, Amy, reached out to you. From my understanding, she lost a partner overseas as well. Yeah, so I wrote the article and they were like, hey, we want to publish this thing. And they did and they posted it on their website.

54:36and they attached my socials to it, which I didn't know they were going to do. And then my wife reached out to me through that, and we started talking, and we were both going through a hard time. So I was going through what I was experiencing. She also lost. She was in a relationship with a Marine prior who had passed away during a training accident, and we were there for each other in a very hard time in our lives. Um, my wife is a phenomenal human being who has been through a lot. Um, you won't be able to see that when you look at her because she's so kind and present, um, with everyone around her, but she's been through a lot.

55:24Um, and we met each other at a time where we needed to just grieve together and learn how to move past it. and we did that for each other. And at the time, she lived in Seattle. I was in Texas, and we talked for months, and then eventually met, and the rest was history after that.

55:50Nick Bare:How'd you convince her to move to Texas, and you didn't have to move to Seattle? I told her, Texas is really nice. You should come. It doesn't rain as much here. Honestly, that's how I got my wife here. She was living in Nashville at the time, and I convinced her to come down for a John Party concert, It's Dub's Barbecue in Austin. And she told me, she said, I'm never moving to Austin, just so you know. Never moving to Texas. And a few months later, she was moving into Austin. We've been here since. You just got to get them here once. Yeah, that's it. That's it. So when did the pursuit of some of these more ambitious physical challenges start?

56:33Yeah. Yeah. So once I started CrossFit, I was like competing at the adaptive CrossFit games. I really enjoyed it. It pushed me in my overall fitness level. I was really strong before. I loved powerlifting, weightlifting, going to the gym. Like I said, I'm an introvert. I love putting the headphones in and just slamming weights. And I love the approach of overall fitness and pushing yourself in different avenues and that through competing in CrossFit, that really opened my eyes to that. And the first year I improved so much. I was like, I'm going back next year, improved again so much. And then the third year I was like, okay, I think my fitness level is where it's at.

57:22Now I want to push it to the extreme, not in a overall encompassing level of fitness, but I want to find what I'm passionate about and push towards one direction. And so after three years of CrossFit, I'm like, what the heck do I do now? How do I push the envelope of what's perceived possible for someone with a disability? And I was like, well, there's Guinness World Records out there. Why don't I go chase one of those? I really leaned into, I found a love for endurance. I used to hate endurance running.

58:01Nick Bare:We have so many similarities. I'm telling you. We're really best friends, man. Yeah. You told the story about when you were younger, lawn mowing. When I was in high school, I had middle school, high school, my own lawn mowing company. I had the signs all over our local town. There's a lot of similarities in the story. The bodybuilding, the strength training. I hated endurance. Sorry, you can keep going. I'm really connected right now. Yeah, no, I love it because it's so true. Like I really hated running or any type of endurance. I was bad at it. I didn't enjoy it. I was just like, I just want to stop.

58:42Like, why would you want to do this? And I was like, well, maybe there's another side to this where I'm like, okay, maybe if I push this a little bit more, I can find some enjoyment out of it. And I like a good challenge. and I was like that's one area I've always been really bad at why don't I lean into that and I just remember going outside my house for like a three mile run just completely gassed just pushing in my wheelchair up and down the sidewalk and I'm like I want to get better at this it was like I started taking notes like how I did what I can improve on started watching videos started finding ways to improve.

59:25And I got this crazy idea of going after the world record for the most miles covered in a wheelchair in 24 hours. And I was like, I want to do that. And I didn't tell anyone. I didn't even tell my wife for a while. I was like, I want to see if I can commit to this. And my wife's just like, you're going for cardio a lot nowadays. I was like, yeah, I'm kind of enjoying it. And I really just found comfort in the suffering of just going and just being. There's nothing like being in your own headspace when you're doing cardio and just out there and just moving your body. And you know, at any point you can quit, right?

