Hello everyone, I’ve been missing for some time, I feel like now is the right time to tell my story.

I have been struggling mentally the last 5 years. It is something that for a long time I just “dealt with”. I assumed I was just lazy, I lacked motivation.

This was meant to be something short, but it’s just impossible to shrink it without feeling like I’m missing important details.

Last may I hit an all-time low. I was completely stuck. I couldn’t leave my apartment in Andorra; I could barely leave my bed. My support team at INEOS got me home and assessed professionally, where I was diagnosed with Depression.

I took a break from cycling, started medication, and was told I wasn’t expected to race again last year, but I quite quickly felt better.

I ended up returning to the Tour of Guanxi at the end of the season, everything seemed on track. I was in the best place mentally and physically that I had been in for a very long time. I had a good off season, but as soon as I came back to training those same negative perceptions and thoughts came back.

Before the teams December training camp I went into full panic mode, I could barely leave my bed. I was embarrassed that I wasn’t going to be at the camp at the level I wanted to be at. I didn’t really sleep any of these days, I didn’t train either. I break down into my own bubble, I don’t respond to anyone and leave my phone on silent. It’s like I feel that I am letting people down, and that I can’t even control my own actions.

When I’m in these states of high anxiety, the coping method I’ve always gone to is food. Obviously, as a professional athlete this is not ideal, but its uncontrollable to me. I binge eat anything that’s in front of me, and then quite often will make myself sick. Then I will feel guilty for binging, starve myself, before being completely empty and eating loads of food again. Obviously, this leads to me gaining weight, when my goal is the opposite, causing more anxiety and continuing the same vicious cycle.

I arrived at the December camp, the first week went well, and then the second week I was in bed with fever. I got back from the camp and went through the same thing as before the camp, I’m nervous for Tour Down Under, I’m undercooked and unfit. I go through Anxiety “shocks” constantly, my whole-body freezes for moments, this is from your nervous system being in “fight or flight” mode.

It’s hard to explain the affect they have on me. My anxiety is just heightened. Things which would never usually bother me, like a car passing me on a road just freeze me for a moments. It makes riding unenjoyable.

Then I had a good period in Australia, I arrive back and the same happens. I’m not where I want to be for UAE tour. The last years I’ve just never felt where I want to be, I always feel like there’s a huge mountain to climb to get the level I “should” be at. This continuous loop of no progress just ends up being very exhausting.

I spent the first half of this season really fighting this. I knew it was my “last chance”. I was doing everything, including two private altitude camps organised and funded by myself. Neither of them successful.

When I struggle mentally it has a massive effect on me physically. I barely sleep, I don’t feel recovered in my sleep, my anxiety leads to an uptake in cortisol. When I took a step back last year my Testosterone levels rose significantly, i was sleeping better, i was more sociable and i didn’t binge one, ive never lost weight so quickly. I’ve always performed well when there’s no pressure on me, and I feel calm. All my biggest performances have come that way. To make it clear, this pressure always comes from myself, an internal pressure to be the best, obsessed with perfection, which in sport is just not something realistic or achievable day in day out. Small setbacks are part of sport, but I just can’t deal with them in a good way. One bad performance or day and I panic to the point where it spirals out of control.

I reached breaking point before the Tour de Hongrie this year. The whole journey there I was repeatedly having anxiety shocks. I couldn’t concentrate on anything. At the airport I was told I didn’t need to race but I was determined. I put a poker face on, I went, and I rode ok. On return I was exhausted.

I knew I couldn’t keep going as I was, but I also knew if I stopped to take a step back then realistically my career was in jeopardy. I spent days, weeks completely stuck. In the end I’m in a similar position now then I was those few months ago.

I had another medical assessment, where it was clear that my depressive symptoms were not improving, and if anything, getting worse. That gave me some reassurance that it wasn’t just “me”.

