Four-time Olympic medallist Jack Carlin has announced his retirement from cycling at the age of 28.
The track sprinter was part of Great Britain’s squad for 10 years, and went to the Tokyo and Paris Olympic Games, winning silver in the team sprint and bronze in the individual sprint at both.
Carlin’s decision to retire comes as he feels he’s not willing to “give that 100%” to be competitive for the current Olympic cycle to Los Angeles 2028.
Following the Paris Olympics last summer, he said in a press conference this week: “I took a bit of time away to try and find that fire and urge to go again for another four years… and the motivation never came back to really feel like I could throw myself back into it for another long period of time, to give it my all.
“Looking back at my career, you can win or lose things by thousands of a second, and if I wasn’t going to give that 100%, which I don’t feel I have to give, I don’t think it’s worth doing. I think I’d be doing myself a disservice, the people around me a disservice, and also the jersey a disservice.”
Carlin (left) won his first Olympic medal in the team sprint at the Tokyo Games alongside Jason Kenny and Ryan Owens.
(Image credit: Getty Images)
Inspired by the Commonwealth Games in his home city in 2014, the Scot joined the GB senior academy two years later, still a teenager, and has since collected four Olympic medals, six World Championships medals, six European Championships medals, and three Commonwealth Games medals, all either silver or bronze.
His final competitive appearance came in the keirin final of the Paris Olympics last August, in which he crashed and injured his hip.
“I am content and truly happy with my career. It’s been 10 years within a high performance role at [British Cycling], and I’ve achieved so much within that and I’m content with that. I thought at that point, ‘What else is there to chase, when I don’t have 100% of me…