MARK ETHERIDGE: Young’s rapid rise to cycling superstardom

At the tender age of only four Lucy Young had already found her competitive streak and was actively showing dogs at competitions, despite barely being able to see over the back of her own dog!

Twenty-six years later it was she who was the greyhound — being unsuccessfully chased down at the African Continental Cycling Championships individual time trial event in Iten, Kenya earlier in October.

Second off the start line she was immediately in the hot-seat and stayed there as 11 of the continent’s finest time trialists only saw the back of her as they huffed and puffed but couldn’t get her down from her throne.

The net result is that she is an African champion at her first continental championships. Now get this — she only started taking cycling seriously about a year ago, inspired in part by the fact her boyfriend, Brandon Downes is himself a pro cyclist and former Ride 947 road race winner.

“Both my parents have very strong careers in their own right so I did sport every afternoon... swimming, hockey, cross-country, horse-riding, you name it.”

Dogs are still one of her big loves and she’s actually gone on to representing SA in dog-showing at the World Dog Show in Birmingham, England.

Inspired by a work colleague just after she’d finished university saw her dabbling in mountain biking and then moving on to triathlon, her first proper triathlon was in 2021 after lockdown hit and she was third in her age-group in the 70.3 event (half an Ironman race).

“In hindsight, lockdown proved the perfect opportunity for me to focus on my career and heaps of indoor cycling and treadmill running allowed me to build the most amazing foundation.”

In 2022 she felt confident enough to go for the full Iron Man distance.

But leg and stomach problems combined to scupper her race 18km into the marathon, though she still managed a top 10.

“So I fell a bit out of love with running, it was more my hip flexors that were [and still are] a bit of the problem.”

But then, like a bolt from the blue came Brandon.

“I went to a lot of races with him and ended up joining him for criteriums and other races and before long I ended up on the podium and beating a lot of the pro girls.”

It wasn’t long before she was scouted by the Customized Pirtek outfit “and that opened up so many doors to me in terms of a sponsored bike, kit, nutrition, transport to races and accommodation”.

A lot of podiums started coming her way, including gold in the Blue Diamond road race, another gold in the individual TT Gauteng provincial champs where she beat last year’s 947 race winner Carla Oberholzer, “that really put me on the map”, and then silver behind Hayley Preen at the time trial nationals.

Cycling SA also started taking notice and she was part of Team SA at the African Games in Ghana where her TT skills saw her medal in the individual race and then acting as domestique for Preen in the road race.

Grabbing gold in Kenya still seems like a dream come true for Young.

“With SA’s top cyclist, Ashleigh Moolman Pasio in our team, I was just so relaxed because, after all, she’s so accomplished and I was the new kid on the block [or bike].

“Of course it helped that Iten was 2,400m above sea level and I came from Johannesburg [1750m] while Ash was coming from pretty much sea level in Spain.

“But I was very impressed by my numbers on the bike and just stayed calm and focused and the next thing I was African champion.”

She says time trialling changes her whole demeanour.

“TT is my passion, I’m a different person. The road race has so many dynamics and is like a chess game whereas in the time trial, it’s just you, the bike and the clock — the most powerful girl, the most aerodynamic girl wins, it’s completely fair and honest — so to win in my favourite discipline was beyond amazing.”

Off the bike her career is taking off just as quickly and she’s a senior manager specialising in data analytics and risk assessments at IBIS SLR Consulting.

So her days are spent balancing, literally and figuratively, with a lot of her cycling training being done at 4am, simply because most SA cyclists don’t have the luxury of being full-time cyclists.

She cycles daily except Mondays when she’ll either do some walking in the park with her pointer dog Oliver, mom or boyfriend, or a combination of both.

Looking ahead and she has an Olympic dream but it’s tough. “Everything is based on Olympic slots gained through getting more UCI points from different people’s achievements and at the moment we only have two women’s slots for all the SA riders so I’m not sure how realistic it is at the moment.”

The good news is that, despite being born to British parents, she’s much affiliated to Africa and does not see herself going to Europe to further her cycling.

“I’m very much a homebody. I love SA, I love my parents, my dogs, my brother, my boyfriend, my job and the European life is extremely hard for a South African cyclist.”

But if it weren’t for cycling there would be another animal-related calling for her.

“I got to national level at horse riding and it’s still dear to my heart. I will probably go back to it at some time — there is nothing better than having complete compatibility with a horse, after a good ride, everything just seems right and magical.”

Despite competing at top level in two of the most dangerous sports — cycling and horse riding — Young has never broken a single bone in her body.

What she has done though is break through to the top of SA cycling and it looks as if she’s not moving out of that hot seat any time soon...

Downes, who has also won a number of races across SA, including, the 947 Ride Joburg and numerous road race tours and is a Cycling SA rider rep, is upbeat.

“I first met Lucy when she was involved with triathlons. I suggested some changes to her TT bike set-up to improve her performance and speed, and this is really where our interactions started.”

“After some encouragement, she reluctantly agreed to try out a few crit races, and surprised herself with some of her performances and results. When she started racing the crits I gave her a lot of input from a tactical point of view, learnt from my own career, and she’s progressed exponentially. She always gives 100% and, has an ability to dig really deep when it counts, especially in the time trial. 

“As a woman cyclist she has many years to race at a high level.

“She’s only been racing on the road for just over a year now and what she’s done in this very short space of time is incredible — and more than some people manage to achieve in lengthy careers in the sport.”