British Olympic cyclist Katie Archibald literally got a bad break ― all for simply walking around at home.
Archibald, 30, announced on Instagram Thursday that she broke her leg tripping over a step in her garden. She also dislocated her ankle and tore ligaments “off the bone.”
“What the heck,” she wrote.
Indeed. Archibald suddenly won’t be competing in Paris.
“A hundred apologies for what this means for the Olympic team, which I’ve been told won’t involve me,” she wrote. “I’m still processing that bit of news, but thought I better confirm it publicly instead of leaving it to the grapevine (trip hazard and all that).”
The track-cycling star shared a rueful selfie from her hospital bed and a snap of her cast on her lower left leg.
She had surgery to pin the bones back together and reattach the ligaments, and reported that it took some doing to realign her ankle as well.
“Ciao for now,” she said.
British Cycling on Thursday cited “the cruel manner in which she has been denied the chance” to compete in the Games.
Archibald can at least take solace in her previous two Olympic gold medals ― 2016 in Rio in the team pursuit and 2021 in Tokyo in the women’s Madison.
She also has company when it comes to pre-Games bad luck. French swimmer Rafael Fente-Damers had just qualified in a race for his home country’s Games this week when he punched the pool water in celebration. He dislocated his shoulder in the process.
Here’s Archibald, left, in all her Olympic glory, celebrating her 2021 gold medal with Laura Kenny at the Tokyo Games.
