Trafalgar Student, Hannah Cycles to Success

Greatness and Trafalgar student are synonymous with each other. This is exemplified by Grade 12 student Hannah F. 

On Thursday, May 12, 2022, Hannah represented Trafalgar Castle School at the Durham High School Mountain Bike Series in Uxbridge. She flew out of the gates from the start and maintained her lead throughout the 7-kilometre sprint race through Durham Forest. She came in first place finishing, four minutes and seven seconds ahead of the second-place finisher.

Before the race, Hannah had the opportunity to train at Woodland Hills in California for an intense seven weeks with her new bike team this winter. 

“This completely immersive experience provided me with so many learning opportunities to further my understanding of myself and my sport while exploring a beautiful new place and getting faster on the bike,” says Hannah about her experience training in California. 

While living in California, she was able to experience and partake in the lifestyle of a professional athlete. Her life in California was scheduled to accommodate her athlete schedule, which consisted of more than 20 hours on the bike a week and 10 hours of extra training such as yoga, power training, stretching, and more. 

Hannah says, “I’m so grateful that I had this opportunity to train like a professional athlete because it taught me that hard work does pay off, and with enough knowledge, discipline, dedication, ambition, support and understanding, anything is possible.”

On Wednesday, May 18, 2022, Hannah participated in the senior boy’s Lake Ontario Secondary School Competition  (LOSSA) mountain bike race. To prepare for the Canada Cups, Hannah wanted to race in a longer and more competitive race, so she reached out to the event organizer and was able to race against the senior boys! 

Although this was a nerve-wracking experience, she was confident in her training and abilities and knew her ultimate goal was to place. 

“With my coach’s words in the back of my head reminding me, “You’ve got to race, to place,” I took a deep breath and raced,” says Hannah, “as soon as I started, the nerves went away.” Hannah placed third out of everyone in the whole race! 

 ‘I’m very proud of my competitive mindset and strategy throughout the race,” she says “thank you to everybody at school who wished me good luck, and an extra thank you to Mrs . Zupancic for coming to the races and cheering me on!”    

In the future, Hannah would like to represent Team Canada to inspire young girls to get into cycling. She would also like to become more skilled in her craft and travel to more places. 

Congratulations, Hannah! Trafalgar is so proud of you.