Since 2007 women’s cycling has gone through an almost unrecognizable transformation. Mandatory live coverage, minimum wages, technological advancements – and Lizzie Deignan has seen it all. She’s won a world title, stood on the Olympic podium on home soil, and changed how the sport treats riders who become mothers mid-career. On Friday Deignan announced her one-year contract extension with Lidl-Trek while also announcing that 2025 will be her final season in the peloton.
“For the last couple of years, it’s been a question that’s been asked for me over and over again: when are you going to retire? And of course, I’ve been thinking about it,” Deignan explained in a roundtable a few days before the announcement. “It’s been a gradual process.”
The decision was helped along by multiple factors – a flight delay getting home from team camp and moving back to Yorkshire among them.
“There was one specific moment this year where I thought, ‘OK, this is it. I’ve had enough.’ I was flying home from a training camp in January, and I was diverted to Glasgow airport and had this crazy, long night,” Deignan said. “I got home at five o’clock in the morning and was up at seven o’clock with the kids. It was a bit of a moment of ‘Can I do this anymore? Do I want to do this anymore?’ I sort of realized that, yeah, I didn’t want to do it anymore.”
For most of her career, Deignan resided in Monaco with her partner and former professional Philip Deignan. The pair decided to move back home to Yorkshire during the 2023 season, and being back home among family, away from the cycling-obsessed world of Monaco, gave Deignan a glimpse of life after racing.
“It’s been really, really nice,” Deignan said of the move back home. “I think also that probably played into the retirement decision. When we lived in Monaco, it was very much because of my career and about being cycling-led and cycling-focused. Living in Yorkshire, the next chapter is sort of pulling me in. Family is here, my daughter’s at school, and my son’s very happy. I suppose it just feels like the next chapter is a bit closer than it used to be.”
Deignan’s career has been one for the record books, her list of victories long. In the early days of her career, in 2011, she was already a British road champion with victories at Tour Feminin l’Ardeche. A year later she was winning Classics like Gent-Wevelgem. In 2014 she won the Commonwealth Games road race. She had joined Boels-Dolmans a year prior in 2013, but at that time the team wasn’t yet the biggest team on the scene. She was one of the riders who helped skyrocket the Dutch team to the top, winning Trofeo Alfredo Binda, Philly Classic, Ronde van Vlaanderen, the Tour of Britain, and more while wearing their colors. In 2015 she won the World Championships road race in Richmond, USA.
By the time she announced her first pregnancy during the 2018 season, she was one of the best riders in the world.
When she announced she was pregnant, and would be taking a year away from the sport, she was one of the first high-profile riders to make it clear her cycling career would continue after having a baby. At that time Deignan and Boels-Dolmans parted ways and she signed onto the new women’s team Trek-Segafredo was building. She was one of their first signings, with the team backing her, not knowing how her form would be after giving birth.
In 2019 when she rejoined the peloton in new colours she showed that a woman could be both a new mother and succeed at the WorldTour level, winning Tour of Britain. A year later she added La Course by the Tour de France and Liège-Bastogne-Liège to her palmares.
The Fall of 2021 brought one of her most prestigious victories: the inaugural Paris-Roubaix Femmes avec Zwift. She rode away from the rest of the peloton with 82 km remaining and held her advantage to the line to win her third “Monument”.
Looking back on her career, the three Monument victories, the London Olympic Games where she came second behind Marianne Vos, and her world title all stand out.
“Without a doubt, London [Olympic Games] 2012 was an incredible experience as a person and as an athlete you know, to live through a home games, to be the first Olympic medalist to really share that with everyone, not just cyclists,” Deignan said. “The person in the corner shop gave me a big thank you, you know, congratulatory card. It felt so big in our country at the time and I felt really at the forefront of that, and that was really special.
“Winning the world title was obviously a dream come true. Everyone wants to be able to wear the rainbows, and luckily, in cycling, you get the rainbows for the rest of your life, which is pretty cool. So I’ve got those and all my three Monuments – Paris-Roubaix, [Tour of Flanders], and [Liège-Bastgone-Liège] were big wins. Two of those came as a mother and I can be really proud of those achievements as well.”
Aside from the long list of wins she’s claimed throughout her career, the birth of her two children and what that has meant for the sport has perhaps been Deignan’s biggest accomplishment. There were mothers in the peloton before Deignan, but she was one of the first to secure a lengthy contract while pregnant and then step away a second time to have a second child. She sat out the 2022 season to grow her family from three to four and returned in 2023 to continue racing for Trek-Segafredo.
Deignan was determined not to let her desire for a family end her cycling career, and because of that other women in the peloton have felt a door open for them to be able to do the same. Furthermore, in 2020 the UCI implemented a maternity leave clause into WorldTour contracts. Since then, a number of top riders have stepped away to have babies and come back to the sport.
