Ex World Road Champ Lizzie Deignan to retire from cycling

Former world champion and Olympic silver medal-winner Lizzie Deignan has announced she will retire at the end of next season.

The 35-year-old mother of two from Otley has signed a new one-year contract with team Lidl-Trek and will hang up her bike for the final time in 2025.

Yorkshire-born Deignan, who won the 2015 Road World Championships and road race silver at London 2012, told the BBC: "I'm really proud of the career I've had.

"Do I feel that I can achieve anything that I haven't already achieved? Probably not.

""If I'm really honest with myself, I think the fire and the determination that it takes to be the best in the world is probably running short."

Deignan, previously known as Armitstead before marrying professional cyclist Gary Deignan in 2016, is one of Britain's most successful road cyclists and produced her best performances in one-day races.

She was the first to win all three of cycling's major one-day races - Liege-Bastogne-Liege, the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix.

Deignan's victory in the inaugural Paris-Roubaix Femmes in 2021 helped seal her place among the best of her generation after she broke away with over 80 kilometres remaining to win the race.

She twice won the women's Tour of Britain (2016 and 2019) and the Trofeo Alfredo Binda (2015 and 2016) and is a three-time winner of the Grand-Prix de Plouay (2015, 2017 and 2020).

After missing three anti-doping tests through 2015 and 2016, Deignan avoided a potential four-year ban when the Court of Arbitration for Sport found that she had missed the first due to the testing authorities' failures.

"It was a life-changing experience to go through something so publicly. To have your character assassinated when you've done nothing wrong was incredibly hurtful," she added.

"I have no regrets. Because every regret led to a lesson and there's definitely races that I could have won that I let slip through my fingers, but that's all part of it."

Great Britain performance director Stephen Park added: "Lizzie is one of Britain's most decorated and influential cyclists and will be remembered for a boundary-pushing career of iconic cycling moments.

"Whether it's representing her country at the highest level or performing at the forefront of the women's pro peloton, Lizzie has done it all.

"What stands out most in Lizzie is her impact across the entire women's peloton, and the work she's done to pave the way for many young riders. Her iconic performances on the bike and advocacy for women's sport off the bike have inspired many, and she has been cited as the direct inspiration for many of the young women coming up through the GB Cycling Team pathway."

Deignan, appointed an MBE in the 2023 New Year Honours list, won some of her biggest races after becoming a mother - she had Orla in 2018 and Shea in 2022.

She has also consistently argued for women to earn a greater share of cycling's salaries and sponsorship deals.

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