Rebecca Romero

Early life and education

Romero was born in Carshalton, Surrey, of an English mother and Spanish father, and brought up in Wallington, Surrey where she attended Wallington High School for Girls. Her success in both sports has meant that she has been funded as a full-time athlete since graduating from university. She went to St Mary's College in Strawberry Hill, where she studied Sports Science and English, gaining a 2.1 in 2002. She has a postgraduate diploma in Marketing Communications, which she gained in 2006. Rebecca is currently studying for an MSc in Sports and Exercise Nutrition at the University of Chester.

Rowing

Romero has won world championships in both cycling and rowing; as a rower, she won a silver medal at the Athens 2004 Olympics in the quadruple sculls, and the following year was part of the British crew that won the 2005 World Championships in the quad sculls. Suffering from a persistent back injury, Romero retired from rowing in 2006.

Cycling

Romero later took up track cycling, and made rapid progress in her new sport, specialising in track endurance events.

In December 2006, Romero won a silver medal in the pursuit at the UCI Track World Cup event in Moscow – her international cycling debut – losing out to fellow Briton Wendy Houvenaghel.

Romero won her first Cycling World Championships medal in March 2007 with silver in the 3 km pursuit. The following year, at the 2008 UCI Track Cycling World Championships, held in Manchester, she won the individual and, (with Houvenaghel and Joanna Rowsell), team pursuit events.

Beijing Olympics

She became the first British woman ever to compete in two different sports at the Olympic Games when she rode in the individual pursuit in Beijing. In winning the gold, she also became only the second woman of any country (after Roswitha Krause of East Germany) to win a medal in two different sports at Summer Games.

Romero appeared nude on her bicycle in an advert for Powerade sports drink in the run up to the 2008 Summer Olympics.

Romero was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2009 New Year Honours.

Post-Beijing

Romero was expected to return to track cycling in October 2009 but did not return amid speculation that the individual pursuit would be dropped from the Olympic programme. It was announced in December 2009 that the event was to be dropped, meaning Romero was unable to defend her title at the 2012 Summer Olympics. She condemned the decision to drop the event as "ludicrous" but seemed set to make a further change of events by switching to the road time trial.

In August 2009 she attempted the 874-mile non-stop mixed tandem bicycle record attempt from Land's End to John O'Groats with James Cracknell but had to give up at more than half way due to a knee injury.

She planned to race in a time trial at Levens, Cumbria on 13 August 2011. She also raced in the British Time Trial Championships on 4 September 2011 finishing 4th overall.

In October 2011 Romero announced that she was withdrawing from British Cycling's Olympic Programme and that she would not be competing in the 2012 Olympics. She subsequently confirmed that she would compete in the Ironman 70.3 triathlon in Mallorca and the Ironman UK event in Bolton in 2012 and the 2012 Ironman World Championship.

Romero has set up Romero Performance, a sports performance consultancy organisation, which launched in January 2013.

Cycling