Something like this is not something that can be changed overnight, I am going through therapy currently but it’s a process. I’ve already done some sessions with a therapist that didn’t work out, so it’s back to square one. I’m very lucky to have access to the world’s leading Psychologists through the team, so I will be working closely with them over the next period.

It’s unlikely I will race again this year. There’s still time, and I could do it, but in hindsight it wasn’t a good choice to come back last year either.

I’ve always had this thought process in my head that getting fitter and thinner made me happier, but it just covers up the real problem. As soon as I’m set back my negative thoughts come back, getting fitter is like putting a plaster over a wound that needs stitches.

At the moment my future in cycling also unclear. In this moment its unrealistic to continue as a proffesional cyclist so i will not be riding for INEOS next year. When I can get in the right place of mind there’s nothing I enjoy more. It’s like an addiction to me. That’s what makes It feel so painful that I can’t do it in this moment. I have everything I’ve ever wanted, but I’m still not happy.

Whatever happens, my cycling career is not done. Just on pause. I owe it to myself and to everyone who has worked so hard for me the last 10 years to get me to where I am.

I know if I can change my behaviours my consistency will come with, and I’ll be at a level I’ve never been able to show before. In the last 4 years I don’t think I’ve had more than a handful of periods where I’ve trained consistently for a few months. When I have it got me wins such as LBL or Giro u23, but single performances are not what make a great rider. I remember before the Wollongong WC in 2022 my agent had to come to my house to convince me to go. I was in tears. I couldn’t imagine anything worse. I was convinced I would fail; I was fat, I wasn’t good enough to perform. I had spent a week in bed, my bike was broken, and I was completely stuck. I arrived and got a bronze medal in the time trial.

I also want to add that it feels incredibly wrong for me to be writing this. I have thought it was a good idea to do so for months, I sit down to do it daily and find myself doing something else, but it’s gone on too long. At the moment I don’t leave the house, for almost anything. I’m scared. Even writing this now I can sense how stupid it really is, but that doesn’t change that it’s how I feel.

I have always worried about people’s perception of me. Now it’s at a point that it just ends up debilitating me. What if I go out and see someone I know? What if they ask where I’ve been? What if they think I’ve put weight on? What if they think I’m lazy? That’s the kind of thing that runs through my head, in every situation.

It means that I distance myself from, everyone. I’ve lost so many great friends the last years, not because we fell out, but just because I distanced myself from them when I’m struggling. People will text me to ask how I’m doing, and I just can’t respond. What am I supposed to say? At what point have I said bad or shit too many times? Will they think less of me if I’m struggling?

It is also one of the things that keeps me off the bike. I’d like to be healthier, fitter and closer to my race weight. I like riding my bike outside, love it even. But what if someone sees me and asks how im doing? See’s that I’m clearly overweight for a professional cyclist? Will they think of me as lazy and wasting the team’s time? Will they laugh at me for the way I look?

At the time I’m writing this, I’m in Paris watching my brother at the Olympics. Even that doesn’t feel right, I feel uncomfortable just being here. Seeing and being confronted by friends and family is difficult, but even more so it just feels wrong to be able to enjoy something. If I’m not even doing my job at the moment, do I even deserve to have fun?

It’s like there’s no situation that doesn’t scare me. If it wasn’t for my girlfriend, I don’t think I would have had any human contact the last 3 months. For that I will always be thankful. Even on the worst of days I can see her and forget for a bit.

I would also like to say a massive thank you, and sorry to my support team at INEOS and beyond. I can’t help but feel like I’ve let you all down, but I’m trying. I really am. My trainer Dajo, psychologists Tim and Robbie and my agent Jamie have all been behind me the last few years, but I just haven’t been able to repay that trust and belief how I’d like to.

I’m hoping writing this and making it public, will make it easier to contact my friends, see people, do normal things. I haven’t been cycling for the last months, but I haven’t been living either.

Hopefully I can update you all in the near future with something more positive. I will be back racing again at the top level of cycling, I’m just not sure when yet. But when I do, I’ll be ready.

Leo