Adrian Alfonso: Trails, Truth, and Reconciliation on Two Wheels

Adrian Alfonso has been building trails in Winnipeg since he was a kid ripping around on a BMX bike in South Osborne. Today, he's a cyclist, trail builder, Indigenous advocate, and founder of Clear Paths, a program that uses cycling routes and green spaces as a framework for Truth and Reconciliation education. Stuart sits down with Adrian to talk about what trails can teach us, what it means to be a contemporary First Nations person in Winnipeg, and why the land beneath our wheels has a lot more to say than most of us realize.

We're talking:

• How Adrian's childhood on the "monkey trails" became the foundation for a life of advocacy

• What Clear Paths is, and how it leads participants through a guided experience of language, relationship, and reconciliation

• The idea that a good trail connects the best places together, and how that philosophy shapes his approach to community building

• His concept of "my truth plus your truth equals reconciliation," and what active listening actually looks like in practice

Connect with Adrian on Instagram at @adrianacorn

Connect with the Clear Paths program on Instagram at @clear_paths_cycling

Episode Transcript:

Stuart Murray 0:00

This podcast was recorded on the ancestral lands, on treaty one territory, the traditional territory of the Anishinaabe Cree Oji Cree Dakota and the Dene peoples, and on the homeland of the Metis nation.

Amanda Logan (Voiceover) 0:20

This is humans on rights, a podcast advocating for the education of human rights. Here's your host, Stuart Murray,

Stuart Murray 0:31

from the trails of Winnipeg to the forefront of indigenous advocacy. Adrian Alfonso is a man in motion, literally and figuratively, a passionate cyclist, trail builder and community leader, Adrian has dedicated himself to creating space for indigenous peoples in the outdoors, one path at a time. He's here today to share his journey, his vision and why the trails we build and the ones we protect matter for generations to come. Adrian Alfonso, welcome to humans on rights, and I understand that you have a land acknowledgement you'd like to share with our listeners.

Adrian Alfonso 1:09

Yes. Boozoo, good morning. My name is Adrian Alfonso, born and raised in Winnipeg. Matt to about Canada. Those three words have been an important thing to reference to myself, is acknowledging the land that we have been on, are currently on and always will be together. We're going to say winnipee. I'll ask that you attempt to join me. Winnipee. Winnipee. This is loosely translated from Cree or in pneumon as I know it, and is to mean murky waters. There's also Anishinaabeg word for it, which is very similar, but I'm not going to share that here in this land acknowledgement today. So we got 1p and then we got manitabou, join in if you feel like it

Stuart Murray 2:06

manitiabou

Adrian Alfonso 2:06

about once, manitiu about. And what this loosely translates from is um, the Narrows, where the Great Spirit is, and there's a physical place in our in our province, where that's a geographical feature that has been visited for a very long time for very good reasons, and it like man to about, means the drumming of the Great Spirit. When you where the Great Spirit sits and drums. So we got two references now of where we might be. And the third one is Canada. This is the language of this the language family is called wendu at this is of your on Iroquois, and that translates to the village. So my form of land acknowledgement is to always honor the original place names, the language it's spoken in, and of course, the people who are still here speaking that language. When we also do a land acknowledgement, we're doing something that is loosely taken from the Haudenosaunee Thanksgiving address. So it's in the book called braiding sweetgrass by Robin wall Kilmer, and there's a page in there that walks us through the gratitude and acknowledgement of all things affiliated with one space and or a combination of spaces. Also would like to acknowledge that Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, exists because of a watershed, and that this place is based around the story of waters and the travel of it, it is great to be here and continue conversations on what trails look and feel like since then, until now, and with collaborative efforts based upon and respect what good trails be like in the future. So thank you.

Stuart Murray 4:21

Yeah, Adrian, thanks for the for the acknowledgement. Thanks for, you know, giving me a chance to sort of share it with you. I think that's important. I really, you know, would love to start the conversation off with you by by getting a sense of, you know, I went on to YouTube. I followed some of the things you've done. You know, there you've seconded with your daughter how important that is to you, some of the articles in the free press that you've been involved in. And, I mean, you do a lot of stuff. I mean, we're going to get into a lot of stuff that you do, Adrian, but let's kind of start at the beginning, if you don't mind what, what got you interested in. Relationship of cycling the paths that we you are on, understanding what that relationship looks like to the creator and and how you're trying to bring people along on that journey, to let them understand it through your perspective.

