Two years ago, a study by Women in Sport found that more than one million teenage girls who once considered themselves ‘sporty’, disengage from sport following primary school. Reasons for the drop off include fear of judgement, a lack of confidence and safety, as well as the pressures of school work. According to two-time Olympic champion Joanna Rowsell, it doesn’t have to be this way.
“I feel lucky that I went through the Talent ID programme when I did. I got Talent ID’d as a teenager, and I was at that point where I was probably just starting to disengage with sports, as many teenage girls do,” the Briton remembers. “I felt really lucky that I got a program to come along and sweep me up and tell me I could be an Olympian. I also realise that most people won't have that. Still, a huge number of teenage girls do drop out in sport, and it's a really big problem. Any little bit we can do to try and make a difference to that is really important.”
Since her retirement from elite racing, Rowsell has dedicated her life to ensuring that the next generation of girls have the opportunities to experience what sport has to offer. She has taken up a role as Partnerships and Community Manager at Women in Sport, believing that she can play an integral part in reducing that percentage of people who believe that sport isn’t the place for them.
“It's really interesting seeing a different side of things because I often see a lot of the positives. People come to me with positive stories of having watched me in London, and been inspired, and that's really lovely to hear,” Rowsell says. “But I also know there's still a lot of work to be done, so I do feel proud of the legacy, but also very keen to try and keep that going and keep that momentum and keep driving it forward.”
When glancing through Rowsell’s career results, it’s no surprise that she has managed to inspire people to get involved in cycling. The 35-year-old won gold medals in the women's team pursuit at the 2012 London Olympics and the 2016 Rio Olympics and she also has five World Championship titles, four in the team pursuit (2008, 2009, 2012 and 2014) plus one in the individual pursuit at the 2014 World Championships.
“Both Olympic medals are really special. I think Rio was tougher as defending an Olympic title was a lot harder than I thought it would be. I always just presumed to go into my second Games, everything would be easy, but you've got a lot more pressure on you. Also the standard across the board from everyone else in the world, they had raised their game massively coming into Rio.” Rowsell reflects.
She adds that her individual performances stand out when she looks back across her career so far: “I’m also really proud of my Commonwealth Games performance of 2014 because I was originally talent spotted for the individual pursuit. It was really nice to do it in a major championship even if it was just once.”
Pushing for equality between men’s and women’s events has also been important to Rowsell during her time as part of the Great Britain Cycling Team. She highlights the 2008 World Championships in Manchester as a landmark moment due to it being the first time that the team pursuit was included for women.
“It was a really big turning point. I was only 19 years old to win gold there, that was an important time for women's sport to have that equality at World Championship level,” Rowsell says.
While the British rider has seen plenty of progression during her career when it comes to the development of the women’s side of the sport, she also notes that there is still work to be done to keep track cycling relevant on a more general level. Rowsell points out that keeping the attention of fans on the sport in between Olympic cycles is something that needs to be improved upon.
“The big problem is the dip in the awareness of the sport between Olympic Games. We need to really work on maintaining that profile between Games with things like the Nations Cups that used to be huge,” Rowsell explains. “I'd love to see more of those. Everyone always raves about track cycling to me during those two week Olympic periods, but then trying to maintain that over four years is tough. We can do it.”
Alongside her work at Women in Sport, Rowsell can also regularly be heard on Eurosport’s coverage of track cycling and women’s road racing. She’s an example of a rider who has stayed closely involved with her sport even after retirement, keen to give back to the community which she believes gave so much to her. She has been recognised for her contribution to the sport of cycling by recently being inducted into the British Cycling Hall of Fame. However, it’s not accolades or results that Rowsell hopes to be remembered for, but instead for people to see her for the person she is off the bike.
“I never really saw myself as someone with the personality to be an elite sportsperson. People used to often say to me I needed to be a bit meaner, more aggressive, those sorts of things, not being too nice,” Rowsell says. “I hope I have proven you don’t really have to be like that, you can be introverted and focused and perhaps not outwardly have all that confidence,but you can perform at a high level being whoever you are.”
