Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to acknowledge Australia's greatest female track cyclist, Anna Meares, who announced her retirement from the sport recently. Anna has won the 500 metre world time trial championship on four occasions, and she is a gold medallist at both the Commonwealth and Olympic Games. At the 2015 World Championships, Anna Meares won gold in the keirin—her 11th world title in total, making her the most decorated track cyclist of all time.

Anna Meares started competitive cycling at the age of 11, driving two hours to the nearest cycling track at Mackay to train. During the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, she won a gold medal and set a new world record in the women's 500-metre time trial. Anna made a very remarkable comeback from a very serious accident at the World Cup in Los Angeles in 2008, when she broke her neck. She fractured her C2 vertebra, dislocated her right shoulder, and suffered torn ligaments and tendons and a heavily bruised right hip and skin abrasions as a result of crashing at 65 kilometres an hour on the steeply banked velodrome. But she was back on the bike in 10 days. After intensive rehabilitation, and through the points she had secured prior to the crash, she fought her way back to qualify for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, where she won silver. Of course, she was the flag-bearer and a medallist at this year's Rio Olympics. There have been many costs for Anna, both physical and emotional, in her remarkable cycling career. Anna, thank you for the memories and good luck for the future.