Adrian Alfonso 5:19

Well, choose the shallow version, and we won't go as deep, but I'll touch on all the points that would guide us to this journey. It's a very big story. We'll start with an area of Winnipeg called South Osborne area, so Riverview community. My relationship with the bicycle has been a lifelong my parents were young. I was the first born, but they both had his and hers. Si kini road bikes, the 10 suites and they my, my dad installed the rear seat, and say, 1983 84 where our kids traveled on the backs of us instead of the front. And we'd spend all day outside. They pack what they needed, and we would just cycle all day, I would fall asleep in that, that little baby seat. So being outside by bicycle has been that's where it began, is the ability just to freely go and that, that sense of being outside all day and having what you need. When we moved to South Osborne. I grew up on a street called Brandon Avenue, which is right at the corner of hay and Brandon, where the, I guess the Marina is now, and the rowing club. So I wasn't allowed to go very far my at first, my parents established that I can ride my bike up and down the street. It's a long street, so I was content ripping up and down my little 20 inch wheels BMX, and just having a blast, stopping at my boundary, turning around, coming back. I would do that for hours, met somebody across the street who was doing the same thing because his parents also said, No, here, you got to stay where we can see you. So my friends and I, who continue to grow up in that neighborhood would naturally be transportation, recreation by bike. And our boundaries were the train tracks that are on the west side of the community called Lord Roberts, the river on the east, which is the Red River, the st Patel Bridge, which is the south end of Osborne, and then the underpass, you know, that's a dangerous area where confusion corners. So throughout my three teens, we'd just be hauling around together, making decisions on the fly. And we got into the what we call quote, unquote, monkey trails that were along the river, and we found that they connected from the forks, which is out of our boundary, all the way down to the bridge drive and along Churchill drive. But that's about seven and a half eight kilometers of just freedom that we could spend at just a forever time right together.

Stuart Murray 8:50

Adrian, tell me a little bit about monkey trails. Who How did they start? Were they just like kind of renegade people like yourself who were exploring is that kind of the history of monkey trails.

Adrian Alfonso 9:02

Monkey trails were created by then, at that time, very established cycling groups out of bicycle shops. So I knew that Gords cycling club would be coming by on Wednesday evenings, and they would be maintaining and riding the trails on their weekly group ride. Woodcock cycle club would come through on Tuesday nights. And, you know, Olympia would occasionally, when they're out this, out that far, doing that loop, they'd come through once in a while. And these groups, in my mind's eye, were massive. They must have had anywhere between eight, at the bare minimum, up to 30 or 40 club members. And so it was like a parade wasn't allowed to join. I. But as I learned their schedule, I was able to meet and stay within my area, and then I was invited to join a bike club multiple times. And then by 15, as 15 years old, I said, you know, I got to ask my parents if I could join it by club. So that was the beginning, for sure, is being invited instead of asking to join. I think that was an impactless part.

Stuart Murray 10:33

Yeah. And, I mean, just for somebody who you know, as you say, Adrian, you're, you kind of had your boundaries initially, you know, kind of ripping up and down the street now you're out in nature. I mean being in trails that are not created by anybody other than other riders,

Adrian Alfonso 10:49

just community, right? We built trails, yeah, and my relationship with water and the trails were immediate. I understand trail design at a young age, I understand trail material. I understood this thing called a corridor, which is height, width and tread of trails. I understood what people preferred by just seeing where the trailer is and how it had moved from being kind of off to the right 10 meters. And now people are preferring over here because of the water that year, 1997 was the flood. We're 16, and pretty much took every every trail that we were not just maintaining or building and sculpting, but it erased everything for many years, and the trees, my relationship with the trees at that time were, they were all quite upright. And then after that, the ice and the softness of the ground kind of just lent them in a bit. They're all leaning in. So it was a is interesting. It's great to learn at that age, not just what I would like in a trail, but what others prefer,

Stuart Murray 12:17

yeah, and I, you know, to go through that, you know, I mean, Manitoba, you know, we're sort of a flood plain. It happens, you know, more than we would like. I mean, there's precautions that are put in place with respect to the floodway and that sort of thing. But, yeah, I can't imagine, sort of the notion of what's something that you've grown accustomed to, that you know, is very meaningful you to you and the others that are riding there to just get kind of wiped out.

