Dame Laura Kenny admitted a lack of hunger to pursue an unprecedented sixth Olympic gold medal contributed to her decision to announce her retirement from cycling at the age of 31.
Kenny, Britain’s most decorated female Olympian, faced an improbable task to reach a fourth Games in Paris this summer having not returned to training after giving birth to her second child.
Realistically, she required an extraordinary performance at next month’s Track Nations Cup in Canada to stand any chance of making the squad, and for Kenny it ultimately came down to a question of priorities.
“Going on to win another gold medal, as much as I would love to do that, it wasn’t giving me the energy I wanted anymore, it just wasn’t,” Kenny told BBC Breakfast.
“I wasn’t thinking, ‘I really want to go on and win one’. I was thinking, ‘I really want to stay at home with the children’.”
Kenny and her husband, Sir Jason Kenny – Britain’s most decorated Olympian – last year welcomed a second son to their family and she said spending time at home was proving increasingly alluring to her.
She added: “I always knew deep down I would know when was the right time. I have had an absolute blast but now is the time for me to hang that bike up.
“It’s been in my head a little while, the sacrifices of leaving the children and your family at home is really quite big and it really is a big decision to make.
“More and more, I was struggling to do that. More people asking me what races was I doing, what training camps was I going on – I didn’t want to go ultimately and that’s what it came down to.
“I knew the minute I was getting those feelings. Once I said to Jase, ‘I don’t think I want to ride a bike anymore’, I started to feel relief.”
Kenny won team pursuit and omnium gold at both the 2012 and 2016 Olympic Games and madison gold at the 2020 Olympics, where she also won a silver medal in the team pursuit.
She is a seven-time world champion and 14-time European champion, won two Commonwealth Games titles and was British National Road Race champion in 2014.
Kenny said the “absolute highlight” of her career was the 2012 Games in London, during which her relationship with Jason also became public.
“I never thought I would go to a home Games, let alone go on to win two gold medals,” she said.
“When I look back, I’m like ‘wow, those two weeks did really change my life’.”
Tributes poured in following Kenny’s announcement, with former Olympic heptathlon champion Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill writing on Instagram: “Laura what an incredible career you have had!
“You are such a legend, always will be and you will continue inspiring! Enjoy this next chapter.”
Sprint great Mark Cavendish described Kenny as an “absolute legend”, while British Olympic Association chairman Sir Hugh Robertson wrote: “Dame Laura Kenny has been our greatest ever female Olympian and a huge part of cycling and Team GB’s success at London, Rio and Tokyo.
“However, as well as being an outstanding athlete, she has also been a wonderful personality. We will all miss her enormously and wish her, and her family, all the very best for the future.”
Kenny, made a Dame in the 2021 New Year’s Honours, hopes to be at this summer’s Paris Olympics “in some capacity” and wants to stay involved with the GB cycling team.
“There’s nothing set in stone but there are things I’m so interested in doing,” she added.
“Something to help the younger generation, whether that could be some kind of academy.
“I could never be a coach because that’s just too much pressure for me, but maybe something in the background that would help the youngsters have the opportunities I had.”
Great Britain team performance director Stephen Park paid tribute to Kenny, saying: “Laura hangs up her wheels as not just one of the sport’s greatest riders, but as one of the greatest sporting talents our country has ever produced.”
Park added: “Just as impressive, however, is the impact which Laura has had on her fellow riders on the GB cycling team and the next generation of Olympic hopefuls.
“She has been a beacon of inspiration for so many, young and old, and I’m sure that the entire British cycling community will join me in wishing her the very best in the next chapter of her life.”
Llori Sharpe claims historic gold for Jamaica at the 2024 Elite Caribbean Cycling Championships
Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA) donates JMD$1 million to Jamaica Cycling Federation for equipment upgrade
The Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA) has made a significant contribution to the development of cycling in Jamaica by donating JMD$1 million to the Jamaica Cycling Federation. The grant, aimed at boosting the sport’s progress, was used to purchase vital racing and training equipment, including state-of-the-art smart trainers.
