'The opportunities for riders outside of Europe are very slim' - 18-year-old Australian says winning the Zwift Academy will be 'life changing'

The winner of the female Zwift Academy says winning the competition to earn a place on Canyon–SRAM zondacrypto’s development squad is life-changing due to the lack of racing opportunities for young riders in her native Australia.

18-year-old Emily Dixon was crowned the winner on the show broadcast by GCN this evening, and told Cycling Weekly that she never expected to get the chance to head to Europe to pursue her goals.

"I've been thinking of that, and I still can't really put it into words,” she said when asked what it means to win. "But it's pretty fricking cool, it’s life changing. The opportunities for riders outside of Europe at the moment are very slim. I don't know if it's always been like that, but especially in Australia, the racing scene is kind of dying, and so to have the Zwift Academy as that opportunity to jump over to Europe and be financially supported as well as is massive, I can't emphasise how important that is and how lucky I am."

A relative newbie to road cycling, Dixon explained that she typically rides on Zwift more than outside due to living in a busy urban environment in Melbourne. She told CW that she had her dad to thank for getting into Zwifting after he took it up during the Covid lockdowns in Australia when the global pandemic was at its worst points.

"I've always been active and quite sporty, but during the pandemic, Melbourne got hit quite hard with a lot of lockdowns, so all my favourite sports, including netball and stuff that I used to just do for socialising got cancelled. So I missed out on that for a lot of time, and then I kind of just wanted something to do in lockdown.

"My dad actually got into Zwifting, and I wanted to join in. And so it was good, because we weren't allowed to leave our house any more than a 5k radius, so it was pretty bad for riding outside. Zwift was a good tool for being able to get my energy out somehow, because I can't sit still, so I just wanted to have an outlet and to feel like I was able to do something physically."

Now with the opportunity of turning professional ahead of her, Dixon said that she took on board plenty of guidance, tips and advice that the likes of Zoe Bäckstedt shared during the Zwift Academy competition process, and explained that she will now look to put that into practice.

"I learned that I feel like you can always push yourself a little bit more. I feel like that’s something I've always thought about, but then this proved you can always do a little bit more," she said. "You can always dig deeper and push yourself that bit harder when there’s the motivation of winning a contract, you can always find that 2% more watts."

She added: "I also learned this week how important it is to believe in yourself, and not compare yourself to others. You can’t sit there thinking, 'oh, she can produce more watts than me, or I don’t know how I stack up against the others,' as if you start questioning yourself too much then it can really get into your mind and how you’re thinking about it all.

"I think it goes to show how you have to be mentally really switched on in this sport, and also ready to take in feedback from the coaches, always. I also learned how valuable asking questions can be. You should never be afraid to ask questions because ultimately that's how you learn to get better."