When she announced that 2025 would be her final season, Deignan was clear that her family was a deciding factor, but she wasn’t leaving the peloton because of her children.
“I think it’d be really easy for me to blame the kids, but actually, it wouldn’t really be fair either,” Deignan explained. “I’ve worked really hard to show that it is possible to be a professional athlete and to be a mum, and I want to stand by that, and it is absolutely possible. The reason I’m retiring is because I no longer want to do it anymore. It’s not because it’s not possible and it’s too much.
“I think the older your children get, the harder it gets because they’re able to communicate that it’s difficult for them when you leave,” she added. “Their understanding of time away and things like that.”
Even with her two breaks from racing, and the ever-evolving nature of the peloton, Deignan still feels she can keep up with the demand. However, she isn’t quite as willing to sacrifice time to the sport as she once was.
“There’s no doubt that the level is getting harder and harder, and I think to this point I’ve been able to manage keeping up with that trend,” she said. “Last year, I was pushing power that I’ve never pushed before. But I think with the professionalism of the sport, also things like altitude camps, etc. take more of a front seat than they used to.
“To be competitive … in the Tour de France, you have to be committing to those altitude camps three weeks before. That’s not something that I want. I want to be able to manage the children, to manage my relationship, and to manage it all. I think the selfishness required is not something that I can justify anymore, and I think that’s fine.
“I don’t think we’re talking about percentages here. It’s not that I’ve taken my foot off the gas in any way, but I think the sport is at a level that’s so high that you really have to be searching for those percentages, and they make all the difference. I know that from the past where I was able to be that selfish athlete, and I’m just not anymore.”
Deignan has seen the sport grow in real-time and has often been part of the change herself. That isn’t something that will end once she hangs up her wheels at the end of the 2025 season.
“I’ve never shied away from confrontation, of calling out inequality, and that’s something that I will continue to strive to push towards,” she said. “We’re not quite there, but we’re certainly on our way and to say I’ve been a part of that, it means more to me than any result.”
She’s not sure exactly what she wants to do next, but she knows she wants to stay in touch with cycling, within the cycling bubble.
“I feel really fortunate that I’m stepping away still very much in love with the sport,” she said. “You know, I love cycling and all the things that’s given me. I certainly won’t be one of those people who never looks at a bike again. I still really want to stay involved.
“Women’s cycling is on this upward trajectory and I’ve been a part of that, and I feel like I have some expertise in the area, and I’d be crazy not to try and share that with the next generation.”
What exactly her future role looks like in the sport is yet to be determined.
“I’ve got too many ideas,” Deignan continued. “That’s my problem. The firm idea is definitely that I want to say within the sport. How that exactly looks? I’m not sure yet, but I’ve got the next 12 months to think about it, which is quite nice.”
Twelve months where she will remain in the peloton, continuing to race for Lidl-Trek. Because while she is ready to retire, she’s not exactly ready to do it right now. After taking 2022 away from the peloton she returned and slipped into a more domestique-style role. The first season back was difficult for other reasons that she has detailed on her social media, but the sport has changed in a way that she feels valued in that role. She’s also one of the most experienced riders in the peloton, making her incredibly valuable as a team captain for the American team.
“It’s just been a really natural evolution of my role,” Deignan said of riding for others. “I feel fortunate to be in [Lidl-Trek] where the role of a domestique is valued and appreciated and understood. Cycling as a team sport – it’s underestimated quite often just how valuable it is to have people in different roles excelling in those roles. It’s really nice going into next season not having the pressure to win myself because that is also a big thing to carry for quite a long time.”
In her final season, Deignan is looking forward to seeing the races through a different lens, riding without the pressure of a needed result over her head.
“Racing without pressure, individual pressure will be quite refreshing and nice, because I have enough internal pressure,” she said. “I’ll put enough pressure on myself without having to win. So it’ll be exciting, I suppose, to race kind of a bit more freely in that way.
“With every race that I do next year, knowing that it’ll be my last time at that event, it’s not something that I have to hide or shy away from. I’m happy that people around me know that it’s my last chance to experience different things as well.
“It’ll be my 18th season next year, and it’s a long time to dedicate yourself to cycling. All good things come to an end, and I feel, personally, very individually, that my time has come.”
Throughout her staggering 18-year career Deignan has been a driving force for change in the peloton, and one of the only women to have two children while racing at a WorldTour level. She’s won most of the top races and been one of the most valued members of multiple teams. Her presence in the peloton will be missed, but we have one more year to celebrate her and everything she’s done, and rest easy knowing she’s not going far.
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