Following a pro road career that pushed her body and mind to the edge, Molly Weaver took an understandable break from cycling.
A well-documented, serious training crash afforded the Brit 13 broken bones, and her self-described "gradual, unglamorous decline" also left her with depression and the feeling of never wanting to ride a bike again.
But slowly, she began to find her way back. Blocking out the international road scene she had left behind, her departure from that world still a bit too raw, Molly immersed herself in the dot-watching and storytelling of the ultra scene, which the pandemic and the internet had conspired to explode over the social media algorithms of many sitting at home restless for their next adventure.
"Before Transcontinental last year, I broke my foot," Weaver tells me at a cafe by the harbourside in Bristol, the city in South West England where she lives. Having discovered the world of ultra cycling, she soon threw herself into it, winning international races and setting various Fastest Known Times. Races like the Transcontinental were the obvious next step on the bucket list of any ultra athlete.
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