“With limited support from Cycling Australia, I looked at other options”

Living in Australia and racing for Ireland may not seem like the easiest way to compete internationally. But for 19-year-old Shannon McCurley, the journey through the early years of her career has anything but dull. Having experienced some back luck and opted away from the Australian set-up, she hasn’t looked back since declaring for Ireland. Here she outlines her long term plans on the eve of her scratch race appearance for Ireland at the UCI World Track Championships in Melbourne this week.

My aim in cycling is to represent Ireland at the 2016 Olympic Games; not sure what discipline at this stage as changes to events will decide where I focus but I’m a keen track and crit rider.

I started cycling as a 13 year old when a knee injury ruled me off the athletics track. I'd always had a passion for sport right from nine years of age where I first competed at a state level I claimed the U10 1,500m State track record. I was top five in Australia as an 800m/1500m track and cross country runner.

In my junior years of cycling, I had a lot of success here. I won the Australian U17 criterium championship, was 2nd in the scratch race, 3rd in the road race, time trial and individual pursuit. I also won the Burnie Criterium as a 14 year old, beating the current Australian elite women's champion.

In this race was an Irish representative Louise Moriarty, and after speaking to Louise we had the idea of representing Ireland at some time in the future depending on what happened here. Most of the good juniors I competed against are currently in the endurance women’s Australian team for the World Championships and Olympics. Obviously these girls are all U23 and looking good for the future. I was crowned Victorian Junior Cyclist of the Year (male and female) and the following year was awarded the Victorian Elite Women Track Cyclist of the Year.

Although a strong future showed promise, a crash in Perth, Western Australia put my cycling career on hold at a very critical stage. I ended up puncturing my thigh muscle which meant when I put power down on the pedal that leg would be lucky to be putting out 30-40% of max power.

This accident had a huge affect on both my physical and mental state of mind when I was racing. As an U19 rider I failed to qualify for junior worlds with the Australian team. After getting my leg good enough to produce some sort of power, I was finally racing well again only to be slowed down by another crash at the Bay criterium classics in Geelong, Victoria. This accident forced me to have an operation on my knee which ruled that season of racing out. With limited support from the VIS (Victorian institute of Sport) who I was racing for at the time of that crash or Cycling Australia, myself and my family decided to look at other options.

I started racing for Ireland in 2010, where I raced a round of the World Cup here in Melbourne. This was my first major international meet and the nerves got the better of me and I possibly rode the worst race of my life, enough about that. I represented Ireland again at the Australian Track Cycling Championships in Sydney where I rode a confident and strong race to secure the silver medal against Australia's best women. Annette Edmondson took the win. In the recent Australian Championships to give you some idea of the quality in the women’s ranks, in the IP the top seven women recorded a 3.38 or better with the winner Annette Edmondson a 3.30. Over the last two years I have been very lucky here that John Beasley and the Malaysian Team have taken me on as I believe that this is one of the best teams to be involved with, they have all been so good to me.

Under the watchful eyes of my new coach John Beasley I was starting to become the rider I always showed I could be in my early years.