Our story
A regular family learning to begin again.
Toughest Alive did not begin with records. It began with walk/jogs, injuries, setbacks, family, and the decision to come back tomorrow.
The extraordinary parts came later. The ordinary beginnings—and the people who kept showing up for one another—are why this community exists.
Our family, outside together.
Ordinary days together are still the foundation.
01 · Begin again
Most big changes begin quietly.
They begin when a regular person takes one step they can repeat.
For us, a walk became a jog. A rehab movement became another movement. A hard season became the next ordinary day. Progress grew because somebody returned—and because somebody else noticed.
That is the beginning we care about. Not the highlight. Not the number. The moment a person decides they are allowed to start where they are and find out what might become possible.
Andrew
Rebuilding is still showing up.
Andrew is an ICU and emergency department nurse with a long-standing love of strength and endurance.
Before Toughest Alive, training was already a major part of his life. A 585-pound deadlift and a 500-pound back squat showed what years of focused work could build. Then a shoulder injury changed the scale of everything.
After the injury and a steroid injection, a bloodstream infection spread into the shoulder joint. His condition deteriorated into severe shoulder joint sepsis. Imaging found three pockets of infection, and emergency surgery was followed by a seven-day hospitalization, IV antibiotics, and about two months away from work.
Rehab did not look impressive. It began with very small movements and light loads. The person accustomed to measuring progress in hundreds of pounds had to respect five pounds, limited range of motion, fatigue, and the discipline not to rush.
That season changed the meaning of toughness. Sometimes pushing your limits means a monumental effort. Sometimes it means accepting today’s honest starting point and doing the small thing again tomorrow.
Andrew moving through another finish.
The weight on the bar does not decide whether the work matters. In one season, five pounds can require more courage than five hundred.
The recovery chapter
The hospital stay and the scar are part of the story. So are the quiet movements that came next.
Andrew during his seven-day hospitalization.
The lasting scar from shoulder surgery.
Before and beyond the setback
These lifts are part of Andrew’s story—not a standard anyone else must meet.
Brooke
The person who makes showing up possible.
Brooke is not a footnote in Andrew’s comeback or the girls’ accomplishments. She is a co-founder of Toughest Alive and the steady force that turns big ideas into a life a family and a community can actually live.
With a degree in Nutrition and Natural Health, Brooke has always cared about health beyond a workout: food, recovery, family rhythms, sustainable choices, and helping people make progress without demanding perfection.
During Andrew’s hospitalization and rehab, she helped carry the practical and emotional weight of the family. As the girls found bigger goals, she helped protect the joy around those goals—supporting the training without making an achievement their whole identity.
Then she helped turn those lessons outward. Brooke co-founded Toughest Alive and directed the inaugural Midnight Sun Block Party in Wasilla, creating the kind of event where first-timers, walkers, families, and experienced endurance athletes could all matter on the same course.
Her influence is built into the way Toughest Alive speaks and behaves: generous encouragement, calm consistency, community before ego, and the belief that people are more likely to keep going when they feel safe enough to be honest.
Brooke and Andrew at home.
Brooke outside in Alaska.
Progress is also the meal, the schedule, the rest, and the person who notices what you need.
Dossie + Sophia
Big miles began with family walk/jogs.
Hadassah and Sophia did not begin as ultrarunners. They began by moving with Mom and Dad.
At ages nine and seven, they completed their first official family run together: the Rio Bravo 10K in Bakersfield. They discovered they enjoyed looped endurance events where people could keep moving, rest, talk, eat, laugh, and see what the day might become.
Hadassah: 100 miles at 12
Years of ordinary outings grew into extraordinary goals. At the Midnight Sun Block Party, Hadassah completed 100 miles in 42 hours, 15 minutes at age 12. To the best of our knowledge, it is the fastest known 100-mile completion by a 12-year-old.
Sophia: 50 miles at 10
Sophia completed 50 miles in 29 hours, 50 minutes at age 10. To the best of our knowledge, it is the fastest known 50-mile completion by a 10-year-old.
The numbers are remarkable, but they are not the lesson. The lesson is that long goals are built through small days—and that children can pursue hard things with joy, support, room to rest, and permission to remain fully themselves.
Hadassah during the early miles of her 100-mile effort.
Sophia moving along a neighborhood path.
The achievement is not the price of belonging. It is evidence of what repeated, supported action can make possible.
Hadassah taking a difficult pause during the middle of her effort.
Sophia with the community at the start of her 50-mile effort.
What grew
One very large mountain—and many smaller ones.
Years after the smallest rehab movements, Andrew completed the first Toughest Alive Reckoning benchmark.
He crossed the strength threshold, ran 62 miles, and completed 620 burpees and sandbag throws in a total time of 17 hours, 15 minutes.
Reckoning is an extreme expression of the same practice: show up, meet the next piece of work, and keep going while the effort remains yours to continue.
It is not the price of admission. Most people may never want to attempt it, and that is completely fine. It is simply one very large mountain.
Why Toughest Alive
Your mountain does not have to look like ours.
We do not believe everyone should run 100 miles, lift a certain weight, or attempt Reckoning.
We believe regular people are capable of extraordinary growth when they have a meaningful reason to begin, a challenge that meets them where they are, and people who keep showing up beside them.
Your goal might be walking your first mile, returning after injury, running a first 5K, becoming stronger, sleeping consistently, having more energy for your family, or doing one difficult thing you have quietly wondered whether you could do.
Toughest Alive exists to help people take that first honest step, push the edge of what they believed was possible, and learn that their limits may not be where they thought they were.
We are still training, learning, making mistakes, starting over, and choosing new mountains too. We are not standing at the finish telling people to catch up. We are in the work with them.
Our family doing the Memorial Day Murph together.
Why we built the Underground
A room where people notice when you show up.
The plan matters. The people who notice whether you showed up matter more.
We built the Toughest Alive Underground around a simple daily ritual, honest accountability, and generous encouragement—not a room full of people trying to out-impress one another.
It is a place where the first mile can be celebrated as generously as the hundredth. Where hard seasons do not cost you your place. Where you can tell the truth, start again, and keep moving toward something that matters.
If you have decided there is something in your life worth taking action on, you do not need to accomplish anything first.
You already belong.
Welcome home.
Join the Underground