Alex Dowsett misses out on Hour Record in Mexico - 'The biggest failure would have been to have never tried'

ByFreddie Clayton

Updated 05/11/2021 at 08:13 GMT

Alex Dowsett has raised £30,827 and counting for the Haemophilia Society despite falling just short in his UCI Hour Record attempt. Dowsett, who held the record for a month in 2015, was proud of fulfilling his ultimate goal of raising awareness of the bleeding disorder that he himself inherited.

Alex Dowsett achieved "his most important goal" of raising awareness of haemophilia despite missing out on Victor Campenaerts' UCI Hour Record.

The 33-year-old rider, who inherited the bleeding disorder, raised over £30,000 for the Haemophilia Society during his attempt at the record.

He covered 54.555km - short on the record distance of 55.089km - but was stoic in defeat and delighted to far exceed his £15,000 fundraising target.

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“The biggest failure today would have been to have never tried and that’s the message I want to send out,” said Dowsett.

“I spent my childhood being told what I couldn’t do. My mum, my dad, and I, we knew what we couldn’t do – football, rugby, boxing – so we set about finding what we could do. We turned a negative into an absolute positive and I’ve been able to carve a massive career out of adversity.

That should be the message. Life can throw you a bad hand at times but it’s what you make of it. It’s how you deal with it.

Dowsett has previously held the hour record before it was topped by Bradley Wiggins, and he also has two Giro d'Italia stage wins to his name alongside six British time trial championship titles.

And while the record remains out of reach for now, Dowsett was proud of the distance he covered and of what he achieved.

“That’s as far as I can go and I’m proud of that and the distance that I managed to cover today, but the most important point today was the awareness that we’ve brought to haemophilia,” said Dowsett.

‘They’ve finally arrived at the big time’ - Watch Dowsett make history at the Giro

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The UCI Track Champions League is coming and you can watch all of the action live on the Eurosport app, eurosport.co.uk and discovery+. Find out more about the "mind-blowing" new era for track cycling, with the first event on November 6 in Mallorca.

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