Adrian Alfonso 12:47

It was great because we had an opportunity to collaborate again. You know, some people did a lot more work than others, but that's just showing up the way you need to, or how you can as a young teenager who was just my only job was to be in high school, I would skip school to go around the bikes on the trails with some of my friends who are my accomplices and the maintenance of our trail network, but at the same time understanding that there's little or nothing you can do with a trail section. Or what we call slumping, is when the river just gets enough water on the high side, and then the freezing, the freeze and thaw of spring kind of just wedges massive. Sections of trail right into the river, and I feel like that's a natural thing, something that shouldn't be really we don't need to manage that, that that relationship of what the river does, it's none of our business. She's just going to do what she needs to do. As that grew we were and we're on cycling, a cycling club that basically cranked open my ability to go with them to not just other areas of the city, because I am supervised. I'm 1516, I'm part of a group that will take care of me. Then there would be the weekend rides where we would all go out of the city and explore. Well for me, is exploration other trail networks, and once I started competing as a mountain bike racer, then I truly seen and felt what a competition or sport level mountain bike trail looked like. So yeah, evolved very It feels like over a long period of time, but from the age of five to 15 looking back, that's just 10 years. But the growth was exponential, and my relationship that had basically shaped the rest of those years

Stuart Murray 15:09

until now. So would you say, Adrian, that a lot of your education, and I'm not talking about in in kind of the traditional sense of education, but you know, obviously, if you had a chance to either go for a ride or go to school, you're going for a ride. Would you say that that became sort of the grounding of a lot of education that you have in terms of what you do today, when you talk about the relationship of riding, the relationship of Earth, the relationship of the environment, to how we need to understand and protect it.

Adrian Alfonso 15:44

I'm very much an experiential learner, which guided my way to where I am now as an experiential educator, and I apply those methods of of learning just by doing and then reflecting, rather than knowledge based, and then practice, and then execution, kind of flip that around backwards. Let's just go and do it, and then we'll intently and deeply unpack it after, and those will be gifts that are from that experience that you'll probably hold forever. So that's that was an important part. Another one is relationships. So in Winnipeg, specifically, we have a relationship with land ownership, a land ownership that goes right to the middle of the river. Some people would believe that if you have a rougher front property, and as I was exploring and joining in on rides, there would be large sections of riding through communities that you have to ride on Scotia street or cadona Avenue or what else we go wosley and some parts of the other northern half so the city, and then once we got to the same river that was just like awesome trails, but very fragmented with connectivity because of whole ownership. So understanding that the word no or no trespassing is I is not just based around respect, but just like, No, like just, it's just just accept that you cannot go there. That's not for everybody. And I began to question that, why in our city do we not have linear park spaces on both sides of every river that we have, which is three main rivers, and then we that's where my journey of being curious and looking into things kind of began is raising question of, wouldn't it be great, like a challenge statement, Wouldn't it be great if and then I would just keep that with me on my rides. And you know now that guides me today as a not just a consultant, but as a person who knows what it feels like to be with a group of people going through this space and where and when to stop, because it's not just important, but just a good place to have a conversation or two. Yeah, that's kind of broken up, but that brings us closer to where we are today.

