It’s amazing how much has changed since I first shared my thoughts on this website. I won my first UCI race in 2021, climbed to 49th in the world rankings, and made the U.S. Elite World Championship team—all in the same year. I’ve also raced the Christmas block twice in Europe, tackling some of the most iconic courses alongside the world’s top racers.

The biggest change, however, came with the birth of my son at the end of 2023. My race calendar—and life—have changed significantly. He has been both a joy and a challenge. While my pregnancy was healthy and successful, it wasn’t as smooth as I had hoped, never quite matching the feats of those incredible professional women I watched on social media who trained through their pregnancies and quickly returned to top-form postpartum. Nonetheless, I believe my continued activity and movement greatly benefited my overall health, as well as my son’s, during and after pregnancy.

Throughout my pregnancy, I noticed a striking contrast between cultural expectations, social media portrayals, and the advice from my medical team. On one hand, there’s a lingering, old-school mentality that pregnant women should limit everything—from their exercise to their ambitions and even their dreams. Conversely, my medical team greatly encouraged me to continue riding and even racing, always prioritizing crash avoidance. Thankfully, it appears we are entering a groundbreaking period where women are achieving unprecedented success. Heroines like Cathryn Pendrel, Lizzie Deignan, and Kristin Armstrong, among others, have been inspiring by pushing the limits in top-level sports. Teams and sponsors are also evolving, no longer terminating contracts at the first sign of pregnancy. While I’m thrilled to witness this progress for women, I acknowledge that these new expectations can also bring significant pressure – at least it did for me.

I guess the key takeaway I’d like to impart to anyone reading this is, that pregnant women are stronger and more capable than we’ve traditionally been led to believe—we can do awesome things! It’s important to listen to your own body and set your own goals. Don’t let the achievements of others make you feel as if you’re falling short.

As for racing – my goal for 2024 is to come back to racing cyclocross at the UCI level stronger than ever, sharing my story along the way to promote and further normalize the notion of mothers returning to their passions and dreams.

——Original About section:——-

All my life, I have never been the best, I have struggled, fought, Race Highlightsand pushed to reach my goals.

Growing up on a swim team, no matter how many hours I put in, I was always the top of the B relay just off pace of the A times. I was fast, just not quite fast enough. While getting my undergrad and master’s in mathematics, at times I felt behind my peers, spending longer hours studying, relying heavily on office hours, and having intense dedication to find success and prove that I could do it.

I would love to sit with you and tell you that my life is perfect, show photos of everything that has gone right and all the future goals I plan on crushing, put on that insta filter and sell it. In this day and age, it seems that is almost demanded of our athletes and heroes. However, I am not going to do that. Maybe there is someone like me out there, someone who needs to hear that you can be imperfect and still reach dreams, that’s what cycling has done for me.

Racing my bicycle has been an immeasurable gift in my life, and I am passionate about pressing further into and sharing that gift with others.

After years of being what felt like mid pack, cyclocross has been a strange and foreign change. In 2014 I was introduced to racing bikes by my husband, I started with road and found my way to cyclocross half way through the season in that first year. Much to my surprise, I was good. I consistently podiumed and as I trained harder, I won more and with greater margins. Then in what felt like too short of a time span my husband (sighting sandbagging) pushed me to upgrade. Three times this occurred, from Cat 4-3, then Cat3-2 and finally Cat2-1 and every time the fear gripped me, how could I dream of competing at that next level, they are so much faster than I am? However my mindset slowly started to change. Much to my disbelief, again and again I was able to rise to the challenge and make it to the next step. I discovered I was great, that for the first time I had the confidence and the belief I was capable of being on an elite level.

In 2018 I took a leap and decided to build my race calendar around national UCI races. Starting the season hunting that single point, it’s surreal to look back at how far I went. I was able to garner 57 UCI points, a couple top 5’s and a near miss of the podium, finishing with a top 200 world ranking.

I want to share that passion with other women, young or not, the power of racing, of going out and trying something hard, of getting better and reaching for the stars. If there is one thing I have learned, it’s that you can’t do it alone, my mentors, my sponsors, my fellow racers, all lifting me up and pushing me farther than what I considered possible. I want every racer to feel that support and accomplishment.

Racing has become a passion, of course I still struggle with confidence at times but now I look forward to what is possible: Is learning to bunny hop really impossible? Maybe I can reach the top step in a UCI race? What would I need to do to race in Europe?