Nicole Cooke

olympic gold medal, Beijing (2008) and World Road Race Track Gold (2008)

There are so many factors bigger than you at play in any one moment in a road race. A sudden twist or turn in the road, and the race can be won or lost in a flash. In any time, all your work, your perseverance and all your sacrifices can come to a sudden finish.

There are plenty of ditches along the route of a road racer

It’s all about your ability to convert overwhelming, sometimes very unfair situations, into positive energy and outcomes. Getting back up and on the road, literally.

In my racing career, I was lucky to achieve exhilarating records for women’s cycling. Gender barriers happened all along the path in cycling. There is sexism in British cycling and it is pervasive globally.

These blocks constantly create disproportionate challenges for women in the sport, no question.

When I stepped forward from competing and started a career in the private sector, I continued to make these barriers visible and dismount as many as I could. On both doping and gender bias, I have made submissions to UK Sport, British Cycling, international racing organizations, the press U.K. Parliamentary committees to impact change

Commonwealth, Olympic and World road race champion, Nicole Cooke retired in 2013 at the age of 29. Now in the private sector, she still champions the cause of women in sports. Nicole Cooke’s trajectory from a village in Wales to the international podium is captured in her book: The Breakaway.