Anna Meares

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Anna Meares Road cycling
Anna Meares (2008)
Anna Meares (2008)
To person
Nickname Mearesy
Date of birth September 21, 1983
nation AustraliaAustralia Australia
discipline train
To the team
Current team End of career
function driver
Societies)
Port Adelaide
Most important successes
Olympic games
bronzeOlympic bronze in the Keirin 2016
goldOlympic Champion Sprint 2012
bronzeOlympic bronze in team sprint
(with Kaarle McCulloch 2012 )
silverOlympic silver in the 2008 sprint
goldOlympic champion 500 meter time trial 2004
bronzeOlympic bronze in sprint 2004
Last updated: October 15, 2016

Anna Meares (born September 21, 1983 in Blackwater ) is a former Australian cyclist . With two Olympic victories, eleven world championships and eight oceanic titles, she is not only the most successful track cyclist in Australia to date, but also the most successful "of all time" ( as of 2016 ). In addition, she set six world records in the course of her career.

Athletic career

Anna Meares began cycling at the age of eleven, following in the footsteps of her older sister Kerrie . Her great role model was the Australian racing driver Kathryn Watt . Although the nearest cycle track was two hours away, she decided to go for track cycling.

Meares' first major success was the bronze medal in the sprint at the 2002 Commonwealth Games . At the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, she won the gold medal in the 500-meter time trial with a new world record (33.952 seconds) and in the final beat the previous record holder Yonghua Jiang from China. This made her the first woman to break the 34-second mark over 500 meters; at the same time, she was the first Australian to win an Olympic gold medal in cycling.

In January 2008, Meares had a serious fall at the Track World Cup in Los Angeles and broke a neck vertebra, so that the end of her career was feared. But just a few months later, she won the silver medal in the sprint at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. In 2009 she took first place in the team sprint at the UCI Track World Championships 2009 in Pruszków . In 2010 Anna Meares became world champion in the 500 m time trial for the third time and in the team sprint for the second time together with Kaarle McCulloch , with the two riders setting a new world record over 32.923s. In the same year she won three gold medals at the Commonwealth Games : in the sprint, in the team sprint and in the time trial.

At the UCI Track World Championships 2011 in Apeldoorn , she was the most successful athlete with three gold medals - in the sprint, keirin and team sprint. At the UCI Track World Championships in Melbourne in 2012 , she and McCulloch won the silver medal in the team sprint, became world champion in the time trial and set two new world records . In the same year she was Olympic champion for the second time , in the sprint. At the second run of the Track Cycling World Cup 2013/14 in Aguascalientes , Meares won the 500-meter time trial and set a new world record of 32.836 seconds.

In total, Anna Meares set six world records (up to 2015): After the first over 500 meters at the Olympic Games in Athens , she improved the record over this distance four times up to 2013, until the last one from the Russian Anastassija Woinowa at the UEC railway European Championships 2015 has been improved. In addition, she set a world record over 200 meters at the 2012 World Track Championships.

In July 2016, it was announced that Anna Meares would lead the Australian team as the flag bearer at the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro . This makes Meares the second cyclist to bear the Australian flag after Dunc Gray in 1932 . She won the bronze medal in the Keirin competition.

In October 2016, Anna Meares announced her retirement from competitive cycling. A few weeks later , the Anna Meares Velodrome named after her was inaugurated in Chandler , a suburb of Brisbane , and the namesake herself completed the first laps on the track.

Private

In her autobiography The Anna Meares story , published in 2009, Anne Meares describes how she recovered from her serious accident in 2008 and found her way back to her old strength .

Anna Meares is an ambassador for the Little Heroes Foundation , a foundation that supports seriously ill children and their families. In January 2014, Meares announced that she would have her bald head after the 2014 Commonwealth Games in solidarity with the sick children if she had raised $ 250,000 in donations by then.

Anna Meares' sister is the also successful former track cyclist Kerrie Meares . In February 2020, Anna Meares became the mother of a daughter; The father of the child is the Australian national coach Nick Flyger.

successes

Anna Meares (2012)
On April 9, 2012 Anna Meares improved the world record over 500 meters.
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
silver Olympic Games - Sprint
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
  • OceaniaChampionJersey.png Oceania Champion - Sprint, 500m Time Trial
2014
2015
2016

Web links

Commons : Anna Meares  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Most successful track cyclist of all time Meares ends her career. In: rad-net.de. March 25, 2013. Retrieved October 19, 2016 .
  2. ↑ Vogel takes fourth victory for the Germans in Aguascalientes. radsport-news.com, December 7, 2013, accessed December 8, 2013 .
  3. ↑ 9news: Cycling star Anna Meares named as Australia's flag bearer for Rio Olympics. In: 9news.com.au. July 6, 2016, accessed July 6, 2016 .
  4. ↑ Guardian sport: Anna Meares announces retirement from cycling after career including six Olympic medals. In: theguardian.com. October 16, 2016, accessed October 16, 2016 .
  5. ↑ Contact Kathy Mc Leish: Cycling star Anna Meares take first lap at $ 59m velodrome named in her honor. In: abc.net.au. November 12, 2016, accessed December 18, 2016 .
  6. ↑ Cyclingnews.com: The Anna Meares story: When courage triumphs over disaster
  7. ↑ Anna Meares To Face The Shears And Raise $ 250,000. Little Heroes Foundation, January 19, 2014, accessed January 22, 2014 .
  8. ^ Anna Meares announces birth of first child. In: sbs.com.au. February 12, 2020, accessed on February 12, 2020 .
personal data
SURNAME Meares, Anna
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Australian cyclist
DATE OF BIRTH September 21, 1983
PLACE OF BIRTH Blackwater