Stuart Murray 18:34

Yeah, interesting. I just want to explore for a second. Adrian, when you you know, you talk about having linear trails, which, you know, we don't have. There's fragmentation. And you know, I spend a bit of time in Ottawa, and you know, they have the canal in Ottawa, which is very public, you know, whereas in Winnipeg, I mean, you have areas around the forks and different places where there is more public space. And then, of course, there's more private space in Winnipeg, which is one of the challenges that you would talk about, with respect to, you know, fragmentation. Did you ever have conversations with any maybe an organization, a private citizen who did not said no trespassing or something? Did you ever have a conversation with them say, Would you be open for us to have a trail come through, you know, respectfully come through your property, which will maintain Is that something you've ever explored in your curiosity? Absolutely not.

Adrian Alfonso 19:31

Yeah, there would be not a safe or respectful space for a young indigenous man having any conversation with any landowner.

Stuart Murray 19:43

Unfortunately, yeah, fair comment, and I appreciate how you you put that because I you know you're you obviously are a curious person. You know that that allows you to, you know, take you outside your comfort zone and do things. Which we're going to get into some of that stuff, like your competitiveness, but, you know, I appreciate you framing that Adrian, because, you know, there are some that would say that while it may be private it, you know, it, there still is a relationship to the land and the water and, you know, just having that opportunity, but I appreciate how you respected that, and I appreciate how you framed it being a young Indigenous person, which is unfortunate your experience, but I appreciate your honesty. You know, I think that's important.

Adrian Alfonso 20:35

Things are changing. Things are changing now. So what my lived experience up until now has been just full of micros and macros with relationships and conversations. So that's where, like I said, I respected the word or the intention of no without engaging.

Stuart Murray 20:58

So acceptance, yeah, fair fair comment. Tell me a little bit about your your your relationship of cycling and being in school. I mean, did you, did you graduate?

Adrian Alfonso 21:12

Unfortunately, not graduated with my graduating class from trip to high school, but I did attend other colleges and experiences, which is like a great, a great way to say that there are other cycling groups that exist, and it's, it's been a great journey. One of my biggest sort of aha moments was when I was employed by or employed with, I'd rather say, employed with a natural cycle courier, which is a cooperative, so delivering packages that were still highly important to move by people and a great time in a good time. And there was a worker Co Op, so it was a consensus decision making opportunity, and I think that was my school of collaboration and having nonpartisan debates on how things move forward, which was the birth of my volunteer after that into strike up committees, ad hoc community committees, and eventually leading to participation on boards.

Stuart Murray 22:29

So let's kind of explore that a little bit. Adrian, you, you're obviously engaged in writing. You're engaged in clubs. You let's talk a little bit about how you got competitive. You know, what? Where did you see that? And how did you see that? From your perspective, always maintaining your understanding of the importance of riding a bike and being on the land, yeah.

Adrian Alfonso 22:52

So what we have is a natural sense for everybody that after about half an hour and we're in wilderness, and we were just experiencing wilderness on its own, with or without a bicycle, our bodies recognize and remember that, and we start going to a state of, I'd have to say, A natural state of noticing breathing differently. We have endorphins and oxytocin being released. If we're alone, that's what's happening. But if we're up with when we're with others, we're also connecting. We're also finding each other. And then whether you're with somebody or not, you're also re engaging your relationship with the land. She's going to teach you, and you're going to learn. You're just going to observe experience, and you're going to learn something new. She's also healing at that same time. So I hadn't realized and put a finger on it. But for me, mountain biking was a way to access that experience, the ability to begin at my house, or my home or wherever I'm staying, get to a green space or just a space that I like, and then just be there and benefit from making the effort to get there and enjoy and then coming home a slightly different person than I was when I left, whether I learned something new or the natural spaces just did what they needed to be.

