Emma's Profile

Emma started cycling at eight years old with her sister, through the Towy Riders in her home country of Wales. Having been spotted by the Great Britain Cycling Team, she joined the academy programme in 2018. 2023 has been a stand-out year for Emma, winning four national titles, a world championship team sprint silver and claiming her first ever world title in the women’s sprint events at the 2023 UCI Cycling World Championships.

Emma initially rode endurance but her sprint potential was spotted by the Great Britain Cycling Team and since joining the academy programme has risen through academy ranks, winning a number of junior medals in her first couple of years on the programme.

The 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games saw a step-change for Emma as she came away with two bronze medals for her home nation, Team Wales and subsequently started working more closely with the Podium squad and coach Kaarle McCulloch.

Emma won her first elite world championships medal, a bronze, as part of the team sprint squad alongside Sophie Capewell and Lauren Bell at the 2022 UCI Track Cycling World Championships in October.

2023 kicked off with a bang when Emma took all four women’s sprint titles at the National Track Championships, followed by her first individual world cup win in the sprint, against her teammate Sophie Capewell.  The pinnacle of Emma’s career so far came in the form of her first world title at the 2023 UCI Cycling World Championships. After taking the silver medal in the team sprint and setting a world record in the event, Emma went on to set a British record in the flying 200m as well as a sea-level world record. She then beat German Lea Friedrich in a straight 2-0 final to become the youngest and third ever British female sprint world champion, behind Victoria Pendleton and Becky James.

Finucane had a fantastic start to the Olympic year, taking a hattrick of medals at the UEC Elite Track European Championships, gold in the sprint and silver in the keirin and team sprint events. This was followed up with a gold medal in the team sprint alongside Lauren Bell, Katy Marchant and Sophie Capewell at the first UCI Tissot Track Nations Cup of the season, the first time for a British team in 11 years.

Heading into her first Olympic Games, it kicked off in sensational fashion as she was part of the women’s sprint squad that won gold and became Olympic champions; the first British team ever to do this and after a British team not having qualified for a Games since 2012. The team delivered faultless rides throughout the day, breaking the world record three times to take the win over New Zealand.

Finucane continued her Olympic success with two more bronze medals in the keirin and sprint, making history by becoming the first British woman to win three medals in a single Games in 60 years.

Finucane ended the season with more success at the UCI Track World Championships in Copenhagen, starting with another team sprint win alongside Capewell and Marchant which would see them become the first women’s squad to win the Olympic and world titles in the same year.

Individually, Finucane defended her sprint title to top off an incredibly successful year.

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