1:00:15But you also know that, okay, I have a little bit more to give. I can push this a little further. And I think it's one of the most effective tools for my mental health that I experienced was just getting out there and logging some miles. And it really reset me and got me in a good place for the day. And I could go home and I'm like, okay, I'm ready to be present with my family and be here. And I'm like, I'm going to do this world record because I like where this is taking me. so then I finally eventually told people I was like I'm gonna put it out in the world and make it a reality and you know trained for a whole year and uh just completed it last November I did

1:01:00Nick Bare:152 miles in 24 hours what was the record prior 113 okay I see you crushed it a little bit yeah wow what was the the rally was it on a track so months of planning went into doing the world record and originally I had a military base that was going to let me run it on a flight line. It was like a mile and a half down and back. It was beautiful, perfectly flat. And everything was ready to go. And then 10 days prior to when I was going to do the attempt, the head officer of the base calls me. He's like, hey, I'm sorry, we can't do this here anymore because of the government shutdown. Because that was back in November.

1:01:42And I'm just like, what am I going to do? And I reached out to an organization I work with locally called Morgan's Wonderland. They are a fully adaptive theme park for kids with disabilities in San Antonio. It's an amazing place. And they helped fund and run a functional fitness program I coached for a long time, providing fitness for people with disabilities for free in the San Antonio area. so I reached out to Brooke and I'm just she was on the email of all the invites I had to go to this base because I had to get their background info to get them base access because a lot of them were civilian and I said hey base got cancelled I don't have the location anymore you might want to cancel your flights people flying in this might not happen and Brooke was like do it at Morgan's and I was like okay let's do it and i literally did a loop that is smaller than a running track for 24 hours 0.21 miles it was around a bunch of tennis racquetball courts you should have hit me out we could have

1:02:52Nick Bare:figured something out yeah well now i know there's a um there's this awesome location that would be great for an event like that it's in nashville tennessee um it's in shelby bottoms park and it's called the, I think, Cornelius Airstrip. It's an old abandoned airstrip. It's, I think, 1.2 miles around. I used to run it when we lived there all the time. There's cyclists there all the time. People rollerblading, perfectly flat, beautiful area. Be perfect for something like that. I know. I look back on it now. I was like, man, what could I have done if I had a good course? but yeah it had to be perfectly flat per the standards of Guinness like I had to get a surveyor out there to level out and if it was off by just a tiny bit it wouldn't have been a Guinness world record so I was like I had 10 days it was crunch time I was reaching out connecting to everyone and that was the one for sure thing I had and I was like let's just run it I know I could still beat the current record.

1:04:03I might not get to where I wanted to be, but I was like, I'm going to fight like hell to get where I want to be and my goal of what I wanted out of it.

1:04:13Nick Bare:Do you know what the pace per mile is for that? My moving pace was 820. With rest, it was 955. Okay. And what is your heart rate? because you're using your arms for everything yeah like what is how do you measure your heart rate and zones and just to compare and contrast traditional running so when i was training i wore the the chest strap heart monitor um and i got some good data off of that um and then i had the watch on, but it was very inaccurate just because I'm constantly moving my wrist and you just can't get a good read. And then I also noticed like if I have a watch on my wrist while I'm pushing a wheelchair, like my right arm would blow up more than my left because of the watch was on it and circulation.

1:05:09So eventually I just kind of nixed the whole like the data collection of it. I still do it every once in a while in training, but I'm usually, in the world record, I had it the watch on my chair and we collected that on it, but I was in the 130 range pretty much the whole time. So, in a steady, moving, consistent pace, but not to, you know, zone four or anything crazy.

1:05:38Nick Bare:And then, do your arms just get fatigued or do they get pumped? They get pumped up and And eventually, depending on how long you go, it's super swollen and like fatigue of the tendons and the joints. But my arms aren't the first thing to go when I'm pushing. It's usually my back. I can imagine that. Just hinging. It's like doing good mornings just constantly of just back and forth. Lower? Lower back? Lower back. Do you do any specific training for posterior chain, lower back? I do a lot of seated deadlifts. Makes sense. Yeah. Just strength. I would say my training is very unconventional to what a runner would be, obviously, but I almost always do one-on-one-off strength and conditioning.

