Brian R. Stark

Brian R. Stark recently discovered there’s more to Facebook than cat videos. Through connections he made in a shared Facebook group of fellow seasoned transcontinental runners and walkers, Brian helped bring 29 of these alumni together to create the first-ever compilation of stories of crossing America on foot. Brian grew up in southern Indiana where he developed a love of distance running every time he forgot his homework and had to run three miles home to get it. Completing his ten-thousandth career mile during high school, he went on to run marathons and ultra-marathons in college. Starting a career as an English teacher, he began occasionally running to school, sometimes having to start at 2:00 am and covering 30 miles to get from home to school. As always, Brian would use his own personal adventures from running to inspire his students to tell their own stories through writing. A thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail taught him to love wilderness living and covering great distances on foot and several years later, a solo 4,800-mile coast-to-coast trail run from Delaware to California made him the first person to run the American Discovery Trail. That trip is detailed in his book, Getting to the Point: In a dozen pairs of shoes. More recently, Brian has stuck to his passion by crossing individual states. In total, he has crossed 34 US states on foot. He has taught in the US, Kuwait, and currently at an international boarding school in the Swiss Alps, where Swiss chocolate and local cheese make fine trail running snacks.