Victoria Louise Pendleton (born 24 September 1980) is a British former track cyclist who specialised in the sprint, team sprint and keirin disciplines. She is a former Olympic, World, European and Commonwealth champion. She won three Olympic medals—two golds and one silver—during her career.
Pendleton won nine world titles, including a record-equalling six in the individual sprint between 2005 and 2012. She also won world titles in the team sprint, in 2007 and 2008, and the keirin, in 2007. At the 2008 Summer Olympics, she won the gold medal in the sprint, and in the 2012 Summer Olympics, she won the gold medal in the keirin and
a silver medal in the sprint. She also became a Commonwealth Games champion in the sprint in 2006 and a European champion in the team sprint and keirin in 2011. She retired from track cycling after the 2012 Olympics and had a short career as a jockey from 2015–16. Riding Pacha Du Polder, she won her first race at Wincanton in March 2016 and finished fifth in the Foxhunter Chase at the Cheltenham Festival later that month.
Pendleton was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2009 New Year Honours and Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2013 New Year Honours. She is a member of the British Cycling Hall of Fame.
Victoria Pendleton was born on 24 September 1980 and grew up with her twin brother and older sister in Stotfold, Bedfordshire. Her father, Max, was a keen amateur cyclist and former British National 8 km grass track cycling champion. He would take the nine-year-old twins out racing at the weekends and create children's races for them to compete in. She was a member of Mildenhall Cycling Club. Pendleton attended Fearnhill School and played hockey for Harpenden. She later said that the "traits that make an Olympic champion do not make for a popular teenage girl" at school, and that she felt like a social outcast, which she described as "painful".
At the age of nine, Pendleton rode her first race, a 400 m event, on the grass track at Fordham, Cambridgeshire. When she was 16, assistant national track coach, Marshall Thomas, invited her to a trial in Manchester, where she cycled in a velodrome for the first time. Thomas then assumed coaching responsibilities from her father. At that time, Pendleton did not envisage a career in cycling due to a lack of female role-models in the sport. She took a degree in sports science at Northumbria University, Newcastle upon Tyne, and in her final year at university, she trained with British Cycling one week per month. After graduating in 2002, she became a full-time cyclist.
Pendleton finished second in the 500 m time trial, 30 km points race and the sprint as well as recording a third-place finish in the scratch race at the 2001 British National Track Championships. From 2002–2004, she trained at the World Cycling Centre in Switzerland, under the tutelage of Frédéric Magné. Pendleton found the experience challenging, her wellbeing suffered, and she self-harmed. She began deviating from her training programme, which upset Magné. Commenting on this period, Pendleton explained: "I had always feared letting down figures of authority, my dad most of all, and so I felt diminished by disappointing Fred." British Cycling sent psychiatrist Steve Peters to meet her. They began working together, with positive results. Pendleton later stated: "If it wasn't for Steve [Peters], I don't think I'd be cycling today."
Pendleton competed at the 2002 Commonwealth Games, where she finished fourth in the sprint. In 2003, she recorded another fourth-place finish in the sprint at the 2003 UCI Track Cycling World Championships. In the 2003 World Cup, she won the scratch race in Sydney, and the following year, she secured victory in the sprint at the 2004 World Cup event in Manchester. She then finished fourth in the sprint at the 2004 UCI Track Cycling World Championships. At the 2004 Summer Olympics, she finished sixth in the 500 m time trial and ninth in the sprint. Pendleton later said that she was not ready both physically and psychologically for the Olympics at that time, and considered quitting the sport. At the end of the year, she won the keirin at the 2004–05 World Cup meeting in Los Angeles.
In January, Pendleton competed in a subsequent meeting of the World Cup in Manchester, where she claimed second place in the 500 m time trial. She then won her first world title after finishing first in the sprint at the 2005 UCI Track Cycling World Championships in Los Angeles. She overcame Anna Meares in the semi-finals before defeating Tamilla Abassova in the final. She became the first British woman to be a track cycling world champion since Beryl Burton in 1966. At the 2005–06 World Cup event in Manchester, Pendleton won the sprint and finished third in both the keirin and 500 m time trial.
At the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, she won a silver medal in the 500 m time trial (behind Anna Meares). She then defeated Meares in the final of the sprint to secure the gold medal. The following month, at the 2006 UCI Track Cycling World Championships in Bordeaux, Pendleton was unable to defend her world sprint title. She finished runner-up after she was beaten by Natalia Tsylinskaya in the final. In the keirin, an incident with rival Anna Meares caused Meares to be relegated and left Pendleton unable to challenge for a medal. Meares apologised afterwards, but the incident started a long-term rivalry between the pair. Pendleton won three gold medals at the Manchester leg of the 2006–07 Track Cycling World Cup, securing victories in the sprint, keirin and 500 m time trial.
At the 2007 UCI Track Cycling World Championships, she won the team sprint alongside Shanaze Reade, the sprint (overcoming Guo Shuang in the final), and the keirin. In December, she won gold in the keirin at the 2007–08 World Cup event in Sydney. At the end of 2007, she was named Sunday Times Sportswoman of the Year and the Sports Journalists' Association's Sportswoman of the Year.
Coming back from illness and a knee injury, Pendleton finished second in the sprint at the 2007–08 World Cup meeting in Copenhagen. During her build-up to the Olympics, she won two world titles at the 2008 UCI Track Cycling World Championships in the sprint (overcoming Simona Krupeckaite in the final) and the team sprint (with Reade). She was also second in the keirin. At the 2008 Summer Olympics, Pendleton won the gold medal in the sprint, defeating Anna Meares in the final. Her success made her the first British female cyclist to win a gold medal in the sprint at an Olympic Games. Pendleton was critical of the Olympics, pointing out that only three medal events in track cycling were available for women, whereas there were seven medal events in the men's Olympic schedule. Only one of the women's races was in a discipline that Pendleton competed in, and she said she felt "sick" by the decision.
In October 2008, Pendleton joined the Sky+HD Trade Team. In the 2008–09 World Cup, she won three gold medals at the meeting in Manchester, triumphing in the keirin, sprint and 500 m time trial.
She retained her world title in the sprint at the 2009 UCI Track Cycling World Championships in Pruszków, with a photo-finish victory over Willy Kanis. In addition to her world sprint title, Pendleton also finished second in the team sprint (with Reade) and third in the 500 m time trial. In the 2009–10 World Cup event in Manchester, Pendleton finished first in the sprint and second in the 500 m time trial.
At the 2010 UCI Track Cycling World Championships in Copenhagen, Pendleton again retained her world sprint title. She defeated Anna Meares in the semi-finals before overcoming Guo in the final to achieve victory in the event for the fourth year in succession. She also finished runner-up in the kierin. Later that year, she won her ninth consecutive British sprint title at the National Championships. She also won the 500 m time trial for the eighth time, her 25th national track title overall. Pendleton chose not to participate at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in order to focus on the upcoming European Championships. There, she won a silver medal in the team sprint with Jessica Varnish. In the 2010–11 World Cup, Pendleton won silver medals in the sprint and team sprint in Melbourne, before securing gold medals in the team sprint and keirin in Cali.