1:06:29I do strength training as much as I do cardio just because I am more injury prone. And I'd say once I get closer to big events, I'll lean more into cardio. I'll push the miles a lot harder. But I need the strength base leading up to an event to make sure that nothing gives out.

1:06:52Nick Bare:Let's talk about the going more ultra. What was your initial goal? What did you want to come and do at the ultra? Man, I wanted to fully utilize the format of the race. I wanted to see what broke. first. I wanted to go out there and leave it all out there. I remember like Max would come up to me. He's like, man, what's your, what's your goal out here? I was like, I don't have one, you know? And I'm sure that's like a common thing. A lot of people say of like, I don't have a goal, but I feel like setting a goal in a race, like the go one more ultra is already setting yourself up for failure in a certain way.

1:07:35Like I get it. If like the furthest you've gone is like 70 and you're like, I really want to hit a hundred. That's a strong goal. And that's, that's something to chase. But I also know there was people who probably set that goal for themselves. And then they're like, as soon as they hit a hundred, they're done.

1:07:51Nick Bare:A hundred percent. Yeah. A hundred percent. Because it's a limiter. It's a mental limiter you're placing on yourself. And I wanted no part of that. And I was like, I'm going to go out here until I cannot go anymore. and that was my goal going into it. Yeah, when I did my last man standing in 2023, I told myself going into it, I just want to hit 100 miles and it just so happened my mind and body quit right after 100 miles. It's like when you're in the gym, I want to do 10 reps. You start fatiguing at eight, you hit RPE 10 on rep 10. It just so happens because your mind tells the body what to do.

1:08:33Nick Bare:Yeah, with the last man standing style race of all the races I've done was the mentally hardest race I've done because I set that number. And then when I got there, trying to convince myself to keep going after that was really hard because I was counting down. If you're going to do a hundred mile race, you get to mile 80, I got 20 miles left. mile 90, I got 10 miles left. Last man standing. You don't have those check marks and milestones. It's just one after the other, after the other. It's a strong approach. Yeah. When I did that world record, it wasn't a mile goal necessarily, but I had the clock, right?

1:09:22There's a few more hours left and I'll be done. Two more hours left, one more hour left. And when I got to the end of it, that 24 hours, I asked myself, I was like, I, I think I could keep going if I had to. And I was like, I want to find a race that provides that. And then I just went down a rabbit hole of backyard ultras. And I was like, man, it's off road. We'll, we'll have to figure that out. But I was like, I want a part of this.

1:09:51Nick Bare:It's doing 27 hours, 110 miles. Did you get a custom wheelchair made just for this race? what did they have to do differently to it a lot of things mainly more so the frame build had to be completely different because in an everyday regular wheelchair the casters are pretty much like right underneath you and you need more stability in off road like you hit a rock like I'm going to flip over to the side so it's a much wider base I had to get off-road tires, but not too knobby of tires because I have to push on the wheel itself since it is a little bit wider chair. The front casters had to be extended out.

1:10:41Those also needed to be off-road air tires so it's not as jarring when you're hitting rocks or experience any instability in the chair or the course. It was a lot of brainstorming. and it was interesting taking what I had learned from the world record and realizing it does not apply at all to what I was trying to accomplish at the Go One More of, man, the world record, I could zone out and I could just listen to music and just go somewhere else in my head. You can't do that out there because for me, I'm not a runner. I have four points of contact with the ground at all times. I feel everything.

1:11:27And it was just mentally, it was more mentally draining than anything. Like it obviously physically challenging, right? Being off road, but I had to stay so alert at all times.