Stuart Murray 24:44

So, so share, if you can Adrian, you know what, what sorts of things would you? Would you learn when you came back, when you start to reflect on where you started your journey, you're going through the green space, or whatever it may be. And then when you when you come. What sorts of things would you? Would you share with people that you learned I would go

Adrian Alfonso 25:05

on a mission to root find and root connect, because I love utilizing all sorts of existing pathways and green spaces. So I'm always trying to create our attempt to create a very natural way of getting through multiple green spaces by one experience within a two hour period. So a duration of two hour and I'd have these loops in our city. Some of them were called the West Loop, the North Loop, at South Loop, not so much the East loop, that one is really hard for me to do. But by creating these loops that I can share with others, to show them all the spaces was very important. So the quality of the spaces was highly important. I believe now, in hindsight, that a good trail only connects the best places together, not a good Trail is a good experience. So that was my form of the foundation of what a route finding or route experience is about I'll repeat that again, because I feel like I could do it just a little bit better. But to me, a trail connects the best places to get. That's it. How you design that trail is completely up to the community or the professionals, as long as we're connecting places of importance, preferably green spaces that are still somewhat natural, water features, diverse forests, and then come back and connect together with other trails, is highly important to me, and

Stuart Murray 26:59

I, You know, just interesting that when I think about some of the stuff, when I researched you that you've been involved in with the, you know, the clear paths you're a founder of, that the traditional trails and advocacy, the indigenous youth mentorship that you're involved in, I mean, you're obviously incredibly active, and in many areas, let's talk about clear paths. You know you're the founder of that. Talk a little bit about what, what is that Adrian share for listeners, and why is that important for you? What does that mean for you?

Adrian Alfonso 27:32

Yeah, absolutely so right now, clear paths is reimagined and redirected, and what clear pass offers is Truth and Reconciliation workshops based upon trails as reconciliation, which was formed around and with my friend Justin levier, Justin Bear, where we physically bring people through nodes of interest and storytelling about facts of indigenous and Canadian history together, I offer that skill. I offer that essence of being together, compiling it into a workshops, series of workshops, and then we work together when you are reconciliation ready. So again, we have nonpartisan discussions around our relationships together between Indigenous and nondigenous people using trails. So okay,

Stuart Murray 28:32

so just, let's get a little bit granular Adrian, if we could. But so so we would meet at a dedicated spot you that you would determine we all have our bikes so, so let's, let's walk through that journey. You, you sort of talk to give people a sense of of who you are, or what your expectations are, or how would somebody get engaged in, in in that journey, and and then just, do you stop and chat and give people a sense to engage and understand and just just walk us through a typical clear path day, if there will or a program, I'm not sure if I'm using the right words there, but so

Adrian Alfonso 29:13

the program that I offer, or we offer, is completely accessible, so it's based on a relationship. If you want a walking tour, we'll do that you need in four walls presentation style workshop. We can also bring the information to you, and we'll have visuals and things set up. But what's really important is that no matter the size of the group that most people should be able to join in at its best or at its biggest, we'll all be together outside navigating some topics that we get to collaborate on and have an experience where we learn from Yeah, some of the topics are like. And language of the land relationships and then reconciliation. So there's like a guided, guided journey through that process, and we visit each one. So the beginning of our session today, I did a personal land acknowledgement. And so we, for example, would reflect on what that looks and feels like, just kind of like what we did in our little session here. And then we move to other spaces to continue more conversations on relationships and unpacking what that looks and feels like in many ways, and then what reconciliation is.

Stuart Murray 30:42

And from your perspective, if I'm the student or the person who is part of your clear paths program, how would you share with me what reconciliation looks like if we're in a green space, we've arrived either by walking or by bike, and you say it's accessible, which is fantastic. How would you like to share what, what you you would like to teach, or you would like me to learn at that moment about reconciliation in that space.

Adrian Alfonso 31:16

So of course, it requires a building, or a building of a vessel for these conversations to continue and have dialog based upon respect and, of course, care. And once we get to discussing reconciliation, we ensure that there is no reconciliation without truth. And I've been instructed by or advised by many indigenous people who also do this work that we cannot talk about reconciliation without truth and reconciliation. So that's where that trust comes in. And once we all feel or have an inkling of what it feels like to be heard, then what we have created is an opportunity to everybody to share their truth and not to be questioned on that truth. So throughout my years of doing this together, I've come to the conclusion that my truth plus your truth equals reconciliation. So it's, uh, what do we call that? I'm still working on the word called August, active listening. We get to active practice, active listening and then share truth. We really, really love to use Maurice and killers for questions of identifying our truths. That takes a lot of work before we get to that truth and reconciliation part. But that's the that's the basis, is understanding who we are as we understand it. What is our truth? I can always just feel how important that is to people, to be filled, held and heard. Yep. As far as reconciliation, you know that could look many different ways, but there is a Venn diagram that I really love to bring out. It is, how do you like your reconciliation? And it's presented and created by the Yellowhead Institute. And there's four, four types of reconciliation, there's easy, symbolic, impactful and transformation. And I'll leave it up for the listeners to look into that themselves. Thank you.

