Recent Podcasts
The Guide Life with AMGA President, Angela Hawse (Ep.85)
Angela Hawse is the president of the American Mountain Guides Association (AMGA), and is certified to the highest international mountain guide standards. We talk to her about how she got into guiding; the various roles she has taken on in her career; what advice she would offer to aspiring guides; her company Chicks Climbing and Skiing, her work with POW Climb, and more.
New Skis, New Goggles, & Random Reviews (Ep.44)
Sam Shaheen, Luke Koppa, and Jonathan Ellsworth talk about new goggles; new skis; which ski companies made the biggest impressions on us this season; funniest answers so far to our BLISTER Survey; and more.
Avalanche Beacons & Backcountry Safety with BCA Co-Founder, Bruce Edgerly (Ep.43)
Avalanche beacons might not be sexy, but their proper use and design can be the difference between life and death. So we sat down with BCA’s co-founder, Bruce Edgerly, to talk about avalanche transceiver design, backcountry safety research, and the most important — yet often overlooked — aspects of a rescue.
Filmmaker, Sanjay Rawal, on the World’s Longest Race (Ep.2)
Brendan Leonard and Jonathan Ellsworth talk with filmmaker, Sanjay Rawal, about a 3,100 mile-long race that takes place on a sidewalk in Queens, NY; the attempt to save the traditional ways of life of the San Bushmen of Botswana; the long-distance (and extremely consequential) rituals of a Buddhist monastic community in Japan, and a whole lot more.
Blister Speaker Series 1.3: Dan Abrams, Flylow (Ep.84)
Our 3rd Blister Speaker Series at Western Colorado University was with Dan Abrams, president and co-founder of Flylow. Dan gets into the details of running an outerwear company, and in doing so, offers insight into maintaining perspective while under pressure, how he approaches risky decisions, making the most of bad situations, and more.
New Gear + Sam’s Review of Tinder (Ep.42)
Sam Shaheen, Kristin Sinnott, and Jonathan Ellsworth talk about some of their favorite new skis, then — in what might be our most anticipated review ever — Sam Shaheen gives us his honest, in-depth, pretty hilarious, and surprisingly insightful take on the dating app, Tinder.
Trends, Favorite Gear, and Most / Least Durable Products, with Eric Helmbrecht of Powder Hound AK (Ep.41)
Alaska is a place where your gear really needs to hold up. So we talk to Eric Helmbrecht, owner of Powder Hound Ski Shop in Girdwood Alaska, about the trends he’s seeing in skiing and snowboarding; the gear with the most & least durability issues; some of his favorite gear; and more.
Michael “Bird” Shaffer on Old & New Ways of Experiencing the Mountains (Ep.83)
To be sure, a guy named Bird is going to see the world a bit differently. So we talked to Bird about growing up on a commune in Washington; falling in love with skiing; finding a home away from home in Chamonix; his passion for speed riding, better (and worse) ways of experiencing the mountains, and more.
19/20 Apparel — Sustainability, New Tech, & the Death of Full-Zip Jackets?? (Ep.40)
We’ve been inundated at HQ with new apparel from Patagonia, Mammut, Flylow, Sole, and much more in the past few weeks. Sam Shaheen and Luke Koppa recently sat down to do their favorite thing — geek out on new apparel.
Zoetica: Solutions to the Global Recycling & Trash Crisis (Ep.82)
Trash is a growing global crisis, and currently, the majority of “recycled” products are still ending up in landfills or being burned. So we discuss the crisis, the myths, and the solutions to these problems with the founders of Zoetica, who are working to help us rethink these issues and take concrete actions to address them.
Prior Snowboards & Skis, with Dominic Morin (Ep.39)
We talk to Prior’s head snowboard and ski shaper, Dominic Morin, about the origins of Prior, their philosophy of ski and snowboard shaping, their craziest designs, their new shapes for 19/20, and the legacy of Chris Prior.
What Makes Someone a “Runner”? (Ep.1)
In our inaugural episode of Blister’s new running podcast, Off The Couch, Brendan Leonard (semi-rad.com) and Jonathan Ellsworth talk about their running backgrounds; their love / hate relationships with running; and Strava as a modern-day spiritual exercise??