1:11:40Nick Bare:Well, the course is so different too. I mean, there's not huge points of elevation, but there's these small dips, there's rocks. I think it's at mile it's probably like three where it's the back half by the river you go in this little dip and you just climb up out of it and someone had a video of you climbing up and out out of that and I was like holy crap he's like he's working back there yeah the hills were brutal there's yeah that one back hill got me every loop I had to like mentally prepare myself. I was like, if ever I do stop for anything other than rain, it would have probably been that hill.

1:12:27Just because if I let up for even half a second, I would be going backwards and there's no, and I would just have to find a way to grit my teeth and get up that thing every single time. You know, I enjoyed the downhills. The downhills were great, but I had to work for them on those uphills.

1:12:48Nick Bare:Yeah. I mean, we knew rain was coming at some point that weekend. It's like every year we're hoping for good weather and it just dumps on us. How did the, I mean, at what point did you know the rain was going to truly affect the race for you? I mean, it drizzled here and there, but then we got a huge roll of it coming through. So how did that kind of affect your pace? Going into it, I tried to train for any scenario leading up to the race. I trained in some off-road, just freshly rained, some mud, and it was always a struggle just to complete a loop within an hour. I had a nice 4.17 loop I would hit, and I trained in the mud and I got in at like 59 minutes and 30 seconds.

1:13:51Like it took everything I got to work through mud. So I was like, okay, this might be possible. But, and then leading into the race, you got the weather forecast, the 10 day forecast. It had rained the day before the race, the rain, the day of the race. And then eight days after the race. And I'm like, I trained for six months. I wanted to show people, I worked hard for this that I earned my spot here and that I came to show up and work and I was like man this is gonna suck if I just show up to the start line and I'm just stuck in the mud right at the start and lo and behold the the skies opened up a little bit um and yeah we got some sprinkles like here and there the first day but it was it remained fairly clear um when those happen like yeah some mud stuck but I could keep moving and then I knew if we got heavy rain that would probably be it for me because the mud out there is very different than um you know what I had trained with like mud will stick to my chair either way but it never locked up my wheels to where I just was stuck and when that torrential downpour came it was like three minutes and then it was over.

1:15:12I made it about 20 feet and I was just done. I couldn't push anymore. And I was like, okay, well, it's either I sit here and wait for someone to come get me or I keep going. And I felt like I could keep going. So that's what I did.

1:15:35Nick Bare:So you hopped down to the chair and started dragging the chair. Yeah. I, I, the only goal I set for myself in that race is I said, I'm going to go until I can't go anymore. Um, and I was not going to let the extreme conditions of weather prevent me from doing that. Uh, the chair is, is not an extension of me. It's a tool and I don't need the tool to get what I needed to do out there. So yeah, I got out of the chair and I started yanking it and dragging it. I knew the race was done for me. Like still competing in the race but I wasn't done with the race. Yeah. Well that ended up being the most viral photo of the year.

1:16:22I think Cam Haynes mentioned on his

1:16:24Nick Bare:podcast that it should be the time photo of the year. And I am like it's like I don't know how best way to describe this outside of my children very few things like hit nerves in me and make me emotional but when Trey walked up to me I believe it was Trey it was right after the rain came in he's like hey Mike's out there still I was like yeah I know he's dragging his chair I was like, what do you mean? He showed me a video and dude, that like equal parts of like emotion and joy and jacked up as I watched that I was like, dude, send that to me right now and post that in my story and the amount of like positivity and inspiration and just motivation people got from seeing that was incredible I'm curious I can imagine, but I'm curious how was it received on your end?

1:17:29It was overwhelming. I had no idea the effect it would have on a lot of people and how it would speak to people. I went into the race with my goals and aspirations and my coaches talked to me. They're like, what are you going to do if it rains? I was like, I'm going to keep going however I can. and I could never have imagined it being received the way it did. I passed out almost immediately once I got back to a bed and showered and I woke up and I just had like hundreds of messages from people all over the world of just telling me how it spoke to them and how it lit a fire in them and how they just wanted to push themselves more than they currently are.

