WA Cycling Great Mel Hoskins Calls Time

World class track and road cyclist Melissa Hoskins has announced her retirement from the sport following a glittering career.

The 26 year-old decided to step away after a “retirement test run” confirmed her suspicions that her stint on the saddle was up.

She leaves the competitive side of the sport having twice represented her country at Olympic level (London 2012, Rio 2016), as a World Champion (2015 team pursuit) and as the first female cyclist to win the WAIS Athlete of the Year title (2015).

Having recently betrothed to fiancé and fellow elite cyclist Rohan Dennis, Hoskins told Cyclingnews that she felt now was the right time to move into a new phase of her life.

“I had the sense that it was time for a new chapter,” Hoskins said. “Cycling can be an extremely selfish sport and when you have two people – me and Rohan – in the same household, trying to be the best of the best… We’ve done really well over the past five years, but I think now where he is with his career and where I was with mine, another four years until the next Olympic cycle would have been really hard.”

Hoskins rode in an Australian squad with fellow West Australian Josie Tomic at the London Games, for a fourth place finish in the team pursuit and appeared set to challenge Great Britain for gold in Rio until a serious training crash in the week leading into competition compromised her chances.

Despite being on crutches until the day before the qualification round and heavily bruised from the incident whilst in competition, Hoskins heroically took to the Velodrome, riding the first two rounds as Australia eventually completed duties with a fifth place ranking.

The disappointment of missing an opportunity at gold will always be raw for Hoskins, yet she takes a broader view of her achievements, reflecting on an incredible career that has given her cherished memories and friends for life.

“I had two rolls of the dice with the Olympics,” Hoskins said. “Obviously neither time did I come out with the result we wanted or in some regards expected. It was hard to deal with at the time.

“Over the past few months, I’ve gained a new understanding about how to define my career,” she added. “A career shouldn’t be defined by medals won or results collected. I choose to define my career by what I achieved as a person, where I’ve been, the people I met and the standard by which I’ve done my job. I’ve hit every target that I’ve wanted to hit in that regard on the bike and off, and as a person, I think I’m better for that.”

With the topic of retirement and post-athlete career particularly relevant in Australia at this point in time, Hoskins conceded that the decision to step away had been difficult. Whilst she knows things will be different, her perspective is drawn on creating opportunities that are right for her and she intends to mark her future involvement in the sport based on that view.

“Deep down, I knew at Rio I was done, but it’s easy to stop riding, stop racing, not make announcement, but as soon as you put a title to it, tell people or put it out in a media release, it becomes so much more real. I was ready to stop racing, but I wasn’t ready to think about what that would mean.”

“I have so much knowledge, and I don’t want to step away completely,” she said. “I want to give back from the sidelines. I’d love to help people achieve their dreams.”

You can read the Cyclingnews feature here.