Timothy: Cycling is my job - I do it for my family

Much has changed for cyclist Richael Timothy since her Paralympic Games debut in Tokyo three years ago.

The most significant one being that she is now a mother, with her one-year-old daughter Lucy and partner Jenny likely to be her most vocal supporters in the French capital.

With Covid hanging like a dark cloud over the last Games, qualification was secured a long way out, and while the enormity of becoming a Paralympian was not taken lightly, she felt little pressure heading into the unknown.

This time around things are different. Even two months out from the Games, the 29-year-old wasn’t assured of her place.

While she had never been so fit, there was an anxiousness until her name was confirmed.

"I'm going in much better than I was before Tokyo, strength wise and cycling wise, but I think there was just a lot more pressure on actually qualifying to go than there was previously," she told RTÉ Sport.

"This year was probably [harder] in terms of stress and that, that you're training for Paris, but you're actually not even sure if you're going to be there. It was different in that sense."

She heads to Paris with a busy schedule on the bike. Her first two outings are in the velodrome – the 3000m individual pursuit and 500m time trial – followed by two days on the road in the time trial and road race.

Timothy competes in the C3 category, meaning she competes on a solo bike.

Unlike the World Championships however, athletes in C1 and C2 categories - the lower the number, the more severe the impairment – are all competing in the same events.

For example, in the short sprint event, a C1 or C2 athlete would get a percentage of their time taken off because they have a higher level of disability.

It makes competing in the time trial and 500m