How to be a pro cyclist: Yana Belomoina’s career story

A stellar 2017 season saw the rider from the Ukrainian city of Lutsk win three World Cup races in Albstadt, Vallnord and Mont-Sainte-Anne, ending up as the overall winner of women’s cross-country World Cup that season. That same year she also became European Champion.

Belomoina got into mountain biking through simply wanting to play sport and be active, and had some friends who wanted to do exactly the same things. Biking and mountain biking wasn’t her immediate first choice, however, and she only started riding a bike in a sporting sense at 11 years old.

Belomoina showed some aptitude for the sport, and she’s grateful for the influence that her first couple of coaches had on her. They chose the right approach to guiding her, which included the right amount of motivation and making sure training wasn’t too exhausting.

“The first times I started to get on the podium, the emotions affected me,” she says. “I began to realise that I had found the right sport.”

As a teenager, Belomoina raced across various cycling disciplines, including mountain biking. In part this was due to an effort from her coaches to make sure Belomoina could develop different skills, but ultimately, mountain biking was always her preference.

As a junior Belomoina was dominating the domestic circuit, and this saw her being picked by the Ukraine national coaches who started sending her abroad to compete.

As mentioned, success at Elite level was immediate when Belomoina moved out of U23 racing. In the 2015 World Championships, Belomoina came third. The following year, she steadily improved her performances at the World Cup. Her seventh place at Vallnord was a sign of things to come.

Being away from home to race and training away from where you were born and grew up is never easy for any bike athlete. It’s something Belomoina had to do at a young age and now has a regular routine when it comes to planning out the year.

Belomoina bases herself in Slovenia during the summer months, where she can train on plenty of off-road terrain. Slovenia’s location in the middle of Europe also means she can reach many cross-country races in a matter of hours.

“This is not my home, but I feel at home,” says Belomoina. “It’s easier for me, because I’m always with my husband [Maksym, her mechanic and coach]. The two of us have been together for many years. We have adapted to this rhythm.”

“I will not say that it is in my favour, because I go uphill a lot, and I loved when the trails were more powerful, with long steep climbs. We had to adapt and change the training to be faster and add equipment on the descents.”

After that successful 2017 season, Belomoina suffered several injuries, including a broken hip. The recovery periods haven’t been easy and she admits some mental health struggles.

Belomoina now says she’s back to 90 percent of where she was in 2017, though there are still many psychological issues that need to be worked.

Belomoina still has specific goals and retirement is definitely not on the cards.

“Sometimes I joke that I will not retire until I achieve my goals,” she says. “I don’t have a gold medal from the World Championships. There are four medals [across Junior, U23 and Elite racing], but not gold.