Roughly three years ago or so I couldn't jog a mile without stopping. My Garmin put my VO2 max at 36 — which, as far as I can tell, is about as low as it goes for a grown man. Then two things hit close together: my son was born, and I got obsessed with hunting.

Hunting is what got me running, honestly. There's an old saying — "legs and lungs kill bucks" — and I took it personally. If I wanted to get deeper into the country and pack an animal out, I needed an engine I didn't have. So I started running. And somewhere in there it flipped: running stopped being a means to an end and became its own obsession. I signed up for a 50K as my misogi for the year — a challenge with a real 50/50 shot of failing.

Funny enough the training wasn't the hard part. The logistics were. I ended up keeping a running list — I actually called it my "rolling action item list" — of everything the race needed. What to eat and when. What to drink and how much. Which vest, which shoes, which layers. Goal pace. The weather. And a nagging "…whatever else I'm forgetting." because I had a lot to learn.

Then hunting season came, and I was doing the exact same thing — a whole separate pile of gear, a different list, the same "did I forget something?" dread — except now the cost of forgetting was a freezing night on a mountain instead of experiencing a rough aid station.

I went looking for something to hold all of it. Every app I found picked one sport and made you a tourist in the other. A backpacking list didn't know what a hunt needed. And none of them told me whether I was actually ready — just what my pack weighed. And the running apps & websites were great at helping me plan my paces and goal times, but nothing helped me plan my drop bags and if my gear was prepared.

So I built it. Kairn is the thing I wanted and couldn't find: one place that knows what you own, what a given trip actually needs, and whether you're ready to walk out the door — whether that door opens onto a start line or a trailhead before you trek up to 10,000 ft.

I'm not fast, for the record, nor am I a great runner. I finished the 50K in about seven and a half hours including 2,680 feet of climbing — middle of the pack on a good day. I'm a husband and father of two little ones with a mild obsession for hard things in the mountains, and I built the tool I needed to keep them all straight.

It's an early beta, and it's just me right now. If you're the kind of person who dumps every piece of gear on the living room floor in July — for a hunt, a race, or both — I'd love for you to try it and tell me what's broken or what features you would love to have built in.

— Gilbert