The Australian Cycling Team made history and savoured redemption across the four disciplines at Paris 2024.
Road
The undoubted highlight of the road cycling campaign was a gold medal to Grace Brown in the Women’s Time Trial on the opening day of the Games.
Grace produced a dominant performance in wet conditions to win by more than one minute and 30 seconds, delivering Australia its first ever gold medal in the event.
She finished 23rd in the Road Race alongside Lauretta Hanson (22nd) and Ruby Roseman-Ganon (39th), while Australia’s top placed rider in the Men’s Road Race was Michael Matthews in 15th.
BMX
An emotional gold to Saya Sakakibara in the Women’s BMX Racing made for a successful Games for our BMX riders who competed across two disciplines.
Izaac Kennedy also made the Men’s final in BMX Racing, while Natalya Diehm won a bronze medal in BMX Freestyle after overcoming five ACL knee injuries throughout her career.
Mountain Bike
Rebecca Henderson marked her fourth Olympics with a career-best result at the Games when she finished 13th in the Women’s race.
Rebecca was fighting it out with the top 10 for most of the race and walked away pleased with her performance at Elancourt Hill.
Track
A world record and historic gold medal for the Men’s Team Pursuit was the standout performance of the track team at the velodrome in Paris.
Sam Welsford, Kelland O’Brien, Conor Leahy and Oliver Bleddyn broke the world record in the semi-final, then backed up to beat Great Britain in the final to deliver Australia its first gold medal in the event since 2004.
The Men’s Team Sprint also won bronze with Matthew Richardson, Leigh Hoffman and Matthew Glaetzer - who won his first Olympic medal at his fourth Games.
Matthew Richardson then backed this up with an individual sprint silver - the first medal in the event for Australia since 2012.
He was one of two Australians on the podium in the Men’s Keirin when he and Matthew Glaetzer won silver and bronze respectively behind Dutch superstar Harrie Lavreysen.
It capped a hugely successful week for the track team which enjoyed its best performance since Athens 2004.