Lynsey Dyer, easily one of the best big mountain skiers in the sport’s history, has a thing for unicorns. Yes, it’s mostly symbolic. Unicorns to Dyer, a Sun Valley, Idaho native now living in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, are outdoor athletes, or special people, with magical powers and special things to say. And they’re only here for a short time so we need to take advantage of their presence.
Hence, the impetus for Dyer’s new podcast,#ShowingUp, which is live now with episodes releasing in the coming weeks with, The Inertia. “I love podcasts,” she told us. “I feel like I have access to so many unicorns that have rad things to say. (These athletes) are put on pedestals but they’re so much like us. It’s cool to get them to be like, ‘hey, I’m vulnerable too and this is how I created the life I wanted.'”
Dyer’s voice is as silky as her skiing style and she easily gets guests like Alex Honnold and Conrad Anker to open up on interesting subjects beyond climbing the next peak, like love and tenderness. She says that the podcast will be an insight into what it takes to be a pro athlete, but let’s be honest: being a pro athlete in the outdoors can be a pain in the ass. Long hours, wavering sponsorship, endless travel can all sound exhausting to the normal human. But what truly makes her podcast unique is that she gets these athletes who achieve incredible things to sound uniquely human. “So many of my friends are the most magical, incredible people and some leave the planet too early,” she says. “Dean Potter was one of the most special humans I’ve ever known. I assumed he would be there. Then he wasn’t. I want to capture the essence of these unicorns. They all made something out of nothing.”
Capturing that “essence” is something Lynsey Dyer proves supremely good at.
Editor’s Note: The Inertia will be highlighting each of Lynsey’s current podcasts in the next week or so but until then, you can start with her recent interview of iconic climber Alex Honnold, below.
