Nearly precisely a 12 months in the past, Cat Ferguson gained the East Cleveland Traditional regardless of crashing on the foot of the race’s penultimate climb. 363 days later, and the 18-year-old, now in her first full 12 months as an expert, will line up for Paris-Roubaix Femmes with Movistar.
Each Ferguson’s transfer to the Girls’s WorldTour squad and her star potential have been identified about for some time now. She penned a take care of the Spanish workforce in 2023 after capping off her first 12 months as a junior with a World Championships silver medal, however would wait till the next August to formally experience of their blue and white jersey.
Nevertheless, for all her expertise and now double junior rainbow jersey holder standing, after her emphatic efficiency eventually September’s World Championships in Zurich, her first few months as a professional weren’t meant to unfold as they’ve achieved.
To be making ready for a primary look at Paris-Roubaix Femmes was not a part of the plan.
“I knew right now final 12 months that I used to be going to go professional this 12 months, nevertheless it was by no means a thought in my thoughts [that] in 12 months’ time, I will be doing a race like Roubaix,” admits Ferguson in an unique chat with Cyclingnews.
“The workforce lowered my expectations and informed me that I would not be doing any of the massive Classics or Monuments, after which I ended up doing Flanders and San Remo now.
“I feel we struggled a bit with the riders getting injured and sick, so it was a case that we wanted numbers,” the teenager reveals. But, the Yorkshire native was under no circumstances simply there to make up the numbers, as her outcomes proved.
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A 3rd-place end at Trofeo Alfredo Binda and top-20 outcomes at each Sanremo Girls and the Tour of Flanders could be extra befitting of a seasoned Girls’s WorldTour rider than a first-year professional.
Ferguson is relishing the prospect to check herself on the high races so quickly, buoyed by confidence from her sports activities administrators and coach. Imposter syndrome is seemingly not a part of her vocabulary as she provides: “It is nearly a case of simply managing my pleasure greater than my nerves in the intervening time.”
In fact, the British rider remains to be considerably stunned to be on this place already. Her podium in Lombardy final month, her first outing in 2025, got here as a “massive, massive shock” whereas the sturdy Monument outcomes have been made all of the sweeter by the actual fact she was working within the service of others – one thing Ferguson savours equally as a lot proper now.
“The Monuments, they have been a bit much less result-focused for me; the outcomes type of got here after doing my job for the workforce. [It] is sort of nicer as nicely, figuring out that I can sacrifice myself for some moments for the workforce and nonetheless find yourself getting top-20 at Monuments, is basically loopy too.”
Having made the transition from junior to professional ranks, Ferguson is not the massive fish within the small pond, and domestique duties are serving to her to spherical out her skillset.
“It is helped my private development, and it is what I would like this 12 months to be about, studying how one can do the assist roles. It appears like quite a lot of stress, and nearly extra stress than while you go right into a race for your self generally, as a result of in case you do not do your job, nicely, it is not going to influence you; it is going to influence anyone else. And for me, that feels nearly worse,” she explains.
A free position at her first Roubaix
This weekend’s Paris-Roubaix Femmes will see Ferguson be granted extra freedom than in different Classics to date this 12 months.
“It is a race that the workforce has stated I can do nicely right here, which once more is known as a shock for me that I am given a free position at a Monument. Nevertheless it’s with warning, a free position. There isn’t any stress or something,” she says.
Driving a race like Roubaix with out stress is a privilege that few are allowed, but the Hell of the North has a manner of making stress at each flip.
The Tour of Flanders acted as a baptism of fireside for the 18-year-old into what racing a cobbled Monument might be like relating to the partitions of crowds and build-up to the important thing factors on the course, however Paris-Roubaix gives up an entire completely different cauldron of cobbled chaos.
Ferguson’s strategy to tackling the stress of impending pavé is certainly one of pragmatism combined with a contact of youthful and unfazed resolve.
“I am going to undoubtedly be talking to [my teammates about it], however perhaps not an excessive amount of, as a result of I do know what the reply goes to be, and I do not actually need to hear it till I am within the second experiencing it,” she says.
“With Roubaix, as a result of [the cobblestone sectors] simply come so thick and quick, you nearly simply do not give it some thought, it simply turns into pure that you just simply have to consider positioning.
