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Top Hawke's Bay Cyclist Moving For Dream Job

TOP HAWKE’S BAY CYCLIST MOVING FOR DREAM JOB

Nearing the end of degree studies at EIT, Hannah van Kampen has already scored a job that underpins her road cycling ambitions.

Para Cycling New Zealand has assigned Hannah to work with world para cycling champion Emma Foy as the athlete prepares to defend her title at next year’s Paralympic Games.

Partially sighted, Emma competes on a tandem bike and Hannah is one of her two pilots, taking the front position on the bike.

A reserve for the Paralympics to be staged in Rio de Janeiro in September, Hannah will be part of a squad training in Canada and the USA over the coming northern summer – both countries she’s never been to before.
Currently driving from her home in Hastings to train with Emma once a week in Cambridge, she will relocate to the Waikato once she completes her Bachelor of Recreation and Sport.

“I won’t be able to tease Waikato cyclists about their weather anymore,” she jokes of the region’s reputation for rain.

Based in either Cambridge or Hamilton, she will be close to the velodrome where she’ll be able to train and compete in cycling events.

“It’s exciting, awesome,” she says of this new chapter in her life. “It’s living the dream.”

Hannah started cycling as a 13-year-old and has been a long-time member of the Ramblers Cycling Club. She was awarded a scholarship for coaching by Ivar Hopman in 2009 and began competing at national level.

Two years later, she was selected to race with the New Zealand development squad in Australia and subsequently moved from the under-19s straight into the elite field of women cyclists.

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She gained invaluable experience with cycling stints in Europe and also travelled to compete in the 60-rider Tour of Thailand earlier this year.

Locally, she made her mark in winning last year’s 115km Tour of the Bay.

The former Taikura Rudolf Steiner School student came to EIT on a Year 13 study grant and was also awarded an EIT/Sport Hawke’s Bay sports scholarship.

Hannah says cycling is like having a bug or an addiction.

“I start riding the bike and I can’t stop. I’m not too sporty apart from cycling – I like pushing myself past my limit.”

ENDS

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