The Jamaica Cycling Federation expressed its gratitude for the financial assistance, highlighting the importance of this investment in elevating the sport’s standards. Smart trainers have become increasingly popular in cycling programs worldwide due to their advanced capabilities, which are integral to modern training methods.
“These smart trainers are game changers,” said a spokesperson for the Federation. “They allow riders and coaches to approach training in a more scientific manner, offering features like measuring and tracking energy output, simulating race routes, and even enabling coaches to remotely access training data.”
This technological upgrade not only enhances training efficiency but also opens up new possibilities for coaches to closely monitor and optimize athletes' performance. The equipment's ability to simulate real-world racing conditions and provide accurate data on rider performance will help Jamaica’s cyclists prepare for international competition with cutting-edge tools.
The JOA's donation represents its ongoing commitment to supporting the development of underrepresented sports in Jamaica. “This contribution from the JOA is truly appreciated and confirms the continued support for the growth and development of sports like cycling,” the Federation said.
The equipment is expected to help Jamaica’s cyclists better prepare for regional and international competitions, as the nation continues to push for excellence across various sporting disciplines.
Dream on: Paul urges young T&T cyclists to keep pushing for Olympic feat as 2028 LA Games in sight
While looking ahead to possibly making another Olympic Games appearance in 2028 in Los Angeles, Trinidad and Tobago’s cycling stalwart, Nicholas Paul, is also hopeful that he will be able to share that occasion with a few more riders from the twin island republic.
Well aware of the depth of the talent that Trinidad and Tobago possesses, Paul, who relished a second-consecutive Olympic Games appearance at the just-concluded Paris showpiece, believes it is very much possible for those cyclists to also achieve their dreams of competing at the global multi-sport event.
The decorated Paul, who has numerous championship medals under his belt, and Kwesi Browne represented Trinidad and Tobago with much gusto and pride in Paris, as they gave their all on the track in both the sprint and keirin events, though both failed to make the finals.
“Team sprint, sprint, Keirin, team pursuit, I just want as many cyclists as possible to be able to make it on the Olympic stage,” Paul told the Express.
“It’s a big, big, big pool of talented young cyclists coming up. I have been trying to be a good role model for them, to let them know that they can come out here because the dream is possible. You just have to work hard. We can make a good driving force from juniors straight up to the elite,” he added.
Having contested both the Sprint and Keirin quarterfinals in Paris, Paul expressed an even deeper desire to improve his standards going forward, especially after watching Australian Matthew Richardson and Dutchman Harrie Lavreysen erase his previous world record of 9.100 in the flying 200 metres.
Lavreysen stopped the clock at 9.088 seconds, mere minutes after Richardson clocked 9.091 seconds.
“It (the quarterfinals) was not the outcome I wanted, but you live, you learn, and you come again. But I’m happy for Harrie. That was a great ride, and at the same time, it’s giving me more hunger to get back on that length to be able to break the world record and get that fast again,” Paul noted.
However, for now, the 25-year-old pointed out that the focus is on rest and recovery ahead of his next major assignment, the UCI Track World Championships scheduled for October 16-20 in Denmark.
“I think I’ll back off a bit, have a bit of a rest, and then go into Worlds. I’m really hungry, but at the same time, the build was until Paris. It was a bit stressful, so I have to ease off and then go into Worlds with as much form as possible,” Paul said.
On that note, Paul also expressed gratitude for the support from Trinidad and Tobago’s sporting enthusiasts, though some comments were not welcoming of the athletes’ overall efforts in Paris.
“I never think about the negatives because we could only work with the positives, and we have a lot of positives to work with. Moving forward, us athletes should come together and try to make Trinidad and Tobago better as a whole. Athletics, cycling, and every sport; to raise the level not only in Trinidad and Tobago, but in the Caribbean,” he ended.
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