Foy and Hodges land cycling gold

It was a gold medal hard earned. Foy and Hodges had to work hard to even make the semi-finals, finishing fourth in the qualifying heats, with four to go through.

In the semi-finals, the New Zealanders beat Englishwomen Elizabeth Jordan and Sylvia Misztal 2-0, winning the second race with a powerful finishing burst.

On to the final, where Foy and Hodges faced Australians Jessica Gallagher and Jacqueline Mengler-Mohr, who'd looked strong in the earlier racing.

The Australilans snatched the first race in the best of three final on the line, winning by 0.207s. There was a crash right at the beginning of the second race when the Australians rode into the New Zealanders and sent both teams tumbling.

The judges decided there would simply be a restart with no penalty. Hodges reappeared with her knee bandaged. The second race came down to the final straight and the New Zealanders came over the top to grab victory by 0.055s.

In the decider Foy and Hodges changed tactics and sprinted hard much earlier, opening such a huge lead the Australians never had any chance of closing it.

It was a gold medal well won.

The visually impaired Foy, now 37, has had a remarkable career. She won two medals at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Paralympics and picked up more medals at world championships. In 2021 she withdrew from top sport, but she staged a remarkable comeback in 2025, where at the world champs, with Hodge as her pilot, the pair won two medals.

Hodges, 29, has her own equally stellar cycling story. She was a promising netballer until injury forced a change of sport. She soon shone as a cyclist and was chosen to ride in the Madison at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. Hodges was 11th in the Madison and was also reserve for the team pursuit and omnium events. Now she's capped her career with her exciting partnership with Foy.