Rebecca Romero

Rebecca Romero is a unique athlete, she is one of only two women to have ever won Olympic medals in 2 different sports (Rowing 2004 and Cycling 2008), and the only Briton, male or female to do so.

Rebecca started rowing aged 17 at Kingston Rowing Club, and within 8 months had progressed from being a novice to being in the GB Juniors Squad, and within 3 years had won a World Championships U23 Gold Medal.
In 2001 Rebecca gained her first senior vest when she was selected in the quadruple sculls for the World Championships, where she made the final. 2002 and 2003 would also see credible performances in World Championship finals, but it was 2004 that would prove to be Rebecca’s breakthrough year.

After a year of ranking in the top two in every domestic trial and assessment, Rebecca was selected into the quadruple scull again, the top ranked sculling boat. She had a very successful international racing season collecting two gold medals and a silver, and winning the World Cup Series overall. Her first World medal was then achieved at the Olympic regatta in Athens when Rebecca’s crew took a silver medal, just behind the more senior and vastly more experienced German crew.

2005 was the start of a new Olympiad and saw the start of a new campaign for Olympic Gold. Rebecca was part of a newly formed quad combination and for the second year running they won the overall World Cup Series. The final of the World Championships was a re-run of the 2004 Olympic final. Again the two favourites, Great Britain and Germany were coming head to head, but this time however the result was reversed winning the final by 0.3 seconds, and Rebecca collecting her first World Championship.

However, during the 2005 season Rebecca had got injured and realized that maybe it was time to start moving onto something new. It was at this point, purely by chance she was approached by British Cycling, and following a series of tests was told she had the potential to succeed at the highest level in cycling. In April 2006 Rebecca started the second part of her amazing career training as a cyclist with the aim of participating in the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.

Five months into it Rebecca competed in her first major competition, the British Time Trial Championships. Having only practiced a handful of time trials, she shocked both herself and the cycling world by winning! In her first ever cycling race she had become British Champion!

In December 2006, Rebecca won a silver medal in the pursuit at the UCI Track World Cup event in Moscow, her international cycling debut, eventually losing out to fellow Briton Wendy Houvenaghal.
Rebecca’s rapid rise up the world cycling ranks continued in 2007 when she won her first Cycling World Championships medal in March 2007 with silver in the 3 km pursuit. The following year, at the 2008 World Championships, held in Manchester, she won Gold in both the individual and, team pursuit events, just 2 years after she had started cycling!

The season then culminated in the Beijing Olympic games where Rebecca won a Gold medal beating her team mate in the final, Wendy Houvenaghel, in the individual pursuit.

Rebecca retired from professional cycling in September 2011, but not being content with an easy life decided to take up Ironman triathlon on a ‘social’ basis. Rebecca competed in her first ever Ironman in July 2012 at the UK Ironman Championships and came fifth overall for the women’s category, and consequently qualified herself for the World Ironman Championships in Kona, Hawaii in October 2012, where she came 46th in her age group.