Anna Henderson recovered from a broken collarbone in April to ride to a shock silver medal in the road cycling time trial at the Paris Olympics on Saturday.
At last year’s World Championships, the 25-year-old had missed out on bronze by just two seconds.
In Paris, she snuck the silver by less than a second after coming through wet and treacherous conditions as many others slipped off their bikes and onto the tarmac.
That included Chloe Dygert, one of the pre-race favourites and early pacesetters and yet the American still very nearly pipped Henderson, who had already finished, to second place.
But Dygert faded at the last to give Henderson the silver by just 0.87seconds. Australia’s Grace Brown was a class apart a minute and a half faster than Henderson.
The Briton readily admitted she thought her chances of an Olympic debut were over when she broke her collarbone for the second time this year in April but was back riding her bike indoors three days after surgery.
She credited her result to “a lot of blood, sweat and tears”, and paid tribute to mum Janet and dad John as well as her boyfriend Ollie who were all in the stands cheering her on in the pouring Parisian rain.
The trick she said to the result, which she planned to celebrate at a French patisserie, was simply staying upright.
“I didn’t realise how slippery it was out there until I was on the course and yeah I thought I can lose a whole Olympic Games on one corner here so really take control and you gain all the good time on the straights,” she said.
“Last year I was two seconds from the bronze at Worlds so I’m really happy to be on the right side of the seconds this time.”
April’s crash was the low point for the former skier both mentally and physically but she bounced back to win the National Championships and also ride well at the Tour of Britain.
“I always had Paris on my mind and that really carried me through,” she said.
