Running talk with dirt still on it.
Ten Junk Miles treats running as social glue, not just a training plan. Episodes drift from listener interviews and race logistics into knee recovery, goat milk, Australian ultras, border-crossing marathons, and whatever detail makes the conversation feel lived in.
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Ten Junk Miles is less a neat running interview show than an ongoing roll call of people who have made endurance sports part of ordinary life. Its center of gravity is community. Recent Meet the Nation episodes call listeners one by one, not to extract big lessons, but to make them recognizable when they show up at races, online groups, or aid stations. That gives the show a casual, lived-in texture. Rachel Grabow’s call sits beside reminders about Sugar Badger and Pottawatomie. Andrew Kuzee’s nervous phone pickup turns into familiar banter before the actual story even begins. Eric Mauricette brings in Down East Maine, the Bold Coast Bash, the Bay of Fundy International Marathon, Campobello Island, and the practical weirdness of races that cross borders. Serrah West’s episode wanders through Idaho, goats, raw milk rules, homemade cheese, Stanhope 60K, and a joke about rooster noodle soup that apparently mattered on a hard climb. Greg Phillips stretches the map to Australia, Cosi, ultra trivia, audiobooks, Sam Gash, Montana Farrah Seton, and Glenn Seton. The recovery episodes have a different charge. They are raw check-ins about a root repair, cautious walk-run intervals, tightness, numbness, swelling, pain, and the small math of returning without overreaching. A coaching call can hinge on the meaning of “effusion” and whether short repeats are enough for the week. The longer Sophie Speidel conversation turns shared injury history into a broader discussion of recovery, aging runners, and the mental side of waiting. The Jon Pohlkamp episode adds another angle: a runner found through recovery chatter who returned to significant running after the same kind of repair. Through all of it, the show resists grand sports mythology. It prefers names, places, shoes, race registrations, dog walks, aid stations, and the strange little facts people remember about one another. The result is warm, rambling, and unusually specific. It sounds like a running community keeping itself company while everyone tries to get to the next start line.
Made for: For trail runners, ultrarunners, injured runners, race volunteers, and endurance people who enjoy community stories as much as split times. It especially suits listeners who like long conversational detours and local race lore.
What sets it apart: Ten Junk Miles turns ordinary runner details into the main event: listener phone calls, recovery minutiae, aid-station gossip, regional races, and domestic side quests. It feels less produced than most running shows, but more socially rooted.
A lighthearted conversation by runners about their lives as runners and the issues that are interesting or important to them and guests of the show. TJM is meant to be a companion to you as you run. Think of us as your running partners on days when you just need some friends to get you out on an easy run. The show is composed of 10 segments, one for each mile, and every 10 minutes or so we move on to the next topic, to keep things interesting. Among the hosts' experience are ten 100-mile finishes, dozens of half and full marathons, plenty of 50-milers, and some speedy 5ks and a BQ (and a handful of DNFs).Your host, Scotty Kummer is an attorney, doberman owner and quite possibly the most pain…
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Ten Junk Miles makes running culture tangible through candid recovery detail and generous conversations with the people who organize, race and keep showing up.
Ten Junk Miles follows running into the places race results cannot reach: injury, rehabilitation, training decisions and the communities built around shared miles.
A tenth of a mile is big news when Scotty Kummer is rebuilding his run.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A practical coaching call about injury recovery, steady progress checks, and the next step back to running.
This episode reads as a coaching check-in on injury recovery, with the next couple of weeks, knee comfort, and the conditions for moving up if pain or swelling stay away.
A friendly community call that turns race logistics into the main event.
Meet the Nation leans into the parts runners tend to care about most: names, race stories, local geography, and the small details that make a scene feel lived in.
Sarah West's Idaho running life keeps circling back to a joke about Rooster Noodle Soup.
Ten Junk Miles' Meet the Nation conversation with Sarah West settles into the overlap of Idaho running, homesteading, and the kind of race suffering that almost requires a joke.
An easygoing Australian runner interview where ultra talk, local connections, and trivia share the same road.
Meet The Nation settles into a loose runner conversation shaped by a call with Greg Phillips in Adelaide, South Australia, alongside guest host Josh, Aid Station Chef Holbein.
A listener's ultra-running education moves through race dreams, watch talk, and the lure of a very long finish.
Meet The Nation turns a listener spotlight into a compact portrait of how ultra-running culture moves through books, podcasts, race chatter, and the private question of how far a body can go.
A shared root tear leads into rehab, aging, dog-walk miles, and the uneasy return to technical trails.
Ten Junk Miles' long run with Sophie Spidell turns a shared root tear into a grounded conversation about running when recovery, age, and a long life in the sport overlap.
A specific, grounded return-to-running story where a cleared MRI still leaves room for doubt, patience, and daily work.
Recovery stories often stop at the injury, but this episode stays with the harder middle: John Polkamp's return from rare root repair surgery to fast running.
Trail running, told from inside race week.
Host Scotty interviews Sophie Spidell, a longtime ultra runner recovering from a meniscal root tear surgery.
The host Scotty resumes his 'Meet the Nation' segment by interviewing listener Josh Martins, discussing his recent surgery recovery and running experiences.
Host Scott interviews John Pohlkamp, a 2:38 marathoner who successfully returned to competitive running after a meniscus root repair surgery.
The host introduces an upcoming interview with Sherry Van Stratton while discussing scheduling issues and promoting listener participation in future episodes.
This episode features a community-building interview with listener Rachel Grabow, discussing ultrarunning events like Sugar Badger and Pottawatomie.
He opens by saying this is another injury-and-recovery check-in.
This episode features a conversation with Sophie Speidel, focusing on shared experiences with root tear injuries, recovery strategies, and broader topics like aging in running and mental approaches to the sport.
This episode features a casual interview with listener Andrew Cousy on the Meet the Nation segment, discussing personal topics and podcast community engagement.
This Meet the Nation Monday call is about dialing up a listener and putting a voice to the name.
Sarah West is in Idaho, where she has a strong running group and a homesteading life.
Greg Phillips says his 2018 debut year included a half marathon, marathon, 50K, and 100K.
This episode features an interview with marathoner Jon Pohlkamp, who shares his inspiring recovery journey after undergoing root repair surgery and returning to competitive running.
Michael McTighe, a data analytics and systems worker at an outpatient behavioral health clinic in Rochester, traces his running back to walking 10 to 15 miles as a kid and quitting cigarettes during the pandemic.
This episode features a raw coaching session where the host, recovering from a root tear injury, calls physical therapist Michael Tolman with Coach Liza Howard to discuss injury insights and training strategies for returning to running.
This episode introduces a new series about the host's personal journey to return to running with coach Liza Howard, exploring recovery from setbacks and uncertain future running goals.