I've been cycling since 2017, and spent my first 18 months in the sport focused on the track. In 2019, I switched over to road and moved to Belgium to give it a shot. 2020 was hard for me, as it was for everyone, but I achieved some pretty big goals of mine - including riding in the Tour of Flanders! In 2021, I struggled to find a racing rhythm but turned things around at just the right time. I was selected to represent Ireland twice, I wore the climber's jersey in a race with World Tour riders and I was crowned National Champion in my last race of the 2021 season. One of the most common questions I get is about how I got into cycling, and my journey with sport so far, so I have gone into that in a bit more detail here. I hope you enjoy reading it!
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I’ve been sporty since I was just a kid. I started off with a local running group at age 8, then moved onto swimming, which I did throughout my early teens. I started to do spinning classes when I was about 16 because my dad had joined. From there, it was a natural progression into triathlons. I did quite well in triathlons but I was quite unlucky – doing stupid things like pulling off my timing chip with my wetsuit and not getting results tracked.

After a couple of triathlon seasons, where bad luck seemed to follow me, I decided to go back to running. That was when I really started to become a more dedicated and competitive athlete and when I was moulded into the athlete that I am today. I had a brilliant coach, I claimed 2 national titles on track, and 2nd at cross country nationals. It wasn’t all good vibes though. I was stuck in a cycle of getting a good training block done, getting an injury, having to rest, repeat. I felt that I was never able to get to the level I was capable of because I just couldn’t seem to break out of that rut.
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When I left university, I was a bit lost – I had fallen out of my training routine, and felt I didn’t really have any goals, something I hadn’t experienced in a longtime. I was living in London, and I decided to sign up for the Hackney Half. Having that goal made me determined again, and I started to get into really good shape.

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"I have never been more focused on anything. I used to lie in bed, and play the beeps that would signal the start of the team pursuit event."

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It was about that time that Cycling Ireland were starting up their Talent Transfer program. I had no idea what it entailed, I had never considered being a cyclist. My mum encouraged me to book flights and just come back to Ireland to try out. I thought, why not? I’d get to go home for a weekend and see my family so it sounded like a good idea.
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I did my first tests with Cycling Ireland in March 2017, aged nearly 24, and received word within a few weeks that my tests were good enough to get me through to the next round. I followed a 6-week training program and then came back to do a final round of testing. I was deemed good enough to make it as part of the national squad and I began attending training camps at the Irish training hub in Mallorca. Eventually, a greater commitment was needed, and in March 2018, I moved out to Mallorca to train full-time.
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I think that sounds like the dream to a lot of people, but it was actually an incredibly stressful time. When I look back on it, it was probably the time that I least enjoyed cycling. It was a high-pressure environment; we were training on the velodrome as much as possible, on a fast-track national program(meaning we had to learn quickly), and the difference between a good day and a bad day would come down to a matter of milliseconds. We also didn’t have any funding, which meant that I was relying on ‘Bank of Mum and Dad’ for very basic things like food shops and rent – not what I envisaged for myself at 25! Add to that the fact that cycling is a pretty expensive sport, and you can imagine why I was stressed.
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Throughout 2018, I trained relentlessly for one big goal: going to the European Track Championships in August. I have never been more focused on anything. I used to lie in bed, and play the beeps that would signal the start of the team pursuit event. I would go through every feeling in my head – the tension at the start line, the force through the pedals once we began, every bend of the track. I get nervous even thinking about it now! One month before the event, some new athletes were brought into the mix, and at the end of July 2018, I was told I hadn’t been selected on the team.
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That was one of those moments that I see as a crossroads in my life. I could make the choice to stay home and mope (which is what I felt like doing), or I could go and use my fitness elsewhere. So, I decided to go to Belgium and try my hand at bike racing there for a few weeks. I look back on that now and think it was fate that I didn’t get selected. As cheesy as it sounds, I am so grateful that I came to Belgium then. As soon as I got here in August 2018, I loved it. I started to finally understand why people liked cycling so much, and how fun road racing could be! Within a few months, I left the Cycling Ireland set-up in Mallorca and moved here.

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"That was one of those moments that I see as a crossroads in my life. I could make the choice to stay home and mope (which is what I felt like doing), or I could go and use my fitness elsewhere."

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In 2019, I started my first ever road-racing season. I signed with a team, S-Bikes Bodhi, and for the first time in my life, I had a brand new bike, with disc brakes andDi2. I was thrown in at the deep end – I went from barely any road racing experience, to riding against pros at 35-40km/h in a Belgian peloton. I got comfortable with being uncomfortable, and I started to embrace the fear that I was feeling. All that pushing myself to my limits paid off, and I started to find myself closer and closer to the front of the peloton. I had a couple of solo breakaways, a couple of attacks and even nabbed a 2nd place for myself at the Nationals. I got through to the semi-finals of Zwift Academy last year, after breaking my arm and being confined to the turbo trainer, and was in with a chance to win a professional contract with a World Tour team.

2020 brought about a lot of uncertainty around racing, so I returned to Ireland to be with my family for a while. While I was there, I began to dabble a bit in Zwift racing and used it as a motivation and a way of keeping race-ready when it seemed like everything was on hold. Eventually, things got back to (relatively) normal, and I returned to Belgium to resume racing. I was super fit in July and August - I ended up getting my first Belgian win and some other good results, so I was asked to come as a stagiaire to a UCI team, Ciclotel, at the end of the season. Unfortunately, all the long hours and tough training I had done over lockdown had really built up at this stage, and my motivation dipped completely. I started in the Tour of Flanders and Brugge-De Panne but I really didn't have the condition or mental game to be there.

At the beginning of 2021, I got COVID, and had to take 2 weeks completely off training, followed by 2 weeks of very gradually building up again. This came just as my training would have been ramping up for my racing season, and as a result, I came into February without much form. My coach suggested trying out for the Movistar e-team as a way of keeping motivated while I rebuilt my fitness, and to my surprise, I ended up getting onto the team! I ticked off a lot of my goals in the 2021 season - I represented Ireland twice, I wore the climber's jersey at a race with World Tour riders, won the National Road Championships, and signed my first professional cycling contract with Plantur Pura!

2022 brought about a new set of difficulties, when I was hit by a car at the beginning of the year and suffered some very traumatic injuries. I had 5 surgeries over the course of the year. It's a topic I find difficult to talk about because it was the lowest point of my life.

Luckily, I made a full recovery (or as close to it as possible) and got back to racing in 2023 with Fenix Deceuninck. I had a pretty limited racing calendar, but I made the most of it. I signed a new contract with Hess Cycling Team for 2024 and I'm excited for what's ahead!

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