ALISON JACKSON

Alison Jackson grew up on a bison ranch in rural Alberta and tried almost every sport before finding her place in cycling. Now racing for Liv Cycling, the Canadian talks to Procycling about the beauty of living in a van, her holistic outlook and why dancing on TikTok makes her happy

Interview Sophie Hurcom

Portraits Alex Jackson

There are not too many cyclists here in rural Alberta, none really. I never grew up cycling at all, I did a lot of farm chores. We have a big green farm and we also have bison, so it’s ranch life. When I was 18 I came back from university and someone that had worked for my dad left a bike here, and so I thought, ‘I’ll ride to town.’ And that’s basically how I got my start on the bike. In rural Alberta your neighbours will be at closest a mile away, but otherwise it’s quite a distance between farmyards. The closest town is 20km, and that’s my small hometown that we’re still in the county of. The next city is an hour or two-hour drive.

When I was a kid I really wanted to be a farmer because I loved animals and I loved being outside. My dad mostly targeted my brother to be the farmer, so then I had all this energy and outdoor love; I channelled that more into sport. In a small town, if you become an athlete or sportsperson, you play all the sports that we have a team for. I played volleyball, track, soccer, all sorts. Basically a holistic, all-round athlete approach. I was a gymnast and a dancer, too.

My parents still live on the farm but my husband and I live out of a van, a travel truck, and then we just go wherever the weather is nice. In Canada we will be near Vancouver or we’ll take the travel truck down to the States, but covid makes all that travel hard... The first two years I was on an American team, and at that time we based ourselves out of a truck with a rooftop tent, and my husband would drive me to races. In between, we’d go exploring and camp out in some interesting and new places. We’ve kind of just adopted that lifestyle.