New: Joanna Rowsell

Welcome to Joanna Rowsell’s new blog at thetalkofsport.com. Joanna is the women’s team pursuit World Champion. The 21-year-old cyclist took gold in 2008 and 2009 and will now be looking to add an Olympic gold to her collection in 2012.

In December of last year an announcement was made about changes to the track cycling Olympic programme. This caused a lot of controversy, especially for the men who have lost 2 events. For me, however, it was excellent news, as it had been decided to include my favourite event – the Women’s Team Pursuit – in the London 2012 Olympic programme!

Previously there had been 10 events on the track at the Olympic Games, but only 3 of these were for women. The events have been reshuffled so now out of the 10 gold medals available, 5 are for men and 5 are for women. However this did come at a cost. The famous Individual Pursuit event has been dropped from the programme, a very controversial change, and also an event which Britain had dominated in and I had competed in successfully.

However, the introduction of the Women’s Team Pursuit, bringing the programme in line with the men’s events, was brilliant news for me. The first women’s Team Pursuit World Championships were held in 2008 and I was part of the GB team and we won the first ever World Title and set the first ever World Record. We won again in 2009 and later that year beat our own World Record. So in December 2009 when the announcement was made I was over the moon!

My training has now changed quite a bit. My focus used to be the individual pursuit but that has now changed to Team Pursuit being the number one priority. For the Women’s Team Pursuit a team of 3 girls ride a distance of 3km and aim to set the fastest possible time. After qualifying, the top 4 teams will then ride off for the medals, and then it is all about beating the team on the opposite side of the track. This event requires a lot of training together as a team on the track but also a lot of individual work on the road building up strength and endurance.

As our World Championships are in March, the summer is spent mainly doing long hours on the road to increase that endurance and strength, as well as racing in road races, stage races and time trials.

I took a break after the World Championships this year and a much needed holiday, but have now had 2 months of consistent work. I have also been racing both in the UK and abroad. I have just returned from a weekend in Belgium where I won on Saturday (a 104km race, part of the Belgian National Series) and took 5^th place on Sunday (an 84km race).

Coming up in July the team is getting together for a block of track work, working on skills and technique as well as conditioning drills. I am looking forward to that feeling of zooming around the track again and getting the speed back in my legs!

I will be back racing on the road in August and then in September beginning my specific preparation for the Commonwealth Games where I will be back to Individual Pursuiting, as the Women’s Team Pursuit isn’t included in this event!

Joanna Rowsell