Thornton Chartered Financial Planners are delighted to support junior cyclists Jess Pickavance and Sophie Smith.
Jess Pickavance, discovered her passion for cycling at seven years old when she started cycling around NSC on Tuesday nights. It wasn’t until she turned 14 that she began racing nationally, and she’s now in her final year of youth racing (U16).
With some big goals set for herself, including participating in the national series and an international stage race in the Netherlands, Jess is also preparing for her GCSEs while balancing her training and racing schedule. Mixing road, track, MTB, and gym work, she trained hard all winter and finished a block of intense training in Tenerife.
In the next few months, she will focus on securing podiums in the national series and gaining more track experience to prepare for junior racing next year. Though her ultimate goal is to race at the highest level and make a career out of cycling, Jess is currently taking small steps to get there. She’s grateful for the support of everyone involved in her journey and loves going to races with her friends.
So far this year, Sophie’s greatest achievements have been a 5th in the Youth Tour of Scotland, 4th in a stage at the Pembery national round, 3rd in a stage at the Spokes national round and a 1st at the Dolan series.
Here is an October 2022 update from Sophie:
I have recently just finished my last season as a youth cyclist for RL360 isle of man. I am now going into junior racing and looking forward to the challenges this brings. Longer races and tougher courses so i will be focusing on building up to this over the winter months. My winter training will include several disciplines including road riding, MTB and running, I am also starting to go to the gym to help with my strength. This year has been very busy and quite successful for me, I recently won the Ulster 3 day international, also taking the points jersey and team prize. Later that month I also competed in the North West Youth Tour which I came top ten in two of the races. I am really looking forward to the coming year of riding as a junior and will try my best to improve on last year’s performances.
