Canine walker, lifeguard, and now Olympian: Mark Stewart’s unorthodox path to the Paris Olympics
Over the previous three years, Workforce GB monitor bike proprietor Mark Stewart has possibly taken on additional professions than one other rider contained within the Paris Olympics velodrome.
He has labored as a canine walker, a babysitter, a lifeguard, and now, after a last-minute call-up for Saturday’s Madison event, he has one different place in order so as to add to his CV: Olympian.
The 28-year-old was on no account anticipating to race his bike in Paris. He travelled to the Olympics as a reserve inside the monitor squad, capable of be known as upon if disaster struck. That second acquired right here when Ethan Hayter pulled out of the Madison with a muscle strain, suffered when he fell out of his saddle in Wednesday’s workforce pursuit closing.
“I came across this morning,” Stewart said. “I anticipated it. I assumed, ‘Correct, there’s a possibility I’ll get the choice up proper right here.’ So I was ready. I took the place critically.
“[Racing] is a horrendous combination of the worst nerves you’ve acquired ever had, and confidence, because of we’re high-performance athletes, and now we have this excellent help from British Biking. You do go up there assured, nevertheless on the equivalent time, you’ve acquired acquired this contrasting issue of being most likely probably the most nervous you’ve acquired ever been in your life.”
Paired alongside together with his teammate and buddy Ollie Wood, Stewart accomplished twelfth inside the race, a consequence that left him “gutted”. Nonetheless, the Olympics are solely the third championship event the Scot has accomplished with the nationwide squad since he was dropped by British Biking in 2020, shortly after the Covid pandemic was declared.
“When British Biking kicked me off and dropped me from the programme, it was actually pretty circumstances, although I didn’t understand it on the time,” he said. “I merely acquired out to New Zealand to go to my fiancée, Emma [Cumming], Covid occurred, New Zealand locked down their borders, and I ended up staying for two years.
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“British Biking supported me financially after they kicked me off as a result of events, Covid, so I was ready to apply for the first 12 months full-time. For the second 12 months I was there, the money ran out. So I needed to get jobs.”
(Image credit score rating: Alex Whitehead/SWpix)
Throughout the months that adopted, Stewart blended his teaching with as a lot as 50-hour working weeks, on occasion waking up at 3am to journey his bike.
“I started off babysitting and canine strolling for an in depth family that I do know, and I appreciated that, and I found quite a few aim in that,” he said. “I appreciated working for Taku Wairua, a self progress programme, the place we went into low socio-economic faculties, and I taught youngsters over 10 weeks about their values and who they’re as individuals.
“I was moreover a lifeguard workforce chief, and I had 5 or 6 youthful lifeguards I was caring for, and I wanted to point them that I would get my teaching accomplished sooner than work started at 5:30am. I imagine they thought I was lucky being an athlete, nevertheless I wanted to point them it was a conscious decision, and in case you’d like one factor, it’s also possible to make it happen.”
Stewart re-entered the British Biking fray early last 12 months, when he raced at a Nations Cup meet in Canada, his first event for GB in over three years. He then went on to compete on the World Championships in Glasgow, driving with Wood inside the Madison, and incomes the silver medal.
Not anticipating a call-up for the Olympics, Stewart said he was “over the moon” to be requested to be the reserve inside the males’s endurance squad.
“It’s super-special, to be reliable,” he said. “I joined the British Biking programme in 2014, and spent 5 years trying to go to Tokyo. The choice occurred. They kicked me off. So even merely to work my strategy once more into the squad and compete on the Worlds in Glasgow last 12 months was phenomenal. After which to get known as as a lot as be a reserve, to play a help place for my shut mates, my teammates, was great.”
Now, he said, his focus is already on the next Olympics, scheduled for Los Angeles in 2028.
Does Stewart hope to be there? “Fully,” he said. “The beautiful issue about Madison is the entire ages, shapes, everyone’s available on the market. I spoke to Roger Kluge, and I imagine he’s knocking on the door of 40 [years old], and I said, ‘Are you going to retire this 12 months?’ and he said, ‘No! I’m going to go for a pair additional years.’ If he can go a pair additional years, so can I.”