Stuart Murray 33:56

Yeah, no, for sure. Yeah, you know Adrian when I, you know, when your name came up as a possible guest to be on this podcast, I was excited because I think one of the one of the reasons I I've started this podcast, was to have people like you at, you know, I whether you call yourself an educator, an advocate or both, which is fine, but to always look at, you know, the human rights lens on various issues when you talk about what you do as a, you know, sort of, I don't know if you and you're an indigenous man, clearly, you have a relationship to Mother Earth, and you know, you're, you're, you're you're out there teaching people who you know through active listening, want to understand a little bit more about reconciliation and and I think, from my perspective, Adrian, it's, it's such a very unique. The process that you're you're working on, and so how do you feel? Let me just back up. How did you come up with that? How did you come up with the idea of trying to take the fact that you love cycling, the fact that you love, you know, kind of being initially on monkey trails, you love being out in nature, and then looking at that and saying, here's an opportunity to take this process and bring reconciliation, which is so part of what Canadians, all of us have to do to work on to really understand who we are as Canadians. Yeah, absolutely.

Adrian Alfonso 35:41

I love that, that the intersectionality of being a cyclist is also correlated with being marginalized. As a marginalized person in our society, specifically Winnipeg, there are everyday instances that just add up, and that's just your day of microaggressions and macro aggressions of displacement. I'm sure you or any other cyclists have been shouted at from a moving vehicle, or not shot by that and just aggressively passed, or just constantly being told by other people that you just simply don't belong where you currently are. And so it that was the entryway for me to be like, Aha, I'm riding a bicycle. I may look indigenous, but that really doesn't matter. What matters is I'm on a bike, and there's people who are not liking that. And then I brought into my everyday lived experience, maybe every weekly now, nowadays, because of my position of you know, how things are now, things have changed. So that was my end. That was my end to invite people to consider that feeling in your body to not being welcome as a cyclist, no matter the age. Who you are, you, we have all felt that in our car centric communities, right from a young age. You know, maybe in our way, back when we're very small people who are paying attention to us and not being so disrespectful, but they're still annoyed about our presence, and that's what it's like to be indigenous in Winnipeg. So now that we got that common ground, how do we open up conversations about land use and how we got here in the first place. I'm extremely hopeful with that common ground that we already have, that there is compassion already and people who are interested in learning about relationship by bicycle and navigating Winnipeg is also a colonial concept of many different peers and pillars. But Winnipeg is a colonial city, and it is operating still on colonial ideas and this disruption of natural spaces for all of us to go, reset, re, heal, rethink, regenerate, recreate. They're far and few between compared to other spaces that provide that. So it was easy, and the second layer was as an indigenous person in 2026 who am I? It's clear that people and Canadians have a clear idea of indigenous people in history books and by learning through Canadian history about indigenous people and my rides and experiences are not about the history of indigenous people. My rides are from an indigenous person, and that is difference in indigenous tourism is not about indigenous people, but led by and from indigenous person. I am using this word called contemporary. So what is it like to be a contemporary First Nations? Matt, I love to DJ electronic music that's based around UK culture. I love the bicycle, just like all of us, I probably have a really deep. Deep connection with my bicycle, just like you do as an indigenous person, I love all sorts of ethnic foods, so to kind of change the cognitive bias of what an indigenous person is right now, so that you and I and our peers, and continue rekindling our relationship,

Adrian Alfonso 40:27

to change our cognitive biases on what an indigenous person is. I'm not filling that, that role of representing all indigenous people, but as a person who was born in the early 80s, we've loved a long life. And what's next? How can we come together forward? And the truth is, we have to share our truths, and then we can come and collaborate. Yeah, that's what that is. That's where it began, and that's where we are now.

