Best 9 quotes of Victoria Pendleton on MyQuotes

I don't think I really knew how fit I was when I was a kid. I rode with my dad quite long distances and I've been racing since the age of nine, so we did a lot of sport growing up. My earliest memories of my dad are watching him race, so it was inevitable when we were old enough that my brother and I would get on bikes.

I like to eat healthily anyway and I think I've become more disciplined now I've retired - because I'm such a creature of habit, I don't find it hard to do. I quite enjoy the challenge.

In competition, everything is very well planned in advance and very well detailed. You just stick to the plan, keep your head down and be as disciplined as possible in every aspect, whether sleep, recovery or the intensity of your training. And it's all recorded; the data is analysed.

I really love routine and so I've never found it a problem. I really enjoy it. I don't mind somebody organising what I have to do. I'm a creature of habit in some ways.

It really is all about believing in yourself: 80 per cent mental, 20 per cent physical.

It's a risky business being a cyclist in the UK, there are a lot of people who really dislike us. It's the Jeremy Clarkson influence - we're hated on the roads. We just hope people realise we are just flesh and bones on two wheels.

Succeeding in sport is about how much practise you put in.

When you see your male counterparts living a completely different lifestyle, I think it would be quite depressing! So no, it's not for me.

Steve [sports psychiatrist] had already taught me to try and stop worrying so much about pleasing everyone. We knew that this was one of my most draining flaws and he again used three groups to clarify my thinking. There would always be some people, Steve said, who would care about me and love me. In contrast there would also be a select group of people who would never warm to me - no matter what I did. And in the middle came the overwhelming mass who were largely indifferent to any of my failures or triumphs. I needed to understand that most people didn't really care what I did or said. All my anguish about how they might perceive me was redundant. Steve helped me realize that I spent too much time trying to please those oblivious people in the middle or, more problematically, the small group who would never change their critical opinion of me. I should concentrate on the people who really did show concern for me.