Unconventional: A Conversation with Heather Jackson

May 28, 2026

Only three weeks after finishing in fourth at the 2026 Cocodona 250 Mile, American Heather Jackson is gearing up for a completely different event: the 350-mile Unbound XL gravel cycling event. It’s a race she won with a course record last year. She’s planning on following that up a couple of weeks later with the 2,745-mile Tour Divide self-supported bikepacking race stretching north to south across western Canada and the western United States. And two months after that? UTMB.

Completing just one of these events would be enough for most athletes, but Jackson is trying to fit all of them into one season. Why these races? Between Cocodona 250 Mile, Unbound XL, Tour Divide, and UTMB, Jackson has chosen the Super Bowl equivalents in 200 milers, gravel cycling, bikepacking, and mountain ultrarunning. Jackson explains, “I am always intrigued by racing the big races where the best are there, and seeing, ‘Ok, this is where I stack up.’” Jackson is far more than an elite ultrarunner, and when she came to trail running in 2022, she had no intention of doing it in a conventional manner. I.RUN.FAR