Wild Ideas Worth Living | Interviews On Adventure, Outdoors, Travel, Health, Fitness, Running, Business, Surfing, Exploring

Mirna’s Wild Idea: To run ultra-marathons and advocate for body positivity, showing others fitness comes in many sizes. You may have seen Mirna Valerio, “The Mirnavator.” Her video with REI had millions of views on Facebook. It starts with her reading an angry letter from a guy who wrote to her while she was doing a 50k run. He called her a “fraud,” a “liar,” and said she is not only faking running ultra-marathons, but she’s making a bad name for runners because she is overweight and doesn’t “look like a runner.” Well, Mirna can not only run, but she’s a true force of nature. She’s also a teacher, coach, diversity leader, trained opera singer, mom, wife, and recently added author and brand ambassador to her resume. A few years ago, when Mirna started doing longer runs, she started the site called Fat Girl Running. There weren’t a lot of people who looked like her on the trail, and she wanted to get more people outside running.  Her story was featured in the Wall Street Journal in 2015, and then was picked up