1:18:28And I'm just like, holy crap, dude. Like I had no idea. I was out there for, I think about an hour, dragging the chair, eventually leaving the chair behind and just going on my hands. but I felt a shift in something. I was like, I'm supposed to be doing this.

1:18:57And I don't know if it was the other runners. I don't know if it was the other people being out there, but I was like, I need to keep going. I felt a part of it was like, this is bigger than me.

1:19:16and man, the runners out there, they were amazing. You know, I got stuck in the mud. They come up to me and they're like, let me help carry your chair. What can I do? And they were just like in awe of like what I was doing. And I just, I didn't, it didn't click to me like that at the time. But after the race was just insane. You know, I can't even recall the amazing messages. I tried to respond to as many as I could. But, you know, people tell me they were going through cancer treatments and they were, you know, lost parts of their body and they couldn't figure out how to find a way to move forward.

1:20:02And they see my video and they go out for a run or they set a new PR or a girl in a wheelchair told me she started playing wheelchair soccer. you know, finding a reason from what they saw to go out of their comfort zone. And I'm just like, how the heck did I get in a position to have that kind of effect on people? Yeah.

1:20:29Nick Bare:Insane. Yeah, I can't imagine that was part of the bingo card, you know, when you transition out of the military years ago. I was just in my Bible two nights ago and I was reading the book of Matthew. the parable of talents. And God gives these three individuals different amount of talent. And moral of the book and the story is that God provides us each individually with different talents for us to go steward and use and multiply in the way that those talents were unique and specific to us as individuals. And I can only assume that, you know, 2012, you get hit by this IED, you lose both your legs.

1:21:28It's like, what are my talents now?

1:21:30Nick Bare:What is my purpose? What am I supposed to do? And it takes years and years and years of you adapting and building and refining to now go to multiply those talents you've been blessed with, where there's millions of people on the other side that are watching this and you're now changing their lives. The amount of comments on my YouTube video from the race that I've been like, what is my excuse of why I can't get up and push and go one more and train and get out of my comfort zone? And it's like, it's a testament to the purpose that's on you, your mission in life and the impact is much larger than yourself.

1:22:22Nick Bare:This is service equally as important as your military service. What you've done while in uniform and out of uniform. Yeah, I had no idea that my life would lead me here. I couldn't envision that. I knew I was really good at not quitting. And

1:22:55the pursuit of finding a better version of myself in everything that I do

1:23:06spoke to a lot of people. I think we always try to improve and we don't know how. And it's really just going out there and pushing yourself beyond your comfort zone in whatever shape that takes. It doesn't have to be physical. It could be mental. It could be showing up more for your family, your friends. The pursuit of becoming a better version of yourself is something I aspire in everything that I do and was a large contributor of why I wanted to do this race. Because there's certain things I wanted to overcome. I attach a goal outside of the goal of a race of like everyone's goal would be win BPN, go one more.

1:23:59But I always feel like there's another goal inside of that. You should create something that drives you, that creates that passion of why am I doing this? Am I going to be a better person for enduring this? Or am I just going to win a race? And I feel like if you attach something that speaks to you personally and you find an avenue of self-improvement within that, it will push you well beyond what you think you're capable of.

1:24:32And yeah, that's the approach I took and the response from it is insane.

1:24:39Nick Bare:It's the intent you talked about earlier in the conversation. Right. having a true intent, a genuine intent behind it. Well, brother, I appreciate you. It was so awesome to see you throw down at the race and get connected and now have you on the BPN team and to see what you're going to do next and allowing us to be a part of it. I'm very grateful. I'm very proud. Super excited for what you're about to do. I'm excited too, man. I'm beyond honored to be a part of the team. I love what you guys are doing here, what you're about. The forefront of everything you do has integrity. And that's what I believe should be at the front of everything that you do.

1:25:27And, and I'm just happy to be a part of, a part of BPN and yeah, I'm excited for what the future holds. Thank you, man. Thank you.