By Mrinal Asija; 16 October
Most athletes hope to go out on top. But champion cyclist and Bachelor of Arts and Diploma in Languages alum Grace Brown has scripted a fairytale ending to her sporting career.
Grace competed in her last professional event – the Chrono des Nations in Vendée, France – on 13th October and finished the race, and her career, on the top of the podium.
It was a fitting end to the final and the best-ever season of her incredible sporting journey, which saw her crowned the Olympic and World Champion.
Grace had started the year by winning her third-consecutive Australian individual time trial title. In April, she bagged the title of the Liège-Bastogne-Liège Femmes, becoming the first Australian woman to win a Monument – the most prestigious one-day races in cycling.
It naturally came as a surprise when she announced that she will be retiring at the end of the season just two months after getting the biggest result of her career.
In a video posted on Instagram, the 32-year-old, who graduated from the University in 2014 with a double major in Politics & International Studies and Sociology, revealed her decision was motivated by the desire to spend more time with her family in Australia and that she was content with all that she had achieved.
Given her tall achievements in the sport, it’s hard to imagine that she took it up only eight years ago, at the age of 23. It didn’t come by choice either. Grace’s first sporting passion was running – she was a cross-country and middle-to-long-distance runner. Forced by injuries to quit, she found her place in cycling and started competing in 2016.
In just five years, she was competing at her first Olympic Games. In fact, she narrowly missed out on a medal at Tokyo 2021, finishing fourth. The next year, she took out the gold medal in the time trial at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games. Later, she went on to win back-to-back World Road Championships silver medals in 2022 and 2023.
Despite the end of her career in sight, Grace had set herself high goals going into the Paris Olympics. Taking on slippery conditions on the Parisian streets, Grace dominated the course in which many tripped and clinched the gold. She finished an impressive 1:31.59 faster than the silver medallist – Anna Henderson of Great Britain – to get Australia its first medal of 2024 Games.
Grace’s medal was Australia’s first Olympic gold in the Individual Time Trial. The moment was one of immense pride for the University, whose another alumn – Kathy Watt (Bachelor of Science) – was the first Australian woman to win an Olympics road cycling event (Barcelona 1992).
But Grace was not done making history. In September, she went on to win the gold at the 2024 UCI Road World Championships in Zurich, becoming the first cyclist to win the Olympics and World Championships time trial in the same year.
Grace proudly donned her World Champion’s skinsuit and a golden helmet in her final race on Sunday. "It's time for the rest of life," she said after crossing the finish line, and we wish her the best with that.
Grace Brown has been nominated for the Female Athlete of the Year Award 2024 by the Female Athlete Project. You can vote for the award until the 1st of November her: https://www.thefemaleathleteproject.com/awards.
