Lizzie Deignan will retire at the end of 2025, it was announced on Friday afternoon.
The Lidl-Trek rider, a former world and British national champion, and winner of Paris-Roubaix Femmes, Liège-Bastogne-Liège and the Tour of Flanders, will race on for one more season with her current team.
In a clip posted to social media, the 35-year-old said that she no longer wanted to say goodbye to her children, as happens often with a life on the road.
"I’m going to retire next year, at the end of 2025," she said in the video posted by Lidl-Trek. "Winning the rainbow jersey was up there with the best of them and I did it by myself. Looking back I think wow, who was that girl.
"Roubaix [Paris-Roubaix Femmes] was totally unexpected and also the reaction afterwards was bigger than I thought it would be," she continued. "It was a turning point in women’s cycling. It was special that I got to be the first person to cross the line. I remember winning the WorldTour during the pandemic when Orla was a year and a half old, and to be consistently the best rider in the world when I had a one and a half year old at home was a really impressive achievement.
"My kids are… I just don’t want to say goodbye to them anymore. [I have] no ego or necessity to retire at the top, I’m ready to go full circle and be someone who helps people win bike races again. If I can help the next champions of the sport, then I’m delighted to be a part of that."
"I feel really fortunate that I’m stepping away still very much in love with the sport," Deignan said in a press release from British Cycling. "I love cycling and all the things it’s given me and I certainly won’t be one of those people who never looks at a bike again, I really want to stay involved. Women’s cycling is on an upward trajectory and I’ve been a part of that. I feel I have some expertise in that area and I’d be crazy not to try and share that with the next generation."
Deignan started her career at the Global Racing Team in 2007, before moving to Boels-Dolmans in 2013, at which she enjoyed some of the biggest successes of her career, including the World Championships win in 2015, and then Strade Bianche, the Trofeo Alfredo Binda and the Tour of Flanders in 2016.
Deignan then moved to Lidl-Trek (then Trek-Segafredo) in 2019, with whom she won La Course by Le Tour de France and Liège-Bastogne-Liège in 2020, and then the Tour de Suisse and Paris-Roubaix Femmes in 2021. Another highlight was her silver medal at the 2012 Olympics, the first British medal of the London games.
The rider from Yorkshire was also a trailblazer for off the bike reasons, becoming a mum to two children, in 2018 and 2022, during her professional cycling career, and then returning to the peloton.
"Lizzie is one of Britain’s most decorated and influential cyclists and will be remembered for a boundary-pushing career of iconic cycling moments," Stephen Park, the GB Cycling Team's performance director, said. "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.
"With the Great Britain Cycling Team, we’ve seen her win iconic rainbow jerseys on both the road and track, as well as a sensational silver medal at the London Olympic Games and we will all be supporting her over the coming months, as she completes what will be her 18th season in the pro peloton."
