Ethan Mitchell

EVENT: Cycling - Track - Team Sprint, Individual Sprint

Track cyclist Ethan Mitchell, born in Auckland in 1991, was part of one of the most successful teams in New Zealand sports history.

Mitchell, Eddie Dawkins and Sam Webster compiled a fabulous record in the men’s team sprint. Before they were done, the trio had won two Commonwealth Games gold medals and a silver, an Olympic silver medal and three gold medals, two silvers and a bronze at world championships.

Mitchell had a specific role in the sprint - he developed into the world's best starter in the men's team sprint and was the only wheel 1 rider to go under the 17-second barrier at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games.

He also won a bronze medal in the individual sprint at the world championships in London in 2016, the first New Zealander to win an individual sprint medal at that level.

Mitchell signalled his emergence on the world stage when the year after leaving Sacred Heart College in Auckland he teamed with good friend Webster and Cameron Karwowski to win the team sprint gold at the 2009 world junior champs in Moscow. They beat Germany in the gold medal race.

He said a meeting with Webster at a local club night at the Manukau track when they were both still schoolboys was a pivotal moment in his cycling career. He came under the guidance of Webster’s coach, Justin Grace, and said he drew inspiration from Webster.

‘Sam was cleaning up as soon as he started riding. He was born to ride a bike. I was forever chasing his wheel,’ said Mitchell. He was best man at Webster’s wedding.

Following his world junior champs gold medal, Mitchell produced consistently world-class performances right through to his retirement shortly after the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.

At the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games, he was 10th in the individual sprint, besides winning the team silver medal.

The New Zealanders were fifth in the team sprint at the 2012 London Olympics, then won gold at the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games and silver at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics, denied in the final by a hot British combination.

At the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games, Mitchell not only helped New Zealand defend the team sprint title, but put in a solid performance to finish fifth in the individual sprint.

He maintained his enthusiasm well enough to compete in the delayed Tokyo Olympics, where he, Webster and Sam Dakin finished seventh. Mitchell placed 24th in the individual sprint.

Mitchell, Dawkins and Webster were equally outstanding in the team sprint at the world champs.

They hinted at what was to come by finishing sixth (subsequently promoted to fifth after a drugs disqualification) at Apeldoorn, the Netherlands in 2011, just missing a berth in the semis. They won bronze in Melbourne in 2012, silver in Minsk, Belarus, in 2013, gold in Cali, Colombia, in 2014, silver in Yvelines, France, in 2015, and gold at London in 2016 and Hong Kong in 2017. They were sixth at Apeldoorn in 2018. At Pruszków, Poland in 2019, they were third in qualifying but then slipped to eighth overall.

In their last world championship effort, in Berlin in 2020, the New Zealanders closed out a wonderful decade of achievement for one of New Zealand’s great, if slightly under-rated, teams with a seventh placing.

Dawkins, Mitchell and Webster were twice finalists in the Team section at the Halberg Awards.

After retiring from cycling, Mitchell became a high performance coach and sales manager at a real estate firm.