TAC Board: The Alaska Club Blog

My journey began on September 22nd, 2019. My best friend called and during our conversation, she told me she had lost 80lbs in the last 8 months. She showed me a pic and she looked amazing. I was not about to have her show me up, so I asked "HOW?". She was eating healthy. She had cut out most carbs and sugars. I was 386lbs and had already thought about getting healthy; and this was the last straw.

Summertime in Alaska is crazy. We all go into overdrive, and it seems like for most of us, the level of activity ramps up with the increase in sunlight. As a professional cross-country ski racer, summertime is actually the part of the year when I have to train the most. In our sport, it takes so long to make improvements that we need every workout, every day we can get, in order to get faster by next season. We train May through November, then compete almost every weekend December-March while training every day to prepare for the big events. After the Olympics in Korea in 2018, where I finished a career best 6th place in the Team Sprint event, I am more motivated than ever to train as hard as possible. Unfortunately, or fortunately, this means I somehow have to find a way to mesh the demands of training two or even three times a day with the summertime Alaskan lifestyle.

The Alaska Club focuses on Men’s Health and dedicates the month of July to raising awareness. It’s all about early detection of diseases and improving physical and mental health for men nationally. Yet, keeping healthy is an all-year endeavor. Here are 11 tips for the other months that aren’t Men’s Health Month.