“I nearly discovered a race just like the Tour of Flanders simpler to take care of the important thing sections just like the Koppenberg as a result of there have been simply so many key sections that you just could not permit your self to be nervous for every one, in any other case you’d simply waste a lot power.”
Even when the Skipton-born rider does come unstuck on the pavé of Paris-Roubaix Femmes this weekend, although, she feels higher positioned to deal with the problem in comparison with a 12 months in the past.
“Final 12 months, if I might been caught behind a crash, it could have in all probability destroyed my head as a result of there weren’t that many crashes at a junior stage, simply because there have been fewer ladies within the race, and we fought for a place a lot much less,” she says.
“I am having to get used to [it] much more. A crash does not imply it is the tip of your race, you simply must adapt to it.”
Having watched Paris-Roubaix as a child, it comes as little shock that Ferguson marks it as a race she’d wish to win, whether or not it’s in the end, however as she settles into the lifetime of an expert athlete, she is eager to make her mark throughout the World Tour calendar and guarantee she would not relaxation on the laurels of her junior success.
Becoming a member of the World Tour ‘like a unique sport’ for double junior world champion
Ferguson’s exploits on the junior stage are nicely documented, however she says that her junior profession now appears like a earlier chapter in her story.
“It is very nice to have them and to look again on them and know what I’ve achieved and might obtain, however this class and what I’ve occurring from the long run now undoubtedly appears like a totally completely different sport.”
In her new environment at Movistar, and having moved home to Andorra through the low season, she is eager to crack on along with her improvement on the bike, however cannot ignore the truth that it has been a whirlwind interval since she got here away from Zurich with each junior girls’s street race and particular person time trial rainbow jerseys.
“It has been a really full gasoline eight months, regardless that I’ve had a number of time to relaxation. There’s been quite a lot of change in different areas of my life, like I’ve moved international locations and had tons to take care of by way of that,” Ferguson explains.
Other than lacking her household canine, a quite mischievous Hungarian Vizsla referred to as Tigger, now she’s moved to the continent, the teenager – who additionally competes on the CX course and within the velodrome – is feeling in a very good place, regardless of having signed a professional contract with Movistar sooner than most.
The transfer drew criticism from some within the sport, and Ferguson acknowledges why some could really feel like she has made the soar too quickly, however she by no means felt like she wanted to show the doubters incorrect.
“For me, it was simply much less stress that I had already signed a contract. I knew that the explanation I used to be racing to get a very good end result was simply because I am a racer and I need to get the outcomes as a result of I put the work in,” she explains.
“[It was] one thing I may use as a bonus, particularly when it got here to love a GC race or one thing, when others is perhaps searching for outcomes every stage as a result of they do not need it to look dangerous on their stats.”
Other than permitting her to keep away from the stress of racing for a professional contract final season, Ferguson admits that her resolution to hitch Movistar was an “apparent” one and one thing that she is “1000% blissful” with now.
Her race programme this season will even embrace stage races such because the Vuelta España Femenina and the Tour of Britain in a bid to develop her stage race capabilities additional.
Nevertheless it’s one other race on British roads that causes a pique of pleasure in Ferguson’s voice when talked about, particularly the 2027 Tour de France Femmes, with the UK now confirmed to be internet hosting the Grand Départ.
It is but to be confirmed the place the ladies’s Tour will go to on its first foray into the British Isles, nevertheless, the Yorkshire Submit has hinted that Leeds may kickstart the motion. Information that might be music to the ears of a proud Yorkshire native, Ferguson.
“1000%, the Tour in 2027 is someplace I need to be, and doing nicely [at]. In two extra years, that is two extra years of me getting stronger, so I might 100% love to focus on one thing there if I obtained to go.
“Hopefully, it’s really on my dwelling roads, I might love for it to be in Yorkshire, and I actually suppose they’re one of the best roads, and that is the place it needs to be, however that is simply my opinion and I am clearly a bit biased,” she provides with a chuckle.
That spectacle remains to be greater than two years down the road, with the teenager more likely to face loads of highs, lows, and classes between at times as she beds into the rollercoaster that’s the professional peloton. But, regardless of being one of many latest faces in girls’s biking, she’s already changing into a marked card.
Who’s to say that by this time subsequent 12 months, she could not go from a wildcard decide to one of many key Paris-Roubaix contenders? Lots can change within the area of 12 months; simply ask Ferguson.