Personality of the Month - Jessica Varnish, GB Cycling Team
What is your job or other main activity that involves cycling?
Full time at school, working through GSCE’s. Hoping to stay on for A levels
Where do you live?
Finstall Bromsgrove Worcs.
What most encourages you about cycling where you live?
I’m very lucky as I have an outdoor velodrome about 5 miles away from my home, also the lanes and countryside around here are great roads to train on.
What most discourages you about cycling where you live?
Traffic at peak times.
How would you describe yourself as a cyclist?
Focussed.
What is you earliest cycling memory?
Probably doing “Pee Wee” MTB races when my dad was racing, he used to run behind me to make sure I was OK.
Where is the best place you have ever cycled?
Australia was nice but the roads were very heavy. The velodrome in Ghent was cool.
What is your greatest achievement, in terms of encouraging more people to cycle?
Well, I recently won Hereford and Worcs Junior Female sports personality against the all the more mainstream sports. This really shows how strong cycling is becoming in the sporting world.
What single thing do you think would do most to encourage more cycling in the UK?
More indoor tracks, without doubt. It gives a safe coaching environment and is breeding the best riders in the world. Why don’t we have one in the Midlands?
What has been your favourite cycling experience?
Racing for Great Britain last year for the first time was very special as I was actually too young, but was given special permission to compete in Vienna, and did quite well (beating the British record for the flying 200m time trial). Also doing an international sprint event at Revolution series in Manchester on my birthday was great.
What was your worst cycling experience?
I don’t really have one. Racing with the best is always hard and you have to live with your own, and sometimes other peoples, mistakes.
What is it about using your bike that you like the most?
Coming off the banking at full throttle in a flying 200m effort is amazing…
The answers given are the opinion of the individual and do not necessarily reflect those of any organisation they may represent.
