Zoë Langham took up cycling just four years ago, getting into Zwift racing while studying medicine at university. She has made extraordinary progress since then. At her first big race, the 2022 eSports Worlds, she took the bronze medal. In her debut season on the road, last year, she finished fifth at the Ryedale GP, and was sitting third on GC at the Rás until an unlucky crash on the final stage forced her to abandon with a broken collarbone. Returning to the eSports Worlds last month, the 24-year-old bettered her 2022 performance and took silver. CW spoke to Langham two days after she finished second overall at The Peaks 2 Day.

How did you first get into cycling?

I started out as a really average runner while at uni [from 2018]. I wasn’t really getting anywhere and kept getting injured. Having got on the bike just to keep active, I soon realised I was actually a lot better at cycling than running. I do remember, in my early teens, my dad took me on a 70-mile ride in the Yorkshire Dales that was so savage I cried!

You had been seriously ill as a younger child?

Yes, I had aplastic anaemia, which is basically bone marrow failure and presents similarly to leukaemia. It means you’re not producing red blood cells, the blood cannot clot, you bruise really easily and can’t fight infections. I had a very severe form of it, and it was touch-and-go. Thankfully I had ATG treatment [an immunosuppressive therapy] and went into remission – I was lucky because only about 50% of people respond to it.

As a medical student, squeezing in training must’ve been difficult?

Absolutely it was, though lockdown helped a little, as I got some time off to go home and ride my bike. Zwift came into its own too, at times when we couldn’t go outside. It was during this time that I started training in a more structured way.

https://www.cyclingweekly.com/fitness/being-a-junior-doctor-can-be-really-tough-but-on-the-bike-im-a-different-person-how-zoe-langham-trained-for-the-esports-world-champs