Having joined cycling fairly late at the age of 19, after transferring from heptathlon, Katy Marchant is now the most experienced women’s track sprinters on the squad and led the squad to team sprint success at her third Olympic Games in Paris in 2024.

One of the Great Britain Cycling Team to have begun her sporting career in another discipline, Katy Marchant was a heptathlete in track and field before her impressive power outputs on a Wattbike test hinted that her talents might lie in another area and so her shift to full-time cyclist began.

Yorkshire-born Marchant joined the Senior Academy in 2013 and quickly progressed to the podium squad having already demonstrated her promise with silvers in the team sprint, with Victoria Williamson, and keirin and a bronze in the sprint at the British National Track Championships of that year.

Marchant progressed to the international stage at the 2014 UEC Under-23 European Track Championships in Anadia, Portugal where she won bronze medals in both the keirin and team sprint. The same event the year after saw her take two more medals including a gold in the keirin with the 2016 Rio Olympic Games on the horizon.

Katy’s form continued with a staggering four gold medal wins at the 2015 National Track Championships plus a silver medal alongside Jess Varnish in the team sprint at the UCI Track Cycling World Cup meeting in Hong Kong.

Unfortunately, at the UCI Track Cycling World Championships in London in March 2016, the team of Marchant and Varnish could only qualify in fifth place, missing out on a medal ride and a place at the Olympics by less than one second; a disappointment which left Katy seeking selection for Rio in an individual discipline. After a successful selection, Marchant launched a superb campaign in the sprint events, qualifying second fastest in the flying lap and going on to take the bronze medal in a dominant rider off against Dutch rider Elis Ligtlee.

The Tokyo Olympic cycle saw Katy continue to work on her skills as both an individual and team rider, adding another silver world cup medal to her collection, as well as Commonwealth bronze.  

As another Olympics beckoned, Marchant’s impressive keirin development continued, with a second place at the UCI World Cup meeting in Cambridge, New Zealand, at the start of 2019 and, later in the year, she enjoyed her first taste of UCI World Cup success, producing a scintillating combination of rides to win the keirin in front of a home crowd in Glasgow.

The keirin had become a focus for Marchant who, after the Rio Olympics, spent a period at the legendary keirin training school in Izu, Japan, honing her skills in the derny-paced racing event.

Heading into delayed 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Katy was in good form but having made it to the keirin quarterfinals was caught up in an unfortunate crash that ended her medal hopes in that event. In the sprint event, Katy was knocked out of competition in the quarterfinals, finishing the event in fifth place.

After giving birth to her first child in 2022, Katy returned to the team with renewed energy and focus for the team’s priority event, the team sprint. In her first event back, Katy came away with a silver medal in the team sprint at the 2023 UEC Track Elite European Championships.

Katy had a fantastic start to the Olympic year, taking a silver medal in the women’s team sprint at the 2024 UEC Track Elite European Championships, as well as her first individual international title in the women’s 500m time-trial, becoming the first ever British woman to take that title.

Her Olympic Games kicked off in sensational fashion as she was part of the women’s sprint squad that won gold and became Olympic champions; the first British team ever to do this and after a British team not having qualified for a Games since 2012. The team delivered faultless rides throughout the day, breaking the world record three times to take the win over New Zealand.

Individually, Marchant rode a skilful keirin, just missing out on the podium to take fourth place overall.

Marchant ended the season with triple success at the UCI Track World Championships in Copenhagen, starting with another team sprint win alongside Finucane and Capewell which would see them become the first women’s squad to win the Olympic and world titles in the same year.

Individually, Marchant also came home with a bronze in the final ever women’s 500m time-trial and the keirin, rounding out an incredibly successful year.

Away from cycling, Katy helps run her family’s farm and has her own bespoke cake business.