Stuart Murray 41:01

Adrian, would you say that you've seen some when you said there's been changes? Changes, sometimes are good, sometimes they're not. You know, when you use the word there's been changes, would you reflect on on how you say that, to say that that's there are good changes?

Adrian Alfonso 41:18

Yeah. So with friction here's fire, and I believe that the fire is intended to be there. It's not intended to be snuffled or put out. That fire needs to burn. So the critical the first critical mass movement was protest, and it was weekly, and it always happened. And then a major event happens where the police were involved, and that fragmented and began so many different advocacy groups that were so impactful from that one statement. And then we move over to Idle No More, where indigenous contemporary people were living, and they said, No more. We won't stand by because it's enough. Same thing as critical mass. And then from that event, people like myself, who were urban indigenous people, started to think about, what is my role, and who am I in that community? And then you bring those two together. So now we got an explosion of cycling and bike lanes in communities, and we also have, in my view, an explosion of indigenous advocacy, the releasing of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission report of health action, we have other things happening all at the same time. What such as history is it's like it's not just one major event and then another one. Sometimes it's all kind of happens at the same time. In my world, I just as was part of both

Stuart Murray 43:03

at the same time. Let me ask you just about your competitiveness. Are you still competitive with cycling and BMXing and whatever, whatever, whatever you sort of is your jam these days. I have

Adrian Alfonso 43:17

tools that have built from those experiences, and I do offer very fun, playful coaching sessions where I've acquired a lot of unique and obscure ways of learning essential skills that are fun, and I will not do it any other way. If you're with me and we're doing a little session or two, or with your group, we are going to have a blast. And that was very important for me as an accessible sort of mindset, is cycling can be extremely serious on the sport and but it doesn't have to be serious all the time. So we all are eight year olds on our front street who can't go anywhere being creative and seeing how long our skid mark is that day.

Stuart Murray 44:17

You know, like Adrian, there's so much more, but I kind of love that as a great way maybe to wrap up our conversation, because I just think, you know, we've all kind of done exactly that. And look back and, you know, I grew up in a town where we didn't have, we have had gravel roads, so our skid marks could be pretty long, frankly. But you know, just always to kind of measure that Adrian, if, if if somebody's listening to this and say, Man, I just would love to learn more about what Adrian Alfonso is. Is into. I'd love to explore it more. How might they do that? What would you advise people to do? Who is listening?

Adrian Alfonso 44:53

Yeah, absolutely. I appreciate that question, and I love that you shared a quick story about your relationship with this. Kid, what? What a sensation. No kidding. I hope that we all remember what that feels like one day. So I do have an Instagram handle. I believe, as a person, in my situation, that is the most organic way. So on Instagram I handle is Adrian acorn, and people are welcome to follow me. I think I currently have it on private. But you know what? Follow me anyways, and I'll follow you back. But I do welcome all questions through that media platform. I like it for that. So thank you. Let's engage and see what, see what we're doing together.

Stuart Murray 45:47

Yeah, yeah, fantastic. And I and we'll make sure that we put put that into the show notes. Adrian people that this is also transcribed and people can get that because I, I just think getting in touch with you and exploring what you do, which is, you do a lot, and so it's important, I think, that anybody listening to this, they have an avenue to connect with you. So Adrian Alfonso, I thank you so much for finding some time to have a conversation with me on on this humans on rights podcast. You know, I will at the side of my desk if you have time at some point further on, I would love to have you on to talk about all the things we didn't get to that you're involved in, which are numerous, but this has been a great intro to who Adrian Alfonso is, and I appreciate taking the time to join me today. Thank you very much.

Matt Cundill 46:40

Thanks for listening to humans on rights. A transcript of this episode is available by clicking the link in the show notes of this episode. Humans on rights is recorded and hosted by Stuart Murray. Social Media Marketing by Buffy Davey, music by Doug Edmond. For more, go to human rights hub.ca.

Tara Sands (Voiceover) 47:01

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