Haley Hunter Smith rode the Olympics for Canada in 2021, before embarking on a self-forged path as a privateer. She is supported by MAAP, as well as Trek, SRAM and The Feed  – pursuing results at the top-end of the world’s premiere gravel and marathon MTB events. 

Like a lot of Canadians, Smith grew up doing outdoorsy things – and says she was led into cycling, specifically MTB, by her father and brother.

“They both raced a little, and it was easy for me to go biking with them. At first, I used it as a way to process and deal with some mental health stuff I was going through as a teenager.” 

In ninth grade, Smith was hospitalised and diagnosed with anxiety and anorexia. Riding bikes helped her move through this.

“It was something that made me feel better, but I was really bad at it. I crashed all the time. I don't think I actually liked it, but it became my way of being. And eventually I did fall in love with it.”

It took her a long time to love the sport for the sake of itself. 

“I didn't race right away, but when I did start racing, very quickly mountain biking became about performance for me, and I was really addicted to the process of improving and getting results. I don't think I loved it then, but I knew that I was extremely motivated to do it. I'd say that I only learned to do it purely for the love of it after the Tokyo Olympic Games.”

And much of Smith’s life – at least the part of it she lives on the bike – can be divided into before and after Tokyo.

“The pre-Tokyo Haley is dead. Like that's not me anymore. I don't recognise a lot of those parts of myself. I feel very different now.”

The catharsis of the Olympic cycle being over led to a serious re-evaluation for Smith.

“I definitely have the drive to pursue mastery and to win races. But the all-consuming fire to compete at the Olympics, I could not conjure that now, even if I wanted to, because it broke me.”

This season, Smith is focused on marathon mountain bike and gravel racing, two non-Olympic disciplines, which she describes as having “a different vibe”. She’s focused on self-defined success, rather than seeking validation of her performances according to external criteria.

“Performing in a way that is meaningful to other people in society that just has no weight for me anymore,” she says.

As a MAAP privateer who is also supported by the Trek Driftless gravel racing team, Smith is able to enjoy the best of both worlds. She sets her own race program and is fortunate that in most cases her target events overlap with those her partners want her to be at.

“For the most part MAAP is very much, ‘we want you to be yourself and be authentic, and that includes picking the races that matter to you.’ And Trek is very similar. Their branding for Driftless is to compete, but do so with a smile. Making sure you're having fun and sharing the love of bikes with the community.”

Smith is not solely a cyclist, she’s also engaged in a postgraduate degree, an academic pursuit she describes as “a thing that I'm doing for the next four to six years”. It’s an admirable long-term endeavour, one that builds on her masters in sports psychology, but it’s also a demanding job – one that she must balance with her racing endeavours. This has not always been easy.

“Before this season, I probably would have said I was good at balancing both things. And then I developed these breathing problems, which my doctors all think are related to stress and anxiety.”

What presented initially as musculoskeletal and visceral issues, and prevented Smith from really attacking her training and racing schedule in the first half of 2024, now seem to have a neurological root cause. As Smith puts it, “my body gave me some red flags.”

“I think I struggle to say no, and I really struggle with the feeling of never being done. When you embark on a graduate degree, the end is years away. There are very few finish lines. There's always something you could be doing and I really, really don't handle that well. Whereas biking, you're prescribed your day's training and it's over.”

While balancing all these commitments is a challenge, privateering also allows Smith to give back. In collaboration with MAAP, she has created her own kit which is offered for sale on MAAP.cc – and a portion of the sales will be donated to a cause close to her heart.

“The Indigenous Youth Mountain Bike Program is based on the west coast of Canada and their mandate is to help indigenous populations, particularly kids, get out on the trails, and to build trails,” she explains.

“I'm very conscious of my privilege and how it interacts with my use of trails. Given that mountain biking has been my life for 15 years, and it's a complicated issue in Canada, I feel that mountain biking needs to make some efforts towards reconciliation and be a little less whitewashed.”

Smith has also done work with younger women athletes in the past – and when it comes to advice she would give her younger self, Smith comes back to the idea of self-defined success.

“Try to figure out why you want to do this and do it for you. Don't do it for anything else.”

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